1993/07 Rockies trip - Glacier |
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Thursday July1st
Edna wasn't well for our trip north to Glacier. Yellowstone is really tough on the body, what with the elevation, the weather, and the fumes. Luckily, we had nothing planned for this day except driving, and she was able to sleep for most of the 450 miles across Montana, and she didn't miss any really good scenery, which was her main worry.
By the time we'd got to Glacier, she'd recovered, 
but Sandie needed some sleep, so just the three of us went out that evening. We 
were camping at what used to be the St. Mary's KOA, but is now run directly by the Blackfeet reservation. The weather there was awful, dark, wet, and windy, so we headed for the Many Glacier valley, which looked a little brighter.
At last, we found Edna's bear, what appeared to be a small blond grizzly, steadily working its way down toward the road. A ranger showed up while we were watching, and, as soon as it got within a 100 yards of the road, he ordered us all to get back in our cars and leave the area. He was carrying a rifle and looked serious about it. I guess that if a tourist gets eaten on your beat then it messes
up your career as a ranger.
Once I had my pictures developed I realized that the bear was not a grizzly. It was a black bear. Back in Minnesota and further east black bears are almost always black, but out west they can be brown, cinnamon, or blond, even white. Grizzlies have a hump and this one does not. They also have cute rounded ears whereas this bear has pointy ears. I've embedded a frontal shot in the picture; it's very poor quality but does show the ears clearly.
The view across Swiftcurrrent lake is spectacular, with massive Mount Gould on our left, triangular Mount Grinnell in front of us and Mount Wilbur with its glacier off to our right. Note the storm clouds rushing towards us over Wilbur.
There is also the enormous Many Glacier Hotel, snuggled down on the lake shore, just visible behind Edna in the picture 
above.
There were pockets of wild flowers including these pink penstemons and and stands of bear grass. It's actually a lily, not a grass, but I've since learned that the bear part is true; bears like to eat the plant's young shoots.
We walked around Swiftcurrent Lake and up to Josephine Lake on very muddy trails, got some good views of the storm coming over the mountains, and then got well soaked. A fellow tourist took pity on us and gave us a ride back to the hotel, just in time to take some pictures of the rainbow.
Friday July 2nd
This day was also wet and windy, but we set off to cross the 
Going to the Sun road, stopping off at the overlooks of St Mary's Lake.
We walked the trail through the woods to Barents Falls.
We've been that way before and have other pictures of the family perched on Sandie's tree. The same is true of the bridge, but I think it's been rebuilt a few times.
We drove further up the road towards Mounts Reynolds and Clements, typical of Glacier's great triangular mountains.
Also typical are the many small waterfalls cascading from lingering icefields down to the road and the valleys beneath us.
Up at Logan Pass, we started up the boardwalk towards Hidden Lake, but it was really too early in the season and we soon got bogged down in the snow on the trail. It wasn't really all that cold but everyone was sliding around on the snow. It wasn't all that good either for those of us wearing sandals, though 
I seemed to have more traction with my toes than most people! The picture of John and Edna shows us retreating down to the carpark.
The rocks around the road are of soft argillite or mudstone, mostly green in Glacier and red in Waterton, but we were standing 
on a particularly vivid patch of red.
The view is of the road descending alongside McDonald Creek to the western side of the park.
We continued down to Lake Macdonald for lunch and shopping. Wet, as usual, but dry in the gift shops, so the ladies were happy. We stopped off at a few places on the way back, but the weather was not cooperating.