But pictures are the next best thing, so those will serve the purpose of beginning to try to share my experience...
Without further ado, I bring you the Glacier portion of the trip. I'll try to do more of a narrative this time around instead of just picture captions. (In case you missed the first post from this vacation/camping series, you can read/see about the Grand Teton portion of the trip HERE.)
To get from the Grand Teton National Park to Glacier National Park, the most direct route is traveling north through Yellowstone National Park. Seeing as we had purchased a National Parks pass, that was no problem, except there was a bit of traffic. It was to the wire to see if we'd catch a glimpse of Old Faithful, but we ended up missing it by about 5 or so minutes. Considering there were SO many people there (it was a tourism nightmare - imagine Disney World in terms of crowds, cars, etc.), we decided to head out instead of waiting another hour and a half for the next time it would go off.
 |
| <3 Park Rangers |
After a drive through and stop in Yellowstone, we took a quick (if you can call an hour or so drive "quick") detour into Idaho, where we stopped for lunch. NEW STATE! (Sadly, it was the only new state of the trip; though, we did visit two Canadian provinces new to both of us...but that's for another post at another time...) There wasn't much to take a picture of, but I did find a giant stuffed potato, so I figured that would suffice in terms of evidence.
We spent that night in Helena, Montana - a hotel bed to myself and a real shower never felt so good! In hindsight, I'm really glad we broke up the camping in between the Tetons and Glacier, as I can only take sleeping directly on the hard ground so many days in a row...
After our time in Helena, we hit the road in order to get to Glacier in time to claim a coveted camp site. We entered on the eastern side (after a scenic but bumpy drive), where we found the St. Mary's campground was full. We tried the next site about five miles up the road, and we met with success. Rising Sun it would be! It turned out to be a great spot - there was a restaurant, a visitor store/center, and a shower facility (where you could buy tokens to use them).
Here's a view from the restaurant:
(I think we ended up eating there about 4 or 5 times...we didn't cook our own food.)
As soon as we put up the tent (which we got more efficient at doing throughout the trip!), we were off to see what we could see... It turns out you could see a lot; however, the "Going to the Sun" Road was closed at Logan Pass, so we could only drive so far west before being turned around by a traffic cop.
After rain (and lightning) threatened and then ended our afternoon hike, we ate dinner and then found some places to view sunset. And at night, the moon came out, the clouds finally cleared, and we could see stars! It was absolutely breathtaking.
(Here's a picture of our two-(wo)man tent) -->
When you're camping in a national park, it seems essential (at least to us) to see sunrise, so we found a spot we could pull off the road a mile or so away from our campsite. You just can't beat these views...
Breakfast came next - we decided it was important to fuel up before our 6 mile round-trip ranger-led hike to three waterfalls, which we would be joining at 8:30. We got to the trail head a little early, so we waited in the car - it was cold! When other hikers started arriving, we got out so we could get acquainted and prepare for the hike. A man and his wife came up to me when I was tying my shoes. He said, "I know you. You're the Glacier expert. I heard you speak last night." I must have given them an extremely quizzical look because his wife assured him that I was someone different. "You're not a ranger out of uniform?" he asked. Nope. Apparently I look just like the ranger. (I get mistaken for other people a lot - must be the long brown hair and...?)
Our first stop on the hike (led by Ranger Dori) was a spot where a chalet originally stood. The view was beautiful.
We kept hiking, stopping at three waterfalls along the way (the last one being where we turned around to head back). Our ranger guide filled us in on the wildlife and vegetation, trees, etc. we saw along the way. And, she also told us why the lake appeared teal/aqua - apparently it's from the minerals that get rubbed off when the glaciers slide against one another. The photos don't really do the water color justice...
Here's a picture of me and my friend by one of the falls -->
And here's me by the top fall -->
During the hike, we got to know the man and woman who originally mistook me for the ranger. He's a retired pharmacist and she's a professor/dean in Texas at a college that trains teachers. They were absolutely delightful, and they invited us to dinner later that evening. They were at our same campsite (just up closer to the entrance in their camper), so that worked out well. (I think that encounter/evening deserves its own post, though, so I won't go into detail about that here.)
For our last full day in Glacier, we decided to treat ourselves to a horseback ride. The only problem was that the first place we tried wouldn't have an open ride till 10. Seeing as we wanted to get to the other side of the park (which was no easy task) for the day, we declined, hoping we could get a horse ride over there. We headed back toward our campsite (8+ miles driving south around the outside the park) to see if the Going to the Sun Road was open (rumors were flying among rangers, park staff, and fellow campers the previous night that it was set to open on Saturday) - if it was, it would make our trip much easier, seeing as we could drive west across the park instead of going south outside the park and around the outside (1-1.5 hours versus 2.5-3 hours)...and, to our elation and surprise, it was!
The drive while shorter was INCREDIBLY foggy. I could see about 10-15 feet in front of me. So, it wasn't the most scenic drive (and it probably wasn't the safest drive), but we did it! Sadly, the next place we tried for horses (at Lake McDonald) was full up till Monday, but they called over to Apgar to see if they were open. They were! We just had to get there by 10.
(On a side note, when we told the wrangler at Lake McDonald that we had gotten there by way of the Going to the Sun Road, she was surprised it had opened so early, and she yelled out to the other wranglers fixing up the horses that she had been way off. I asked if they made bets about when the road would open each year, and she said that they all put money into a pool and picked dates. How fun! I wonder who won because no one expected the road to open before July, let alone as early as June 22!)
My horse's name was Winchester...and he liked to ride in the back...and eat the grass...
I hadn't been horseback riding since I was a kid, so it was pretty great. We didn't go faster than a walk, but it was a neat way to see some other parts of the park.
After the horseback ride, we headed back to Lake McDonald for lunch at the lodge, which we were told was a must. The wait was long, but it was worth it. While we waited, I bought more postcards, and we went out back for a glimpse at the lake. (Too bad it was overcast.)
 |
| inside the lodge looking up from our chairs |
Originally we had planned to stay on the west side of the park through sunset, but seeing as it was starting to rain harder and it was extremely cloudy, we decided to head back the other way on the Going to the Sun Road. While not as foggy as the ride westward that morning, some fog still remained. Though, we were able to pull over at a lookout spot to see some bighorn sheep -->
Our trip to Glacier, though it was plagued with rain and fog from time to time, was probably my favorite part of the whole road trip. I could have easily spent a week there and not seen/hiked it all!
Now, to finally wrap up this post, here are just a few other random photos highlighting the trip:
 |
| the restaurant next to our campsite where we ate most of our meals |
 |
| me and my ice cream - such a happy time! :) |
 |
| I have a very real (and somewhat irrational) fear of bears, so this photo was just for fun. But through this road trip I was able to face my fear head on. I'm convinced I'll be better off because of it - meetings with angry parents or coworkers can't possibly be as scary as this... |
Next stop...Banff!
No comments:
Post a Comment