I lost my written blog about the National Glacier Park during a computer crash while trying to upload pictures. Something like that really pisses me off to say it bluntly.
I mentioned in that lost blog, while in Yosemite writing about this section of our trip, that I have so many new impressions every day, that the ones of several days past have left my brain database as they are being overwritten by new ones, and as such I expose to you my aging feeble mind and thus we need to speed up publishing the backlog as soon as a visit is completed.
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two bedrooms, large living room and great
views |
As I am rewriting this part of our trek sitting in Escalante Utah (less than 500 population) in an ultra modern house that looks like a container, it's now 25 days since our stay at Glacier National Park.
We are staying here for a week to take a break from traveling as we go into day 50 of the trip. Two blogs following this rewrite have been completed, but cannot be published before this one is.
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| only a few glaciers left |
And the major problem has been photo uploading to the blog needing a cloud based option as we are using iPads for this exercise. But let me return to the story, without boring you guys with my frustrations.
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| we are at 8000 ft looking at this |
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| water falls everywhere |
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| so much snow in June |
We arrived mid day on the east entrance of the park and checked into our cabin. We had tried to reserve this cabin for the 3 days we would be here, but it was only available for 1 night, so we had to relocate to the west entrance for the next 2 days.
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| more beauty |
As fortune will have it, when we entered the park we found out that the only road east/west traversing the park, the famous "Road to the Sun" was only open for 14 miles to the top of the mountain at Logan's Pass, because snow removal on the other side would take 3 more days.
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water makes mountains more
beautiful |
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| snow is melting creating raging waters |
Thus "predetermination", a good Calvinistic principle for the chosen few: it est the two of us, required the relocation of several hours to the west entrance, where we fortuitously had booked the next two nights.
Those 14 miles towards the pass were sun-drenched with majestic views, that simply floored us into jaw dropping silence. I know that the pictures here cannot describe the stunning sights.
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| so much water |
The next two days were overcast, rainy and cold. I pity the visitors who came the following 4, 5 days as the rain and clouds persisted.
We booked an 8 hour tour in a 1932 red touring car, that was used in those olden days to show wealthy visitors staying at the lodge in luxury the beauty of the park, before they would retire to the verandah for cocktails.
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one of the few left in working order
after the 100 car order in 1932 |
We were not allowed to close the doors of this wooden, quarter million valued vehicle, as too hard a slam might break the irreplaceable lock system and we were warned that our damaging anything in this vehicle could financially ruin us.
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| Jenny before she took her coat off |
Jenny our driver guide, a hardy Wyoming girl in a T shirt, constantly had to herd some of her 12 customers in the 40 degree (Fahrenheit for my european readers) rain and sleet.
If this had been a wet T-shirt competition I would have understood, but here it brought out my paternal instincts, chastising her to wear her raincoat. She did not pay much heed to my mutterings.
We learned from her interesting details, such as when talking about quaking aspen, a tree I would not have been able to identify before, but that I have since proudly been pointing out to Sandee, that they were sharing a communal intelligent root system, through which they regulate water distribution to individual trees as needed, even being able to shut off supply to trees considered lost and thus condemned to die.
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| a burnt out forest |
She spoke about the beneficial affects of fire in the forest in order to rejuvenate the forest, when it became to dense for a healthy living environment.
That pinecones that fall from the firs, need high temperatures to open (read here fire) and spread their seeds in the ashes of the newly available soil.
How different types of trees fight off encroaching other types or welcome plants in their ecology.
The next day we drove around the park in the rain and found a dirt trail that we explored following the edge of a lake, and we had a surprise encounter with a black bear and her cubs.
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mama teaches cubs for 6
months only |
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| bears closed in between camper and our car |
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| the last cub disappears in the woods |
Up to Yellowstone to see if that park will be even more awesome.
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| I name her Janet (sorry Eileen) |
P.S. Only 3 ladies responded to my invite to name the little creature posted here, making me think that: 1) not many of my readers really read the blog, or 2) that the caliber of my readers must in general be regarded as nature ignorant, or 3) that I might not really have a readership and my publisher is hiding from me, that there really is nobody out there and that she sends the blog to nonexistent emails.
But, on the other hand I now know that there are out there three highly intelligent ladies with a broad knowledge base called Janet, Janet and Eileen.
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