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HIKE IT nature calls) and always, always have easy
access to bear spray. To emphasize his
point, Allen pointed: wolf and grizzly
Family owned Sunlight Sports, based in
downtown Cody for more than half a cen- tracks, just a few feet uptrail.
tury, is recognized as one of the best pri- With those images imprinted in our
vately owned outdoor retailers in the minds (and awareness there’s no cell ser-
country. The store teamed with locals to vice in the park), the 12 of us cityslicker
produce a 200-page hiking guide to the re- hikers set out, bookended by our bear-
gion – and Sunlight staff includes a stellar spray-armed sentries.
crew of hiking guides. We started at 6,000 feet elevation,
I signed on for an easy half-day group trekking single file up a narrow trail that
hike in the Shosone National Forest. This stretched across a wide grassy meadow
untamed wilderness, just west of Cody, was dusted with yellow clusters of wild arnica
designated the first National Forest in the flowers. A smattering of lodgepole pines
United States in 1891. became a forest as our trail edged gradu-
Guides Wes Allen and Meredith Zajac ally higher, hugging Clocktower Creek. At
started with a safety lecture: Never hike one point, a fat lodgepole had fallen,
alone (or wander from the group, even if blocking our path; we scrabbled up one
190 WINE DINE & TRAVEL MAGAZINE FALL 2024
