Glacier National Park

Glacier National Park and Waterton National Park, its Canadian counterpart across the border they share (no Wall between them…yet), were designated in 1932 as the world’s first International Peace Park.  Ironically, we arrived there as Donald Trump was tweeting insults at Canadian Prime Minister Trudeau after the infamous G-7 conference.

We repeated our de facto drill when we arrive at a national park – first-day driving tour, second-day dog-friendly hike and a serious hike on the third day.

Lake McDonald, located just inside the park’s western entrance, gives the place a powerful first impression.  The lake is 10 miles long and 500 feet deep.

We were only able to drive a few miles past the lake, because the famous Going To The Sun Road is closed due to snow.  In June.

So we settled for lunch at the Lake McDonald Lodge, one of the hotels built throughout the park 100 years after the War of 1812 (there’s no evidence that Canada has ever tried to burn them down) by the Great Northern Railway to promote tourism.  Their designs mimic Swiss chalets and were supposed to be the centerpiece of the railroad’s vision of promoting Glacier as “America’s Switzerland.”  We ate Montana food (elk) and drank California wine – sorry, Great Northern (which long ago merged into Burlington Northern anyway).

While driving out of the park, we had our first bear sighting.  Ginny was beside herself with excitement, but fortunately she stayed beside me…in the Jeep. 

As we drove to our hike Wednesday morning, we noticed cars suddenly pulling off the road.  Luckily for us, we followed the crowd.  We walked down to the edge of Lake McDonald, which was perfectly still and provided us these stunning mirror images.

Our hike Wednesday was to Avalanche Lake, so named because it’s at the foot of a bowl of mountains, and snow slides down the mountains into the lake during wintertime.  
One striking feature of the terrain on the hike was the large number of fallen trees in the woods near the trail.  

We asked a park ranger about this (wondering if it was due to some tree blight or other disease) and were told this is a natural phenomenon, and all the park does is keep the trails clear and remove any trees or debris that could endanger visitors.  The Park Service has a little unfinished clean-up business adjacent to the trail we were on!

Many of the parts of Glacier we wanted to see were affected by the recent snow, so we weren’t there as long as we’d planned.  However, it’s prominent on our list of places to return to!