Wilderness, Photography & History – Montana Mountain
For many people, the wilderness is therapeutic. For others, photography works the same way. On Wednesday (September 6th), I guided professional photographers Robin Armour (from Yukon Tourism) and Patrick Close (the current artist-in-residence at the Ted Harrison Artist Retreat at Crag Lake) up Montana Mountain for a day of photography and exploring history in the wilderness, getting the best of both (or is that all 3?).
The fall colours were spectacular, and despite rather poor weather that gave us lots of cloud, some rain and even a few flakes of snow, it was a wonderful day. Like many locals, Robin had been up to what is normally called “the stone house” but hadn’t explored beyond that. Patrick is from Saskatoon and the country was all new to him. We were all shooting digital, but Patrick also brought his 5×7 view camera – it was interesting to watch him set up and shoot with it.
It’s hard to imagine how many days I’ve spent on Montana Mountain since I first hiked up from the Carcross Visitor Centre (in 1990) to what I later learned was the first of 3 stone houses – hundreds for sure, with a few nights added in. Every time is a joy, though – the beauty is astounding, the history fascinating, the wildlife encounters sometimes thrilling (grizzly, caribou, Dall sheep, mountain goats – though we saw only 2 goats at a great distance this day).
I’ve spent much less time on the mountain in recent years. Three years ago, I lost an amazing husky on the mountain, probably to wolves. The following year, Jeep tours from Skagway started using the bottom of the mountain quite heavily, and they’ve pounded the road into bone-shaking corrugations. Luckily they don’t go anywhere near the good parts of the mountain (Frontier Excursions goes just past tree-line, much better than the Jeeps but still missing the good stuff). Over this coming winter, though, I want to get my 1996 book about the mountain re-written/updated and back in print, so I need to get back to spending lots of time up there (want to, not just need to). Wednesday’s trip was a good start to getting my head back into that space.
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