Fluid Plans Always Work Out Well

Monday, July 7, 2014

It feels so strange not to be able to post yesterday’s blog!  The Park is truly a place for enjoying Nature with no distractions, at least during the day.  I still have to write at night even if no one will read it for a while!  My little brain will not remember what we did today by the time tomorrow is over!

We’ve set the alarm so that we have plenty of time before our boat tour leaves the dock at ten.   Needn’t have bothered.  We’re both awake before it goes off.  We have lots of time for our leisurely morning routine.  Before anything else, though, we step outside.  The mountains are wearing a patchy coat of fog and mist and are simply gorgeous and ethereal. 

Breakfast today is the hard-boiled eggs that we made at the Whistling Swan and the pastries from Brownies.  The Swan’s fridge was set to “very cold” and the eggs were frozen when we packed them for the trip!  Did you know you can freeze HBEs in the shell and they come out perfectly fine?  My bear claw is filled with cream cheese and huckleberry jam.  Oh and it is yum!  But after two eggs I can’t eat it all, so it will be part of tomorrow’s breakfast, too.

The coffee maker here is really cute.  There are two sides and you can put a prepacked filter/coffee unit in each side or just one.  There is an on button for each one.  Very convenient.

Taking off from the tree top!

What a difference an hour or so makes!  Look at that crystalline sky!

We’re ready to take on the world, so we head on to the boat

dock, only two hours early!  That gives us lots and lots of time to wander and take pictures.  

We watch the cruise lady raise the flag and wash the windows,  and have a lovely chat with a woman and her fourteen-year old son who has hair like Ole’s used to be;  and he has a green streak in it.  He is using mom’s big hummer camera and she says he is better with it than she!

Boat dock

Love the western-themed benches!

You know you're early when you watch the flag being raised!  The water really is
that lovely turquoise;  it's from the glacial flour scoured out by the glaciers
and suspended in the water, reflecting the light.

Both boats will be in use this morning and ours is captained by Kyle, a bearded blond with a winning smile.  He tells us a bit about the geology of the valley, points out Sexton Glacier and the continental divide, explains the difference between a glacier and a snow field (a glacier is at least 25 feet thick and 25 square miles).  He also says that the triple divide is ahead of us. 

When we arrive at our destination, there is a park ranger to guide us on our hike.  First, though, he takes us to Baring Falls, which is just a ten-minute walk and is gorgeous!  He tells us that most of the fatalities in the park are water-related, usually from people slipping on the slippery rocks!  

We all return to the dock area and he tells us about the three-mile hike with two hundred and fifty foot elevation change in two hours.  When we ask him to compare Baring Falls to St Mary Falls, the hike’s destination, he says they are pretty similar.  Hmmmm.  Seems like discretion is the better part of valor and we should take the boat back now!  Better to live to walk another day!

We return on the other boat , Little Chief, with a lady captain.  Kyle’s boat, Joy II, has to have its transmission looked at.  She is knowledgeable too, and a hoot.  She tells us about lichen and gives us a clever way to remember its make up.  Anna Algae fill in love with Freddie Fungi and the started lichen each other.  They got married but their marriage is on the rocks because Freddie is such a fungi!

The reddish trees are being attacked by an insect that is killing them.

She also told us about the avalanche pathways down which the snows rush, burying goats and other animals, freezing them alive.  It’s not all bad, though, because when the bears awaken they can smell the meat from under twenty-five feet of snow and dig up the goat-sickles!

We return to our cabin in the woods and make PBJs for lunch with sea salt and cracker pepper kettle chips and fruit.  Then we decide to take the free shuttle all the way to Logan’s Pass to check that out.  

This little chipmunk grabbed some cottonwood on the ground
and scurried to the top of this pole outside our cabin door.

 The road is being resurfaced after this year’s dreadful winter.  Although the drive is only twelve miles it takes an hour with all the stopping for one-way traffic.  A lady on board says that in June the pass received thirty-six inches of snow!  No wonder it was late in opening!

Wowzer!  Look at all that snow!  There is a trail that is completely covered in snow and if you don’t have snowshoes, I don’t know how you travel it;  but people are doing it in their sneakers and boots!  Some are even skiing!

Joker!

Such serenity.

In JULY!!

We walk across a small snow mound and that’s quite a challenge for this Florida native!  The snow is a little slushy, squeaks, and sends people sliding!  Fun for a moment, not for a season!

The Columbian ground squirrels are having a blast.  There are several on a green “island” in the snow and we can hear them peep-peeping quite loudly!  Just as we are being pleased with spotting them, one comes out of the vegetation practically at our feet and seems to have no fear of people at all!

 We go into the Visitors’ Center.  After all, we’re here and need to do everything there is to do.  They are still getting things set up and part of it is closed off so they can stock the shelves.  We meet a lady wearing a glittery “Reading Rocks” t-shirt and learn that she is an elementary-school librarian with only one year to go before retirement.  She and her husband are from Missouri and she says it’s hot there, too.

Back outside we learn where the eastbound and westbound shuttles park and since ours isn’t there yet, we decide to check out the other side of the parking lot.  What a great idea that was because as we’re walking Marilyn (of the amazing vision) spots a BIG-HORNED SHEEP!  As we’re wildly snapping we realize that there are five more and watch them crossing the mountain.  Spectacular!!

Caption contest!!

Okay, now we can go home happy!  Heading back we watch a border collie playing fetch with a park ranger who is throwing snowballs for him!  The dog belonged to a man in a wheel chair and was one of many dogs we saw at the pass.

Our shuttle is ready to go and we are its only passengers!  The ride seems to go a lot faster;  although it might just have seemed quicker because we aren’t sitting sideways staring at the rock wall up-close and personal the way we had been going up.

On the bus we check out phones because I used mine to take a panorama at the pass.  It turns out Marilyn’s iPhone 4 doesn’t have that setting.  While they are turned on, though, we see that we both have voice mails that couldn’t be delivered.  I go into panic mode.  For both of us to have messages, someone must be trying really hard to reach one of us.  Since Marilyn’s kids don’t have my number and I left hers with my kids, it seems logical that the message is for me and pretty urgent.  Now I’m panicked.  Ask the receptionist at the registration desk where we can get phone service and internet.  For the phone we have to go to St. Mary, although the visitors’ center sometimes works.  The restaurant has internet.

We drive the five miles to the visitors’ center and there is service, sure enough.  The weird thing, though, is that the red warning circles have disappeared and neither of us has a voice mail or a missed call that we haven’t already dealt with! I text both my sons and everything is fine with them.  Hurray for that but I’m sure confused!

Anyway, we trek back to the cabin, download our photos because we can’t wait to see them, and prepare for dinner.  We take our computers so we can upload our blogs.  For dinner we split a soy taco dinner which gives us each one large taco with some rice pilaf, and we both get a side salad.  Everything is very good.  I’ve never had a taco shell like this one.  It is flakey and a friend pie crust!  For dessert we split the chia pudding sampler, which is three different flavors of pudding, chocolate, butterscotch and huckleberry.  The chocolate is a disappointment but the other two are grand!  It is very like tapioca and fun on the tongue.

This was taken with my new phone!  The man behind me was so large
that I couldn't get up to use my camera!

Wish the internet were as satisfying as the food.  It is remarkably slow and blogger is giving me a fit.  I finally give up.  The text is all loaded but adding the photos is excrutiating!  Maybe tomorrow will be better.

After dinner we go to the camp store to buy a bottle of wine and get some ice.  The one we want has a cork and we don’t have a cork screw because we flew here.  Marilyn tells the young man behind the counter that in East Glacier Park they opened our bottle for us.  After some thought he decides that they can take a corkscrew out of inventory for us to use.  He won’t open it;  but we can, so I do!

It is getting late and we drive up and down the stretch between Rising Sun and St. Mary looking for animals.  There are several lovely meadows that are just crying out for wildlife diners!  Nothing!  Not a soul!  The park ranger tells us that we are looking at the right time and that there are animals all over the park.  And, that when we stop we need to be in a paved area.  

We’re also hoping for some sunset shots.   

LIFE IS GOOD.

Please note - we have limited internet in the park, so it may be a while before the next post!