Going to the Sun… Part 2

73. Go to Glacier National Park.   

As I promised in my last entry, I have much more to tell about our trip to Glacier National Park.  I’ll preface some of the stories by admitting that I was rather concerned about bears during our trip.  Not long before our trip there was an incident in a campground near Cooke City, MT in which a Grizzly bear sow and her 3 yearling cubs attacked 3 different people and killed and partially consumed one man.  As Cooke City is just over the pass from where I live, it was a hot topic of conversation.  While I know that this is not typical behavior for bears, it demonstrated what desperate and underweight bears can do.  It made me a bit over-cautious about bears.   

 We got to Glacier National Park on a Sunday. As this was my first time in the park, we spent some time in the Apgar village area to help me get a better feel for the park.  We went to the ranger station to see which campgrounds were still available and we also visited the back-country office because we were contemplating doing some back-packing.  From there we got ourselves a campsite in the Avalanche Creek campground which is the last campground on the west side of Logan Pass on the Going to the Sun Road.  Once settled we walked out to the road to catch the shuttle.   

A few years ago the park service began running a free shuttle along the Going to the Sun Road, the only road that runs through the park from the east to west.  We found this shuttle to be hugely helpful during our time in the park.  That first afternoon we rode the shuttle up to the Logan Pass Visitor Center.  We began going for a hike but after a short while we decided to turn around and go back to camp as we had seen that there was going to be a ranger program about the history of wild fires in the park and we wanted to be sure to make it back in time for that program. We made it to that program and really enjoyed it, but it left us making dinner in the dark.  We decided we didn’t want to make dinner in the dark again.   

Mountains near Logan Pass as seen from the High-Line trail

 

The next morning we caught the shuttle up to the Logan Pass Visitor’s Center again.  This time we planned on spending most of the day hiking.  We hike from Logan Pass west along the high-line trail out to the Granite Park Chalet.  This back-country chalet is one of the nine chalets that once existed throughout the park and comprised the major way of seeing the park before the Going to the Sun Road was built.  Today only two of those chalets still exist: Granite Park and Sperry.  It was a 7.6 mile hike from Logan Pass out to the chalet and it was a beautiful hike.   

Lake McDonald seen through the mountains from the High Line trail

 

Granite Park Chalet

 

Something sort of funny happened during our hike.  Maybe half-way to the chalet I had to stop to pee.  I took a few steps off the side of the trail and after making sure that nobody was coming, I started to take care of my business.  Suddenly a small ground squirrel appeared near my feet and he run up and started drinking my urine before it even hit the ground.  There were plenty of streams and waterfalls so I don’t think he needed the water.  Maybe there was some sort of nutrients, perhaps excess from the vitamins that I take, that my body was flushing.  I don’t know what it was, but he was very excited but lapping my urine right out of the air.  I  tried chasing him away with my foot; I tried yelling at him; I even thought about peeing on his head, but there was no deterring him.  It is a mental image I’ll not soon lose.   

From the Granite Park Chalet we had a 4 mile hike down-hill to “the loop” where we would catch the shuttle back to camp.  Unfortunately, about 2 to 3 miles from our destination, Cass twisted her ankle and fell.  After cleaning up her cuts and wrapping the ankle we limped the rest of the way out.    

   

We hiked just under 12 miles on the day and between Cass’s ankle and just being sore from hiking, we were hurting.  We decided that night that we would take it a bit easier the next couple of days and that we needed to re-evaluate the idea of doing an extended back-country trip.   

   

The next morning we packed up our camp and did the short hike around the Trail of the Cedars.  Cass’s parents might while building the boardwalks that make up this trail so she wanted to be sure to hike it.  We then drove up and over Logan Pass to the east side of the park.  After setting up camp in the Rising Sun Campground, we drove to the Many Glacier portion of the park.  We did a nice easy hike around Swiftcurrent Lake and admired the Many Glacier Hotel before heading back to camp.   

Many Glacier Hotel

 

We were going to enjoy a leisurely boat tour on St. Mary lake but due to a watch that was set a bit slow, we just missed the boat.  So we walked back to camp and while having dinner we saw a black bear walk around the edge of the campground.  A ranger was nearby and the bear was quickly chased off.  We found out later that he was a bit of a regular in that area but was considered to be largely harmless.  We finished the Tuesday evening at a ranger program about the geology of the park.   

Many Glacier Hotel

 

More stories from this trip still to come…..

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