Loving the place to death

All North Fork issues and concerns have a common cause. Whether it is the road, grizzly bears, wolves, zoning or the Inside Road the problem is the same and we cannot get a handle on it. It is simple — too many people.

Land Use Planning addressed it somewhat by establishing 20 acres minimum lot sizes; Glacier Park has now established “ticket entry” to the west side of the park at Apgar and Polebridge. Both are stop gap measures that will fail to solve the problem in the long term.

When I was a teenager I rode horseback all over the northwest corner of the park. Trails to Kishenehn to Kintla Lake, to Goat Haunt and back to Bowman Lake. Boulder Pass was a favorite camp spot. No permits were needed and it was not necessary to let Park officials know when we entered or left Glacier. We just saddled up, forded the river and went wherever we wanted. Even more amazing in today’s world we seldom, if ever, saw other people. The only exception was the campgrounds at Kintla Lake, Bowman Lake, Goat Haunt and Many Glacier. Even there, there were always available campsites, and even areas where horses could be kept.

The best of Glacier was being able to camp anywhere, build a campfire and really enjoy being out in the wild.

At that time there were over 1,000 miles of maintained trails in the Park. I’m told that today there are only about 700.

Today, you need to pay for a backcountry permit, camp in only designated spots and in many places campfires are forbidden.

I no longer hike and seldom go camping, but I cannot imagine camping without a campfire or in a spot surrounded by tin tepees with generators and TVs.

I will not buy a ticket to reserve entry to Glacier so I will contribute to less traffic in the Park and maybe that means I will not drive the Inside Road again. Too bad, but I do have memories that cannot be duplicated by folks today.

It is the same on the North Fork. I used to have only one neighbor, Bart Monahan, on my lane. Now there are a dozen and the 160 acres west of me – once owned by a timber company, now has five houses, each of them worth several hundred thousand dollars. My cabin cost much less even though I have added water, electricity and TV since it was built 60 years ago.

I guess there is no answer short of a major pandemic. Maybe stop plowing or grading the road. I don’t think that would do it. What do you think?