The Final Week and Long Drive

Photo: Sunrift Gorge

Just so this is complete, we'll tell you about our last week in Montana and our drive home. We don't have a lot of photos from that time period, so we'll share some of the ones we didn't get to tease you with before.

On our last days off, we decided to try to hike to Hidden Lake, which is a pretty tame hike but one of the "famous" ones. We hadn't done it before because it had been snowcovered for most of the time we were there. This hike begins from Logan Pass and we can't take the RV there so we needed to catch a shuttle. This is where the adventure began.

There were some mechanical issues with the larger shuttle buses, so the company had brought some of the smaller buses to the east side of the park. We went to the visitor center and prepared to take a shuttle, knowing it may be a longer wait than usual. That was okay because the hike was a short one. We were pleasantly surprised to find a shuttle waiting at the curb with only two other people aboard. We climb on and carry on a pleasant conversation with the couple onboard (a pastor and his wife that were staying at the KOA). The bus fills up, but no driver has come onboard yet. We wait....go ask the rangers who say that the driver is on break and that one should come in 10-15 minutes. We wait...another shuttle arrives. We ask that driver if we can get on his shuttle, but he states that he will be going to lunch and won't be leaving for 35 minutes. We stay put. We wait...and still no driver. In the meantime, the other shuttle fills up with people. We wait...and the OTHER driver is done lunch and takes his shuttle up the mountain. At this point we ask again. Still no answer on where a driver is or when this shuttle will move. We all give up and change plans. Some carpooled with each other, some decide to do something else. We decide to go to lunch.

While eating a great lunch at the park cafe, we decide that we don't think anyone had rented the van that the KOA has for people to use. We head to the campground and ask if we can use the van. We head up the mountain (45 minute trip) and get to Logan Pass. Parking lot is full. Circle, curse, circle, curse...circle...decide to give up and go back down the mountain. Hidden Lake will have to stay hidden from the Holyoke clan.

We drive to the Many Glacier section of the park and decide to pick up a few souvenirs we had been eyeing all summer. After a successful shopping trip we head back to the campground for the evening.

Our last day off we decide to spend with our friends, Dan and Rena. We drove to the west side of the park, did a bit of shopping, went out to eat together and just talked about the summer and what was coming up in the future for all of us. We will really miss them, and hope to connect again in the future. They cooked us a great steak dinner for a farewell treat, too!

The drive home was four long days. St. Mary to Minot, ND.....Minot to Marquette, MI....Marquette to Ogdensberg, NY via Ontario....and Ogdensberg to home. We were all ready to be up and moving by the time we got home! I don't think I would make a good long-haul trucker.

Now we need to get some photos printed, but that will have to wait just a bit while we get Paul off to college and get our classrooms ready. Here are a few more to give you a taste of Glacier. Enjoy.







This is the ranger station at Goat Haunt, and you can see the border patrol checking passports. No line of cars here, but as you can see it is used by lots of hikers and people on the tour boats.


This is the view from Granite Park Chalet where we had lunch on one of our hikes. You can see the trail off to the left.
One of the many wildflower fields we encountered while hiking.
We hope to see you all in person, soon. Thanks for taking the time to share in our summer vacation. We loved it, and the answer to everyone..."Yes, we would do this type of thing again in a heartbeat." We hope to do it at another national park area to allow us the chance to explore somewhere else. Yosemite is high on our list of places to visit in more depth, but we are also open to other opportunities as well. Who knows where we will wander next!
The Holyokes

We're Baaa-aaack!

We made it home this evening, and will update you about our final week and trip as soon as we have a few minutes. It is nice to be home, but we already miss those Montana mountains. See you all soon!
Glen, Terry, and Kyle

5 Moose, 10 Bears, & 15 Miles

On our days off last week we made the decision to travel to the Canadian side of the park. For those that may not know, there are two national parks--one American(Glacier) and one Canadian(Waterton Lakes)--that form an international peace park.

We drove to Waterton townsite, which reminded us of a Bar Harbor or Camden. It is a small town right on Waterton Lake with shops, restaurants, motels, and summer homes. It is also the home of the famous "Prince of Wales" hotel. We tried to go visit it, but it wasn't very RV friendly and was a bit away from the rest of the town. I'll just have to imagine the good looking waiters in kilts! Here is a photo of the hotel. High tea is served in the afternoons.

We were lucky enough to get a campsite in Crandell Lake campground in the park so we decided to stay over and do some things while we were there. The first day we played tourist and walked around all the shops, ate at an outdoor cafe for lunch, and took in the sights.
We enjoyed a lazy afternoon reading books by the lake.
We got tickets for a boat tour the following day and returned to the campground.
That is where the 10 bears came in. First we saw a mom and cub. We were able to pull over and take photos and watch them feed for about 30 minutes. It was great fun. We continued on down the road and saw another mom and cub. Then a third pair, a lone grizzly, and a mom with two cubs. That satisfied even Kyle's quest for bears (for a little while, anyway!)

After setting up camp and getting a good night's sleep, we were set for our boat tour the next morning. We took the hiking gear because the plan was to take the boat from Canada to the US end of the lake, do a hike, and then hike back to the Canadian side.

The ranger station on the US side is an official border crossing and we had to show passports. It is called "Goat Haunt" and there is even an official stamp you can get put in your passport.

We hiked from Goat Haunt up to Kootenai Lake (5.6 miles round trip). We were treated to five moose feeding in the lake. There were 3 cow moose and 2 bulls.

We walked back to the ranger station where we had a lunch break, and then started on the Waterton Lakeshore Trail to walk back to where we had started. (9.7 miles) This trail was a bit disappointing when compared to the others we have done. It was somewhat overgrown in places, although rangers lead an "international peace" hike on the trail twice a week. We were hoping for more views of the lake, but weren't rewarded. There were some interesting suspension bridges on the trail. I decided I would never make it in Africa on those long ones that are in all the adventure movies. Especially when the bad guys are shooting and the boards break! Kyle, on the other hand, thought longer ones would be cool.
One neat thing...we hiked across the international border. Not everyone that does that can say they didn't have to worry about being chased by border police! :-)After getting back to town we rewarded ourselves with dinner out and bought some souvenirs to bring home. Kyle decided he wanted a pair of moccasins trimmed with rabbit fur. Terry got a decorative pottery plate with bears on it, and Glen decided on a t-shirt with a running shoe and a hiking boot making claims about having only to be faster than your hiking partners when hiking in bear territory. Too bad for Glen....the store where we had seen that shirt the day before was closed, and he didn't get to purchase it.

We headed home, crossing the border and being inspected AGAIN. It seems that we get into Canada with just a few questions, but every time we try to come home we need to let the customs officials inside the camper where they check the refrigerator, cupboards, and look in the bathroom to see if we have anyone hidden in there. So, I guess you can all feel safe. They are inspecting all suspicious characters trying to get in the country!

Kyle's cross-country training is going well, but on the long hikes his knee starts to feel twingy. So, on our last couple of days off this week we think we are going to just do some short day hikes that are pretty photogenic and get our last fill of Glacier. Our work schedules run from Sunday through Saturday, and we are not sure yet what will happen with next Sunday. Usually, we work Sundays. We are scheduled to leave bright and early Monday morning to begin our trip home. If we are not needed to work Sunday, we may try to escape a bit early...but won't know until probably Saturday if we can. The good thing is it is easy to pack. Just pull in the slideout and unplug the cords! See you all soon,
Terry, Glen, and Kyle

P.S. While nobody took a guess, the glacier in the last post is named "Salamander Glacier"

Family Fun

For those that think you have to hike to enjoy Glacier, this post may be reassuring. There are things to do that don't involve backpacks. While the family was out, we did some of these activities and will share them with you.

The first day we slept in after arriving late from the airport, and then went for a drive to the "Two Medicine" area of the park. We took a short walk~~related to a hike but no backpacks~~to a waterfall. Running Eagle falls are named for a woman warrior from the Blackfeet tribe who came here on her vision quests. The falls seem to come out of the side of the cliff. We drove on to Two Medicine Lake where we were thinking about a boat ride. It was pretty windy, and we also missed the boat by about 5 minutes. So, we settled for a trip around the gift store where Grammy found the perfect puzzle for our next Sugarloaf vacation. (No, Carl, we promise it really isn't ALL blue)

We finished off day one with a ride into the Many Glacier area of the park to see if we could spot some wildlife and maybe catch a boat ride from the hotel there. But, once again we were a bit late. We did pick up a schedule to use later in the week and booked a trip on the red jammer bus tours for the following day. Grampy decided he wasn't really excited about mountain roads, so he bought a book of bear stories and planned to stay in the cabin while the rest of us took the tour. We told him he couldn't share any of those stories, so we don't know how the book was!

When Wednesday dawned, it came in with a roar. There were thunderstorms in the early morning. As things cleared up a bit we were treated to a beautiful rainbow in front of the mountains. It stayed really windy so for part of our tour the red bus kept the canvas cover on.
As the weather cleared, we did remove the top for the classic jammer tour. We stopped at Logan Pass, and we had fun seeing how much snow had melted since the beginning of the summer. If you compare the photo below to the one we took on our first trip across the Going to the Sun Road, you can see there is a big difference.
We ate a nice lunch at Lake McDonald Lodge on the west side, and came back over the mountains. The views never get old. We stopped and our guide told us a bit about the glaciers where we could see Jackson Glacier. Like the others, it is shrinking. Right now, it is covered in snow so it is hard to see the bluish color and all the cracks.
Kyle and Paul enjoyed the back seat of the red bus, and near the end of the tour discovered the chest of wool blankets in front of them. I am sure they (and a few others) had wished to know about them earlier, as it was pretty chilly in that convertible!
Thursday, we went back into the Many Glacier area of the park for a hike. Yes, backpacks were involved, but only the small ones. We hiked up part of the Iceberg Lake trail to take Marge, Vaughn, and Paul to Ptarmigan Falls. While hiking we heard there was a grizzly that had crossed the trail just a bit ahead of where we were. We were told to make noise. Grammy did, but Kyle got awfully quiet! We never did see a bear on the trail.
Friday we returned to Many Glacier to try a boat tour (schedule in hand). On the way in we were searching the area for the famed wildlife. You can imagine Kyle's disappointment when we rounded a corner and Mom yells out, "Bears--two of them!" Pause...."Oops! Sorry, cows." It got even better as we saw more and then had to wait out a "Montana traffic jam" while they decided which side of the road they wanted to be on.
During our boat tour, we got a great view of this glacier. Does anyone want to guess the name? (Hint: look at the shape of it) We'll tell you the name in the next posting.The tour itself begins at the Many Glacier Hotel. For Stephen King fans, this hotel is the one he based his novel "The Shining" on. A caretaker still lives here all winter. He gets snowed in and sees nobody all winter. Snow covers the lower stories of the motel.

The boat crosses Swiftcurrent lake and lets the passengers off at the boatdock on the other end. You walk two tenths of a mile to Lake Josephine and board another boat. After crossing this lake you have an opportunity to take a ranger-led walk to Grinnell Lake and view Grinell Glacier. You can also do some other trails or hike on your own. You get a ticket to get back on a later boat. Since we had done a hike the day before and some of us were wearing sandals we opted to just stay on the boat and ride it back. We saw several deer on our boat ride as well as some ducks.
It was after the boat ride, on the way out of the park to find lunch that we spotted that grizzly I posted yesterday. We were really glad to see one and it was a great ending to the park portion of our trip with all the family.

The last day we couldn't think of anything to do that didn't involve mountainous roads or hiking, so we went to the town of Browning and toured the Museum of the Plains Indian. There were some interesting displays, but overall it was a disappointing museum. Pretty small, no interactive displays with audio or videos like some we have seen. (Guess we're spoiled) We would have like some kind of a guided tour or something!

We had to work the 3-11 shift that afternoon, and then get a little sleep. The airport is about 2 and 1/2 hours away so we had to get up at 3am to get people ready for the flight. Good thing we found some coffee on the way! We were glad to get updates from home on the progress of the flights and to know that everyone made it safely.

Can't quite believe our work week is almost over again and we have Wednesday and Thursday off. We are not sure yet if we will go visit the Canadian part of the park or go on an overnight backpack. It is hard to know what we REALLY want to do before we go home. Still lots of choices that all look good. We'll let you know what we decided when we get back.

Glen, Terry, and Kyle

Surprise!

Well.....Our hats are off to all who knew that Paul was coming out to visit us. We had NO idea, and were stunned to see him get off the plane with Marge and Vaughn. I don't think we stopped grinning all week, and we are extremely thankful to everyone that had a hand in this. Not even suspecting made it extra special.

We had a fun week as a family and saw some of the park together. We also tried out more local restaurants, did a small hike, took a boat tour, had a red bus tour, and played some cards. I'll try to get some photos up soon, but am just rushing to get this message out before heading to work this afternoon.

One big highlight.....FINALLY we saw a bear. Paul had the magic eyes. It wasn't close enough for Kyle, and perfectly fine with Grammy that we were in the car at the time!