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What is important to know about the Thorofare is that it is timeless. Know that you as a person do not change the place, but the Thorofare is a place that changes you. The change is never passing. The change is forever.

I can relate the highlights of one of my most recent experiences that proved this fact. In August 2003, I was able to shed the demands of front country wildlife and fishery protection to venture into the place where God is oft times the only guardian. God defined the Thorofare long ago, and, since that time, man has been trying to understand Hisdefinition. It is the same for each person who visits the place—no matter the length or the brevity of the visit. One constant of the Thorofare is that it is a place in which man's exposure is brief. That may be the secret of the place's security.

Jason Burckhardt, Cody fisheries biologist, and Daniel Garr, a seasonal fisheries temporary of the highest caliber, accompanied me on this trip. The three of us traveled and worked together for a ten-day expedition. The focus of the trip was to continue to define the Yellowstone cutthroat trout population that, in this modern era, seems to be negatively affected by a multitude of factors. Understanding these factors and the seriousness of the resulting changes would be the desired result of our efforts.

Our trip in was eventful as is every trip into the Thorofare. Just logging a mile in this extraordinary country is an event. We ascended Deer Creek Pass and reached Hidden Creek on the Thorofare on the first day despite a late start. There, we setup camp at the confluence of the creek and the Thorofare River and kept a close eye out for the grizzly bear I encountered the last time I camped at this location. With camp set, we would get an early start into the tributary in the morning. A full day of scientific investigation was our goal, and the day went as planned. To be tucked into this rivulet for a day with an accomplished fisheries scientist was an awakening for a terrestrial wildlife manager/game warden. The technology of modern fishery investigation made our work pleasant. The brilliant blue sky, the majesty of the peaks, the remote country, and the warmth of mid-summer sun defined a perfect work environment. When we descended Hidden Creek Trail that evening, we had completed our work and were satisfied that another sub-population of Yellowstone cutthroat trout was secure in its pristine Thorofare habitat.

The next day we placed additional temperature recording devices on the tributaries and sampled the areas for evidence of the transitory adult fish population. These clean waters only have a thin dilution of available nutrients, so for thousands of years of evolution, the adult fish have visited to spawn but then abandon their progeny and flee to a lower nutrient-rich habitat to increase their chances of survival. I think they, too, may know about the grizzly. One-inch fry and three-inch yearlings were widespread in evidence—the adults having rushed away leaving this new life in their wake. So went our day. And, as the evening approached, we had worked our way to the Thorofare Cabin.

To our good fortune, when we reached the cabin,, Tim Fagan was still there and was bidding farewell to the Park Service crew who from the Park's Thorofare cabin. They had stopped in for an evening visit. Tim, being the gracious host that he always is, encouraged the departing guests to fill their pockets with the cookies he had baked and, also, to freshen their canteens before departing. Tim helped us put our horses and mules out to pasture, and we retired to spend a pleasant evening with our Thorofare host. This, by the way, was the first time the two Cody wardens had overlapped their patrol times in the same place in eleven years.

In the morning, Tim headed for Deer Creek, and the remaining three of us headed for the Yellowstone River in Yellowstone National Park to continue our fisheries research. We completed our investigations with just enough time to reach the cabin at dusk. We found the amenities of the cabin and its facilities a site for sore eyes, feet, and saddle-weary butts. Knowing how fleetng the seasons can be in these high mountain valleys, the long summer days are never long enough for researchers immersed in their investigations.

As the sun set, the full moon was on the rise, and we could tell that the short showers of thunderstorms were going to bed for the night. As the clouds dissolved, the night would be crystal clear. After dinner, the light had faded, but the fullness of the moon was upon the Thorofare, and its natural light highlighted every silhouette as far as the eye could see. In the absence of Tim's gracious company, I was left to relate the history and experiences I knew from the past about the Thorofare. Just before bed the conversation drifted to the Thorofare's recently reestablished wolves.

The rising moon kindled our curiosity about where the wolves might be on a night picture-perfect for their imagined presence. I recounted the survey methods and efforts of Park personnel to document the presence about wolves. In doing so, I mentioned that sometimes a curious person could elicit a wolf to reveal its presence by simulating howling. Howl at the moon? This was not something I had experimented with —but something I understood worked. I explained that, on a previous trip here, I discovered by the evidence of wolf tracks in a one-inch fresh snow that a lone wolf had visited my hobbled horses the previous night.

To allay the skepticism of my audience, as the three of us stood in the meadow, west of the cabin, I found myself mimicking wolf howls to assure my potential skeptics that this was standard sampling technique. Of course, with the few wolves reestablished in the Thorofare at this time and the hundreds of thousands of acres in their home range, not a whisper of a wolf was heard. Both members of my captive audience had joined in to fill the mystery of the night with ancient sound. Three fools howling at the moon in the Thorofare on this moonlit night was the kind of moment that fills the memories of many a person who's had too much to drink. But our only intoxication was the long hours of work and the magic of this one place and time.

At the conclusion of our caterwauling, we sauntered off to our waiting bedrolls in the cabin. The warmth of the summer days enveloped the night, and, to maximize our comfort, we opened the wooden doors and bedded down with only unlatched screen doors to deflect any curious bear. Not to worry, though, as we were much too tired to care about such imagined visitors. Jason uttered one more comment about the extraordinary brightness of the full moon, and the cabin then was filled with the heavy breathing of slumber as we drank in the rain-purified air of the night. I, too, drifted to that parallel world and slept deeply.

Suddenly, we were jolted upright in our sleeping bags by the low moan of layer upon layer of howling wolves. Outside our refuge, to the west and seventy-five feet away from our door, an ancient chorus filled the valley from Yellowstone Point to the Trident. As we crept to the front door, the cobalt blue of the night sky and the neon light of the overhead full moon spotlighted six wolves. Besides the wolves that were clearly visible just beyond the buck-n-pole fence, more shadowy figures indicated the whole Thorofare pack had kept their appointment with our destiny, thrilling us to our very core. The echoes of the howls continued for fifteen minutes or longer, and the wolves were in no hurry to take their leave. Awestruck by the performance, we were now riveted where we stood as the wolves slowly departed to continue their investigations. For the next thirty minutes the pack periodically revealed their location by additional howling on their northward march.

We knew we were the first men in the era of written history and perhaps the first men ever to have this experience in this “place called the Thorofare.” Was it possible that our beckoning call actually summoned these wolves to our location? It couldn't have been as it had been hours since we had tried to detect their presence. We couldn't have scripted this scenario any better than it actually happened. And, if we had scripted this, who would have believed it was possible? This experience is part of each of the souls of the men who experienced it and part of intrigue of the Thorofare.

The next morning, we again rode north and followed the pack's tracks for a half dozen miles, mesmerized by the reality that last night's incantations were not imagined but were part of the luxurious richness that biological diversity promises. Wilderness is truly a luxury—one I hope this country will always choose to afford.

Craig Sax
North Cody Game Warden 1992–Present