Glacier National Park

We have had a whirlwind start to our trip west.  We stopped for one day a Teddy Roosevelt National Park and spent three long days driving.  We got to East Glacier on the fourth day with 1800 miles behind us.  We were pretty tuckered out but we revived to spend a couple of days on the east side of Glacier.  

There are really not words to describe Glacier so I will try to give a short narrative along with a few of the more than 200 pictures that I took.  The first one is on the way up the Going to the Sun Highway from the east side.  This waterfall is just beautiful.  We took the free shuttle service up since one of us is scared of heights and is the one who does all of the driving.

This shot shows the same waterfall with a bit more perspective.  These scenes are just amazing and the photos really do not do them justice.

Here we are at the top of Logan Pass, the summit of the Going to the Sun Highway.  It is 6646 feet at the top of the pass and the mountains rise up much further on both sides.  This is looking down across the valley of the summit.

This is another shot of the floor of the summit valley which is just covered with wildflowers

This shot is looking down the valley from the summit.  It shows the rapid drop as the valley falls away from the summit.

The next day we moved to the west side of Glacier and stayed in a nice wooded campground just outside of the park entrance.  The contrast from the east or dry side of the park to the west or wet side is amazing.  The east is open and some trees and the west is a temperate rain forest.

We took a drive up to the North Fork of the park to a little place called Polebridge which consists of a General Mercantile and a cabin eatery with a few residents.  From Polebridge we drove along the Flathead river to a remote Forest Ranger outpost and campground.  We took a hike through the trees down to the river ever on the lookout for bear.  I was prepared with my pepper spray in hand ready to deal with any dangerous critters.  The only critter we saw was a garter snake.

The next day we drove up to a staging area to catch a shuttle to Logan Pass from the west side but we could not find a place to park, the parking areas were all filled to overflowing.  So, with no other options, I took a firm grip on the steering wheel and we started the ascent to the top.  This is a shot of the road as it winds its way up the mountain.

We made it all the way to the top but my hands were nearly numb from gripping the wheel so hard.  I won't say what else was sore from gripping the seat so hard.  We got to the top and could not find a parking place up there either after trying for about fifteen minutes we gave up and started back down.  We stopped at several pull offs to take in the views.  Here is Marcia using her phone to get a picture with the mountains falling away to the valley in the background.

This is one of my favorite shots.  It shows the river in the bottom of the valley with the steep walls rising up on both sides.  There was some haze in the air so it was hard to get a clear shot but I think the haze adds to the beauty.

Further down the mountain we stopped at Avalanche Creek and hiked up along the Creek for a mile or so.  The water cascading down through the rocks was just beautiful.

This is a little better perspective of the water cascading down.

Next we had to hike through the Cedar grove.  These are just huge and a few have some unusual burls.  Marcia is giving us an idea of just how large these trees are.

I was afraid that burl was going to pull that little cedar over so I thought I should try to hang on to it to keep it from toppling.

That ended our stay at Glacier and it was amazing.  The views there are just so fantastic that it is really hard to describe them.  We left Glacier and headed on west toward Washington.