Meet your backpacking guides!
We want to create a friendly, inviting atmosphere for our clients so we’d like to share a bit about ourselves!
Yve Bardwell
Yve grew up in Montana where spending time in the outdoors was a big part of spending time with her family. This practice became a passion once she left home and began discovering nature for herself. It has helped inform much of her life.
She received a degree in hydrology from the University of Montana and has had the opportunity to center the majority of her work around field science. This has included such things as doing rangeland inventories for the Farm Service Agency, to tracking wolves in the Italian Alps, surveying for lahontan cutthroat in the High Sierras, to guiding river trips on the White Cliffs of the Missouri. She met her husband while working in the Bob Marshall Wilderness and he has been responsible for teaching her the ways of the horse and using them as a means of backcountry travel and a way of life at their home in Choteau.
She has been fortunate to follow her dreams as closely as she knows how. She looks forward to continuing to explore our big backyard and this beautiful state as well as learning from the people, the places, the flora, and the fauna.
Maggie Carr
Maggie grew up along the Rocky Mountain Front. Hiking, riding, and exploring the Bob Marshall Wilderness has been an integral part of her life since an early age. She left Montana to participate in an AmeriCorps program in Washington D.C., but soon realized that Montana was where she belonged. Upon completing her degree in Rangeland Management at Montana State University, she moved back to her hometown of Choteau.
In recent years, Maggie has worked for the United States Forest Service in the Bob Marshall Wilderness, as a wrangler for a guest ranch along the Rocky Mountain Front, and at the local ski hill, Teton Pass Ski Area. These jobs have influenced her desire to share these magnificent places with others and to continue working in the great outdoors. In her free time, Maggie likes to play with her dog, work with her horses, read, ski and laugh at good (or bad) jokes. She has also spent a bit of time working in the sheep industry both in Montana and New Zealand.
Bill and Polly Cunningham
Bill and Polly are our mentors who own High Country Adventures. Bill Cunningham has been involved with High Country Adventures for over 30 years, and has been a partner for over 20. Bill’s wife Polly became a partner in 2005.
Bill has a long history of environmental involvement as a staffer with The Wilderness Society, Montana Wilderness Association, and American Wildlands. He too has backpacked in Europe, New Zealand, Canada, Alaska, and throughout the West. He teaches wilderness courses through the University of Montana, has written several wilderness guidebooks, and writes a Wild Country column for Montana Magazine.
Polly Cunningham has been assisting on the trips in addition to designing menus and planning logistics for the past 10 years. She and Bill have co-authored several hiking guidebooks. Bill and Polly live in Choteau, MT, where they enjoy this wild country year-round.
Becca Hanna RYT, CYT
Becca Hanna is the primary instructor at Yin Yang Yoga in Choteau, Montana. She began practicing yoga in the early 1990s, but her practice was intermittent until 2009 when she began to teach. Shortly thereafter she recognized this to be her true calling, and now calls herself a “retired” paleontologist. She became a certified yoga teacher in April 2010 after successfully completing 280 hours of instructor training with Nancy Ruby’s YogaMotion, and is registered with Yoga Alliance.
Becca has firsthand experience with the healing benefits of yoga, as it played a central role in her recovery from severe depression, cancer, and addictive patterns. She is thrilled to share the methods of movement, techniques for breathing, means of relaxation, and ways of being that are part of this ancient practice. Becca recognizes that the practice of Yoga is not “one-size-fits-all,” and strives to make it accessible to people of all ages and abilities. Contact Becca at [email protected].
