Thursday, June 28, 2012

Glacier Part 1

Beauty is everywhere. There are only a few places that I struggle to find something beautiful about, but just because I can find beauty almost anywhere does not mean that I think everywhere is equally pretty. Even if I had before, I wouldn't now. Glacier National Park is that amazing.


This was a real treat because we've both had it on our summer vacation bucket lists for a couple years. The drive there from West Yellowstone was fantastic, and I think we were both completely in love with Montana before we even got to the park. Granted, it is summer. That's an easy time to fall in love with Montana.


We arrived at the park in the evening and naturally set up camp right away. We wanted to get started on the Going to the Sun road before the sun dropped too low in the sky. We stopped at some of the main switchbacks so we could get out and drool over the gorgeousness of it all for a while. The lighting was a little harsh, but I still love how the pictures turned out.

Looking at how the forest has recovered from previous fires gives me hope for the hillsides burning from the Waldo Canyon Fire in Colorado right now. We may try to control it, but nature will always prevail. After time the mountains around my hometown will be lovely again, just as these are.


There really are no words to describe how incredible it is.


Jim was lucky enough to get his wish! He's always wanted to see Bighorn sheep in the wild and we got quite a good show from these guys. They were coming down the mountain to cross the road. I was taking about a million pictures in the hope that one would turn out ok (since I had to hold the camera out the window and couldn't look through it). When I stopped to see how they were turning out these two guys smacked their horns together like something on the Discovery Channel. I caught the tail end of it, but missed the big smack because I was staring at a 2 inche LCD screen. Note to self: take 8 million pictures but look through them LATER.


We were about as close to them as we could be.


As evidenced by this guy right by my window.

I was more concerned with bears here than most of the places we camp. I'm not sure why. There weren't any bear lockers at each campsite and we were allowed to keep food in the car, unlike some places we've been. There wasn't a resident bear in the campsite like when we were at Black Canyon of the Gunnison in Colorado, and there hadn't been any recent sightings posted at the ranger station. Even still, I was nervous. We decided to set up our grill and cook dinner at a picnic area in the park rather than back at camp. We were right by a lovely lake with a deer who just hung out with us for a while.


It seemed that everywhere we looked there were more waterfalls.


I totally love the blossoms of the bear grass. It's crazy to think that it sends up a stalk of blooms once every 5-10 years.


After reaching the end of the road and turning around we were surprised to see the sheep were still hanging around. Despite all the traffic, cameras, and gawking tourists, they just did their own thing. This guy was standing so majestic he looked just like a statue to me.

We headed back, crashed in the tent, and awaited the adventures of the coming day. 

2 comments:

  1. You guys look like you are having so much fun! I love that you are such adventurers!

    ReplyDelete
  2. Those pictures are ahhhmazing! I want to go road tripping too. :)

    ReplyDelete

OOOH oooh!! We love comments!!!