Glacier National Park Number 2

Monday, July 18th – Glacier National Park to Chester, Montana - Day 157

The Waterton-Glacier International Peace Park combines the Waterton and Glacier National Parks across the Canada-US border. This allows combined efforts for conservation and reflects the fact the animals don’t care about the border.

We have been very fortunate to stay in so many campgrounds with beautiful mountain views, St. Mary’s campground included. We went back to the visitor centre to drop the trailer and get junior ranger booklets. We started down the Going to the Sun Road with fog and rain overhead.

There was very little visibility as we started our first trail to Baring Falls. We had rain jackets to fight the drizzle as we walked downhill to the base of the falls. There was a wooden bridge crossing the stream to let us get to an overhang where we could stay dry. The weather improved as we walked back to the car, we saw some blue skies and clear views when we reached the road.

We started travelling uphill to the Logan Pass visitor centre with stops at multiple viewpoints along the way to see distant glaciers and a river valley with many waterfalls. We arrived and had the kids sworn in as junior rangers. There was a path to a glacier behind the visitor centre and we started walking towards it before it got too snowy to continue. We had all our warm clothes on, but we were still cold. The weather alternated between rain, hail, and fog. We went back to the car and crossed the pass to head down the mountain.

We stopped to look at the Weeping Wall and several other viewpoints before continuing to Lake McDonald. The lake provided a windy view of fire scarred hills on the far bank.

To be continued...

Comments

Mary in Malibu

Tuesday, June 7th - Angeles Mountains, Los Angeles to Santa Monica Mountains, Malibu, California - Day 117 It is great to welcome Mary back on the trip. The kids gave her a huge hug as we picked her up at the airport. They are all really excited to talk to someone other than their parents. We are all driving to our wedding on June 25th. Sixteen days until we need to be in Victoria, British Columbia. Our plan was to drive up the coast from Los Angeles, halfway to San Fran cut inland to Sequoia National Park and Kings Canyon National Park (which is close by) and then head north to Yosemite, before driving back down to Big Sur and then into San Francisco, potentially north east to Lake Tahoe and north to Redwoods National Park. It’s a busy schedule, we’ll see how it goes. On the way to pick up Mary we got a well-deserved oil change for the Santa Fe, courtesy of Valvoline. It was expensive but quick and easy. We were thinking of driving throu...

Back to the Coast

Tuesday, June 14th - Sacramento to Big Sur State Park, California - Day 123 In the morning, we got on the road and drove along the Sacramento river which watered acres and acres of fields on all sides of us. We took a scenic drive before getting on the highway. A brief stop at Walmart and Dollar tree replenished our supplies. We phoned Big Sur State Park to try to get a spot for the night. They had nine spots available, we were three hours away, we needed to hurry. When we finally reached the coast, we drove along a curvy cliffside road that was very beautiful. Views of waves crashing into the rocks on the coastline below were exquisite. Gen was behind the wheel. There were no passing lanes, she finally found a spot to pull off the road and subsequently had several minutes of vehicles continuing to pass us before we could get back on. We finally reached Big Sur State Park and were welcomed with a grove of Red Woods towering over the drive into...

Simnett Travels

Search This Blog