Glacier National Park

The idea for this trip came about last summer, when we all decided that we really wanted to visit some of those national parks... actually most of the national parks. So we dreamed for a long time, and ended up with a 5 week plan for this summer. This summer seemed as good a time as any, since Emily and Lauren both just graduated, and who knows when they'll get a free summer again? Our original itinerary had us gone for several months, and that clearly wouldn't work. So we hemmed and hawed and ended up with 14 destinations on the Western half of the United States. Glacier was our first stop.

After spending the night at our uncle Craig's house in Albion, we drove to Glacier National Park, in Montana. We camped at Fish Creek, which turned out to be right on Lake McDonald, and I think we had the best site in the whole campground, with a beautiful view of the lake. More importantly, the moon rose right above our site, and reflected on the lake. We spent our first day sleeping in (of course!) and then visited the visitor's center and got our barings. The Going-to-the-Sun road just opened, while we were at the center. We did a short hike along Lake McDonald, which also runs along the line of the Robert's Fire that happened in 2003. Everything to the right was green and thick, and everything to the left was dead and brown. Green ferns have filled in over the last 7 years, but its still very obvious that there was a fire. We learned in one of the evening programs at the campground that in that fire 14% of the park was burned in that fire. Wow.

The Going-to-the-Sun Highway runs through the middle of the park, west to east. It only just opened because crews were still working to clear away the snow! Even this early in the season there was a fair amount of traffic, but it was worth it because every view was simply stunning! We hiked up to Avalanche Lake, where three waterfalls lead into a glacial lake. We spent a wonderful day following the road through the park, past lots of indescribably beautiful views. I've never seen such huge cliffs with sweeping views of forest, rock, and snow.

On our last day in the park we drove the Going-to-the-Sun road again to get to the other side of the park, where the entrance to Many Glacier is. Many Glacier is another different landscape, different trees and more flatland, but still gorgeous views of the surrounding mountains. We did a nature trail that looped around Swiftcurrent Lake, near Many Glacier Lodge. Again, beautiful. I was reminded of the movie Man's Favorite Sport, and many jokes were made. With the number of movie references being made on this trip, we are clearly Whitney sisters.

Then we drove outside of the park, down through East Glacier, and along the southern tip of Glacier. In East Glacier we found a bakery with huge chai cupcakes, that I think had about 2 inches of cream cheese frosting. Yum! We also saw the world's largest purple spoon (we're on a road trip, we have to see something goofy, right?!), and visited the wooden spoon shop next door. Lots of beautifully carved spoons (we bought a lovely little salsa spoon) and wait for it... wands. Which we did not buy.

The best part of the day came when we stopped at Goatlick, outside of Walton, Montanna. Apparently moutain goats like the salt naturally found in these cliffs, and they come in late spring and early summer to eat it. We spent a while watching the goats that were hanging out under the the bridge. If you look close, there are about 10 goats in this picture. Dad, your binoculars have come in handy! After observing for a while, we decided they are a lot like dogs, in the way they act. We also got to see a mother goat be territorial, and butt heads with another goat that came too close to her baby. So neat to actually watch this happen!

So after a few days in, we are doing well. Glacier is bear territory, so we had to keep everything remotely related to food in the car at all times. That was a little tedious, to have to take everything in and out all the time. But, the tent surrived the little rain we got, we mastered fires and camp stoves, and played many rounds of Nerts. Life is good.

As I write, we are sitting in Butte, Montanna. Yellowstone here we come!