More mountains (and rain)!
Trip Start
Apr 10, 2005
1
14
25
Trip End
Dec 20, 2005
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Glacier National Park and Waterton National Park, Montana
Tuesday, June 14, 2005
Reluctantly we bundled ourselves up again and braced ourselves for more winter mountain weather driving up to Glacier National Park. Not surprisingly it began to rain as soon as we began climbing the hills, puttering along in our little wagon, with many of Montana's local yahoos roaring by in their V8 muscle trucks.
Only one road traverses the centre of Glacier National Park, called "Going-to-the-Sun" Road. Unfortunately, we discovered that this single road was blocked halfway up with a rock slide that would take several days to clear. So up we went as far as we could, and good thing that we did, because the sun came out and it blew us away, how gorgeous it was. One has the feeling of having swollen eyes full of beautiful scenery, it truly was breathtaking. Taking advantage of the break in the weather, our little crew hiked along Lake MacDonald, minding the shadows for any suspicious Grizzlies.
Back down the way we came, we were forced to drive around the perimeter of the park to the opposite side. We spent the night south of the park and heard wolves howling just on the ridge above our campground. Very spooky. The next day we drove to the east entrance and drove the other half of the Going-to-the-Sun Road and saw absolutely nothing in the fog, rain and snow. We reached the top where the rock slide was and were shocked to see snow banks 20 ft tall. Sam was the only one to run out and jump (and roll) in the snow. Thank goodness we got those pix yesterday!
Since the weather forecast was quite grim we decided to drive back to Canada crossing over to Alberta and visiting Glacier's neighbour, Waterton Provincial Park. Though just slightly less foggy, it rained and rained just the same and wouldn't be clearing for yet another few days. Waterton and Glacier are truly magnificent places to visit, and will definitely warrant another look-see in sunnier times perhaps later on in our travels, but for now, after spending a week in grey, wet weather we decided it was time to catch up with summer. Before we left though, we were treated to a curious sight. While waiting in town in Waterton, we were surprised to see 4 Big Horn Sheep rams walking just 2ft away from our car. These 4 dudes were just strolling by on their way to their watering hole for a drink and some tasty greens. The whole town came to a stop, cars were frozen, camera flashes went off all around these 4 famous dudes. What a sight! Anyhow, onwards to British Columbia!
