Day 15, Glacier NP

This morning we started off our day with the experience of a lifetime. On our way to the park, we passed by a helicopter tour station and decided to check it out. Since the tours were at a discounted price we scheduled ourselves in for the soonest flight possible that would take us through the mountains and valleys of Glacier NP. It was absolutely exhilarating! With huge windows on every side of the chopper, we got amazing views of all the mountains, lakes, and forests as we soared over the park. Our tour was a half hour long, but the minutes flew by as we stared in awe out the windows and snapped picture after picture. It was also really fun wearing the headsets because it made us feel like official pilots. Roger, roger!

When we finally entered the park, after waiting in line behind at least 50 other cars, our first stop was at the shores of Lake McDonald. Here Jessie and I waded through the refreshing water collecting interesting rocks as Dad took pictures of us and the mountainous background. With lots of stuff to do though, we were back on the road after a little while and onto hiking some trails.

Unfortunately, the park was so crowded that we had trouble finding a parking space everywhere we went. Not wanting to waste too much time circling the lots we settled on taking a shuttle bus up to Logan’s Pass, the major trail in the park. The bus passed spectacular waterfalls and gave us terrific views of the mountains and a couple snow caves. However, having not brought any of our hiking supplies on the bus, we thought it best to take the bus back down, collect our stuff and then just drive back up the mountains and try our luck with finding a parking space.

After a quick lunch we drove back up, with a short delay because of some roadside construction. While I went into the Visitor Center to buy some postcards, Jessie and Dad circled the lot in pursuit of an available space. After numerous circles, they finally managed to park our Dusty Bullet in a relatively close spot to the trailhead.

The Logan’s Pass trail we took went on for at least 20 miles, but we only hiked around 5 miles roundtrip. Though the hike was easy, the trail was pretty narrow and had us walking right alongside the edge of the cliff, which was pretty nerve-racking in some spots. But the panoramic views were defiantly worth the trip. One of the day’s biggest highlights though came walking down the trail as we took a family picture. Trudging along the gravel path as if it were a person, a mama mountain goat and her kid passed within a foot of us. They were so close, we could have reached out and pet them, but seeing as they were wild and the mama had a full set of horns, we decided to step back and be cautious. Once they were out of view, we continued our hike, walking all the way until we reached a waterfall about 2 ½ miles from our car. Here we took a break, snapped some pics, and cooled our water bottles in the ice-cold stream that flowed down the side of the mountain. After about ten minutes here we began our way back to the car. To our surprise, we encountered the mountain goat family again. They were standing right in the middle of the path, and several groups, including us, had their cameras out and ready to go. When they began climbing down the steep edge of the cliff, Jessie and I were able to walk behind them and have Dad take a really cool picture of us with the goat and her adorable kid.
Then, within the next ten minutes as we were walking along the last 200 yards of the trail, we spotted several rams grazing in behind a bundle of small pine trees. As they moved out in to the open field to the side we counted seven fully-grown sheep, all with giant curly horns. We couldn’t believe the luck we had with all the animal sightings. First we saw elk, then a baby bear, and now we had mountain goats and big horned sheep to add to our list.

We ended the day driving to our hotel and making a couple of quick stops alongside the road to take some pictures of fields of hay and wheat. Our hotel turned out to be really nice too, and with no major plans for tomorrow we will all take advantage of the luxury of sleeping in tomorrow morning, something we weren’t not able to do today. This day was without a doubt my favorite part of this vacation, and we will surely have tons of stories to tell everyone when we get back home.