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Pat at Glacier National Park |
Montana, Glacier and Waterton National Parks
July 31, 1998
The drought ended with a bang! Explosions of thunder boomed across the peaks of the Rocky Mountains. It echoed down the steep slopes of the Canadian, glacial valley and across Cameron Lake which straddles the border between the United States and Canada. Canoers headed for the bank and swimmers left the water. Escaping away from the approaching storm, we entered Red Rock Canyon and observed three bears in three separate areas as they munched on huckleberries. These berries sell for from about $25 to $35 a gallon, depending on quality. Building up bear fat for winter hibernation does not come cheap. Spotting bears is easy. Just look for a line of cars parked on and off the road and determine where the tourists are looking. Sure, we probably miss lots of bears using this approach, but three bears in a short time ain’t too bad.
We all (my sister Peggy, Sonny Miller, Pat and I) agreed that it had been a very enjoyable day -- good company in a very scenic part of the world. Lunch in the historic Prince of Wales Hotel overlooking upper Waterton Lake was a special treat.
The morning began with a drive over the “Going to the Sun” highway. On previous trips, we had seen mountain goats at a very close range at Logan Pass on this highway. One large, white, billy goat followed us down the trail and made Pat a little nervous. “They are wild animals, after all,” she exclaimed. We sat on a rock on the side of the trail and watched as the billy walked closely by on the trail, as unconcerned with our presence as if we were rocks. A nanny walked up to an overlook and seemed to imitate the tourists by standing upright, placing her front hooves on the wooden rail and looking down across Hidden Lake far below. Then she started licking the wooden railing. Apparently, she was seeking the sweaty stuff that human hands leave on railings when they grip it tightly to keep from falling over the cliff. She systematically moved along the railing to harvest as many of these tasty nutrients as possible. Her white, little kid followed dutifully as tourists on both sides watched in amazement. Four pre-teen girls appeared and walked directly behind the nanny, apparently without noticing her. You might have thought that the girls would notice the unusual outfit that nanny was wearing, but they were too busy chatting. Somehow I suspect that their response to these wild animals would have been the same if it had been a grizzly bear standing there at the overlook. Anyway, the nanny looked casually back over her shoulder at them and then returned to her licking.
A small herd of bighorn sheep were not quite as close as the goats but gave us an excellent view of them as we walked the boardwalk that runs up the mountain behind the visitor’s center. We were all thrilled with the diversity and beauty of the flowers that grow in the tundra there. It looks much like a flower garden with purple monkey flowers, St. John’s wort, glacier lilies, red and yellow paintbrushes, lupines, and many other species of flowers carpeting the tundra. Columbian ground squirrels eat the flowers as fast as they can, but there are too many flowers and too few squirrels, so plenty of the flowers remain to paint the mountainside with hues of red, blue, white and many other colors. The squirrels are a favorite food of grizzly bears. We watched one large grizzly hunting in the valley below. Once he ran a short distance, pounced, and then dug awhile, maybe trying to get a squirrel. But he gave up quickly and continued his search for food.
But back in Canada, it was now time to head home back over the mountains. The sky was dark and becoming darker. We headed into the approaching storm. Light rain fell as we headed south and back into the United States. After some coffee and frozen yogurt at St. Mary, we started back up the steep mountain on the Going to the Sun highway. Heavy rain started to fall. I switched the wipers to full speed, but the rain was too fast and heavy. Even with the lights on, I could barely see the line in the middle of the road beside the car. The lights of oncoming cars were not visible until they were very close. We drove a few minutes in this downpour and somehow managed to avoid cars and rocky cliffs until the rain slowed. Ahead we could see the tail lights of several cars that were stopped in the highway. As we drew near we could see that they had stopped because of a large rock was blocking the highway. We first wondered if there were any cars or people trapped under the slide, but saw no evidence of such. Had we arrived a few minutes earlier, we might have been buried under the slide ourselves. The highway was fairly wide at the site, so it was possible to drive around the slide without being swept into the valley below. Not wanting to hold up traffic and a little concerned about the possibility of additional slides, we drove through the fast-flowing, ankle-deep, brown, water and bounced over rocks and pieces of tree limbs to the other side of the slide. A short time later we approached a second slide – not as big as the first, but still requiring a little detour. It was obvious that the heavy rain clouds had come down the mountain in the direction that we were traveling. The highway was littered with fallen rocks, some larger than a man’s head. When possible, I drove in the lane as far from the rocky cliff as possible so that falling rocks would not hit us. We dodged rocks, washed-out highway, and other cars until we again reached Logan Pass.
As we drove down the west side of the mountain, the sky began to clear. The highway was very wet, so I drove carefully. The sun broke through the clouds. Pat said, “Wow! There is a beautiful rainbow behind us -- but, don’t look.” She didn’t want me to take my eyes from the narrow, rain-slick, rock-strewn, mountain highway. I parked at the next pull-off and we looked back. Not one, but two beautiful rainbows framed the mountainside and the highway we had so recently traveled. It also framed the high mountain snow and the streams that fell over the cliffs. The evening sunshine streamed through the recently washed mountain air and fell on the forests of the lower mountain slopes to reveal an extraordinary green that was contrasted against a few very white clouds in the valley below. It was a very magical moment! Sonny and I wondered if the photos of the scene that we took could really capture the incredible color and majesty of that mountain after the rain.
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| Sonny, Pat and Peggy |
We left that scene and continued driving down the mountain. An occasional rock, loosened by the rain, fell onto the road before or beside us, but we escaped with no new dents in our Honda CRV. In the valley below, we looked for the “pot of gold” where we had seen the end of the rainbow from above, but were disappointed to find none. Oh well, the rangers would not allow us to keep it anyway. But we left that mountain with memories worth a small pot of gold. If not a pot of gold, maybe a gallon of huckleberries. We had experienced a little adventure, got an adrenaline rush, and now have a new set of memories with which we can entertain our friends beside an evening campfire (or Blogger) someday.
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