Michael McCoy was born in Wyoming amidst the cowboys and sagebrush, grew up in Iowa with its vast fields of soybeans and corn, and graduated with a degree in anthropology. Archaeological research led him to Wyoming, Montana, and Mexico; then a cross-country bicycle trip led him to work in Montana for Bikecentennial (later renamed Adventure Cycling Association). He plotted Adventure Cycling's Great Divide Mountain Bike Route, a a 2,700-mile off-pavement bikepacking route that follows the Continental Divide from Banff, Alberta, to Antelope Wells, New Mexico. It's the longest mapped mountain bike route on the planet. Mike has explored more than a million miles in the Northern Rockies, publishing a guidebook href="http://emptybyways.com/rockies-road-trips_260.html">again and again. He lives with his wife Nancy and American field spaniel "Fast Eddie" McCoy near the western foot of the Teton Range.
Some of the best of the Greater Yellowstone Ecosystem lies beyond the borders of the national park that lends the region its name. This itinerary explores a portion of the country to the park’s west and northwest. Beginning in Ashton, Idaho, put rubber to the road on the Mesa Falls Scenic Byway, a smooth ribbon of low-traffic blacktop meandering through Caribou-Targhee National Forest lands. It takes you past...
Get out of the car and start the real exploring.
Bicycle. It’s faster than walking but slow enough that things don’t go by in a blur. One sees, hears, smells, and feels more aboard a bicycle than in a car.
I was hiking in southeast Idaho’s Big Hole Range when a pair of mule deer burst out of the woods running straight at me. I soon learned why: A mountain lion was on their tail. On seeing me, the cougar did a 180 and ran back into the woods; I performed my own 180 and ran the other way.
Alone. I drive companions crazy because I’m always stopping to take a photo, inspect things, or write something down.