Dearborn is a frightful example of the rich beginning to infest the East Side in the Rocky Mountain Front

The eyesore on the highest point above Falls Creek in the Dearborn area.

Extensive fencing on the once accessible Diamond Bar X Ranch 

I get the message

Steamboat Mountain in the Scapegoat Wilderness is a development magnet

 I guess I should have been able to see this coming.

The invasion of rich people with their luxurious second (third, fourth) homes in the mountains of the East Side of the Continental Divide in Montana, following this noxious trend on the West Side (i.e., Kalispell, Missoula).  No, I'm not forgetting that Bozeman is on the East Side, but I'm concentrating on the Rocky Mountain Front here. 

I had hoped our high winds and long, frigid winters and bad, unpaved roads would keep these folks out.

On a beautiful late Fall day I set out for a hike on my beloved Rocky Mountain Front, and chose the Dearborn River country near the prominent Steamboat Mountain.

I had planned to hike to the Devil's Glen up the Dearborn, but opted against it when I encountered the new development on the way to the trailhead.  

There were the new fences, the new houses, the new driveways, the new  "No Trespass" postings, the multiple cars.

To reach the trailhead you have drive through the Montana Wilderness School of the Bible uber-development, that now boasts 76 students.  I spied a basketball court and new buildings.  A tennis court with basketball hoops on the edge of the wilderness?

There's a gate at the trailhead and signs that warn hikers to stay on the trail that parallels a road to more  cabins.  You're warned to stay on the slim trail that eventually leads to a bridge over the Dearborn and the Devil's Glen and Scapegoat Wilderness Area.

I was so put off by the school/cabins that I turned around and decided to go back to the newly developed Falls Creek Trailhead as an escape.

It proved to be the escape I was seeking, although the view sight was fouled by the cabins across the creek, perched high on the hillsides not far from the biggest waterfall.

 I had the trail all to myself while enjoying the big falls and the lesser falls a mile away on a gorgeous, blue-sky, warm day without wind.

Driving out I passed the extensive fencing and postings at the Diamond Bar X, once a ranch that was once open to the public as a restaurant, and if I remember, cabins you could rent.

I fervently hope that the Dearborn over-development isn't the beginning of the end of an untrammeled and lightly developed Rocky Mountain Front. 

Oh, and in the past there has been a murder in this area over the  "private property rights" selfishness.  

Lovely Falls Creek

Paine Gulch in Little Belts

Every time I hike Paine Gulch in the Little Belts I appreciate it a little bit more.

This small, Monarch-area gem is in a tight canyon where walls of limestone rise abruptly on both sides.  Chuck Jennings and I had a wonderful late Fall hike just to get some exercise.