I just looked at my blog and realized I hadn’t entered
anything in 3 months! Not good! So I’ll try to catch up with what has happened
to me during those three quiet months.
First, being at Whitefish is nice. Except for the train, it
is quiet and looking out onto an area of trees, grasses, all sorts of green is
relaxing. I’m able to put my awning out and most of the time it is no problem,
even if it should rain (longest rain has been about 2 minutes). The problem is
when it is windy (there have been a few days).
I have been to Glacier many times since I have been here. I
went several times during late May and early June. Here’s one of the pictures I
took of Lake Macdonald. The breeze was blowing gently and for a few minutes it
stopped. This looks like a mirror, but if you look, you can see the rocky
bottom of the lake.
I also went out to Hungry Horse Dam. The town of Hungry
Horse was actually named after some horses that were lost during a storm and
when found were extremely thin and hungry. The dam is quite high and the road
across it becomes dirt on the far side. There are some campgrounds around the
lake, but I wasn’t interested in continuing on the dirt road very far. Here’s a
picture of the dam and surroundings
I then went to Lake MacDonald Lodge and took the boat ride
around the lake. It was beautiful, but the wind made whitecaps. Doesn’t this
cloud look like Snoopy on a flying saucer?
On June 19, the eastern side of Going-To-The-Sun road
opened. I went to the east side around the bottom of the park. I visited Two
Medicine and took some pictures of Running Eagle Falls. Then, the two parts of
the falls were running. I hear later on in the season, the top part of the
falls disappears and the water comes out of the bottom part.
I then went up to Many Glacier. It, like just about every
place in Glacier, is situated on a lake. The Many Glacier Lodge is 100 years
old this year. It is a gorgeous place, in a gorgeous surrounding. The mountains
and lake make for a wonderful atmosphere. I took GTTS road back home.
On June 26, the EPIC meetup of Kossacks (Daily Kos people)
occurred in Glacier. After a welcome BBQ in Coram on Thursday evening, Friday
was spent hiking up to Avalanche Lake. The lake is gorgeous and is surrounded
by mountains and hanging valleys with waterfalls surrounding the lake. The hike
was not that difficult, but the downs were not friendly to my left knee. Later
that night, we had a picnic at Apgar Picnic area and I went into the lake to
kind of ice down my knee. Shortly after doing that, I ended up with a cramp in
my leg. Not fun.
On June 27, we took the Red Bus up to Logan Pass and one of
the Kossacks and I went rafting afterwards. Then, dinner at Lake MacDonald
Lodge. Wonderful. Expensive, but wonderful. Good company and good food. Couldn’t
be better.
On July 1, one of the couples from the meetup and I rode the
just started shuttle up to Logan Pass. We wandered around there for a while and
then came back. It was great not having to drive myself. We didn’t take the
boardwalk but did some off-road hiking. We saw a sheep far away and discovered
that the earth was soggy in some places.
I went up to Logan Pass late one night to take pictures of
the stars. That didn’t turn out so good. After a few hours up there, I went
down to Two Medicine to sleep before the NPS Instameet – a ranger gives ideas
for photos, etc. This was supposed to be for the sunrise on the mountains
around the lake. But it was so smoky, the sun didn’t really make a dramatic
statement on the mountains, which might have happened if it weren’t so smoky.
When I got up to Logan Pass at 10:00 pm or there abouts,
there was a herd of Big Horns wandering all over the parking lot drinking
either the antifreeze or condensation left on the ground during the day.
Apparently they aren’t affected by the antifreeze.
The next day, I took pictures out of my trailer window of
these babies. The table is about 10 feet away, and these babies were wandering
about on either side until mom called them and they ran away. They won’t be
babies long.
There was an Instameet at Lake MacDonald at Apgar boat
launch to take pictures of the sunset. It wasn’t very spectacular or colorful,
so I don’t have a lot of pictures to share of that. Before the Instameet, I hiked to
MacDonald Creek Falls and took some pictures there. The falls were beautiful
and there were a lot of people there.
I went up to Logan Pass at night again to take star
pictures. I did a little better, but because my camera and lens aren’t the
best, the stars appear out of focus. They might be. But I did get a picture of
the Big Dipper.
There was an Instameet again to photograph the sunset. It
was very smoky and difficult to see the distant mountains. The colors were more
spectacular than previously, because of the smoke. There are now a couple of
major fires happening in the park and after evacuations of St. Mary and closure
of the GTTS road, it has finally reopened.
A new fire has started near Highway 2 around the southern
end of Glacier, so that highway has closed. In addition, they’ve closed the
railroad tracks, so we don’t have as many trains going through (yeah!).
So today, August 21, we are supposed to have a rainy day
with high winds. So far, the winds part has come mostly true (not very high),
but no rain yet.
It is also extremely smoky. It is hard on the eyes and
lungs. Our campground (and all of Flathead County) is in a Stage 2 fire
restriction – no campfires at all. The sun glows red, you can’t see the
mountains and there are (by last count I read in the paper) 101 wildfires in
Montana. There are also fires in Idaho and Washington sending their smoke our
way. Yippee!
Took my truck to the doctor on Wednesday and was told it
needed $1300 worth of work. So, instead of taking a volunteer position during
the winter, which I really wanted to do, I now have to find a paying job during
the winter so I can pay for the work. Oh well, I still have next summer and
beyond to be unpaid!
I’ll get to this more often.
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