Crown of the Continent, Backbone of the World: Part II, East Glacier

Driving around to the east side of Glacier, we stopped at Two Medicine to check out the "trick" waterfalls. Notice there are two.

Also, the rocks. Their color variation in the combination in which we see it is also caused by glacial movement. Each color essentially  represents a different set of millions of years. We get to see them all together because the glaciers grind things up and push them together. Also at Two Medicine, we were treated to some lovely lunch conversation.  We sidled  up next to a picnic bench with the best view, and got to chatting with Shawn and Kim. A heart attack at 51 prompted a life change and they sold everything, bought an RV and are traveling the US 150 miles at a time. Check out their blog here: ktmissouri.blogspot.com . We never cease to bump into fellow travelers who just reinforce that  if you work to make it real, anything is possible. Shawn and I both agreed, it's amazing what you can manage to do if you're willing to crunch a few numbers. 

Up to Many Glacier, this is the view from our "lake level" room

We were excited for the hiking at Many Glacier, and kicked off the day with a boat ride and the ranger guided hike to Grinnell Lake

Check us out at Grinnell Lake

Looking back at the boat on Lake Josephine

Our second hike of the day was to get as far up the Grinnell Glacier Lookout trail as the park service would let us go (the full trail won't  open until July when they blast away the remaining snow with dynamite). This is the bear grass glacier post card shot.  Misnomer on bear grass though, bears don't eat it, and it is not a grass.

On the trail we met a couple celebrating their 20th wedding anniversary. They took this photo for us. Maybe in 20 years we'll  be able to hike this trail again, we'll have to see how the knees hold up, it is well over 5 miles with a 1600ft elevation change.

This was as far as we could get, but it proved to be probably our favorite hike in the park, and maybe a favorite view too. On the upper left-middle, the round snow section is Gem glacier, next to it on, the right, sort of in the bowl of the mountain, Grinnell Glacier, and to the right of that, Salamander glacier. Feast your eyes now, because it's  likely that by 2030, these won't  be glaciers anymore (global warming is real!)

Looking back at the Many Glacier lodge, this swiss chalet style attracted wealthy Americans back in the 20's under the slogan, "See America First", as promoted by the great northern railroad  company. Now it feels a little hokey, and kind of big. If you could pick up Lake MacDonald Lodge and put it down here instead, you'd have a pretty winning combination. But seriosuly, no complaints,  this park is awesome.