Wild Goose Island

Glacier is Gorgeous!

I had a bit of an epiphany today. Well, I guess I don’t know if that’s true because it is a realization that I’ve had in the past and I think lurks in the subconscious of many: Often the work and chores we perform feel tedious because they seem to lack purpose. This idea has come to me before (why it’s so hard to clean a house but easier to cut and haul wood) but it returned today. We had our hotel yesterday (yes, it was a nice reprieve and a chance to rest) but today as we got to camp and set about fetching water and establishing shelter, I felt a sense of purpose as opposed to the almost restlessness that I had at the hotel. It was weird, but it was almost like all the options and possibilities at the hotel stressed me out.

Ok, enough personal psycho-analyzing, here’s what’s going on in the trip (instead of my head): We got to Glacier in mid-afternoon and its motto holds true (where the prairie meets the mountain). The mountains are absolutely fabulous to look at and unlike the Tetons, once you are in the park (at least in this eastern area), you are surrounded by hills and pinnacles. And the water!! The lakes and streams are the most gorgeous blue-green that you can imagine; I doubt the pictures will do them justice. As a comparison, imagine the waters of the Caribbean with a color twice as vibrant and a temperature half as much.

We decided to do a little hike today (that inadvertently turned into probably over 6 miles) up to some waterfalls. There were some people jumping off of a rock into the water at the base of a waterfall; we considered it but hadn’t brought extra clothes, suits, or anything else like that on the hike. The temperature is still scorching so it is an immense relief to encounter the waterfalls in the forest as the air cools and becomes more refreshing. For an even better experience, one can walk up next to them and feel the mist. So that’s about it for today, you probably won’t get this until we’re in Seattle (7/14). Until then…

PS-sorry, no good quotes from Tom; I try to remember the funny/silly/stupid stuff he says but I usually fail…I’m used to the “in one ear – out the other” system when he talks! :-)

More bear...miracle of technology lets me post back in time...scroll down 4 days

I Can Bear-ly Believe It!

Corny title, I know, but you will not believe how close a black bear came to our tent this morning. Tom got out of bed a minute or two before me and was talking to the campers across the way. When I poked my head out he was motioning me to get out of the tent and the only word I was picking up from the other campers’ conversation was “bear”. I ducked back in for the bear spray and skedaddled out of the tent. Sure enough, as I turned around there was a black bear about 15-20 yards from our tent. Holy crap! That was a wake-up call! Then, as we’re busy photographing and filming him, he starts to head for our tent (still open) and the van (also had the back door open…where all our food is). So I was running around trying to get things closed (forgot to stop the video so I apologize in advance for the bad Blair Witch feel to it all) and jump in the car. The bear did turn away before us though and kept digging his way over to the campsite next to us. He was VERY close to her tent, probably just a few feet. After that he meandered through the rest of the campsites on his way over the hill. Whew! And I thought that I wouldn’t have anything interesting to blog about today since we were just going to the hotel! As you’re looking at the pictures, I know you’re going to be thinking that the bear is small, but just remember this one fact: it’s a BEAR!!!

Mammoth Hot Springs...All Dried Up

Hey, Hey, One More Day!!

Now don’t get me wrong, the trip is going absolutely fantastic but I’ve gotta tell you: we’re looking forward to that hotel stay in Great Falls like no other! We were both pretty whipped this morning (cumulative effect of lots of hikes but probably mostly from our hard push up Mt. Washburn. We decided to take it easy today, walk the falls (Tower Falls) that are next to our campsite (we can hear their distant thunder at night) and then do an easy-ish hike around some meadows. The Tower Falls hike was OK, but it was a tough start to the morning because we were all stiff (think 3rd day of basketball conditioning).

We then decided to head up to the Mammoth Springs area (even though that’s the way we are leaving tomorrow) because there was supposed to be an easy hike called Beaver Ponds Trail (6 miles, 3 hours). We started looking at a few more maps once we got up there and discovered that what is “easy” to one author and mapmaker is considered “moderately strenuous” to another. In all honestly, it probably is an easy-moderate hike (there was a fair amount of up and down as well as switchbacks) but for us today, it definitely ranked closer to that “moderately strenuous” category. By the end we weren’t appreciating the abundant wildflowers or views from the ridge. Let me sidetrack for a minute about the wildflowers: they are amazing right now! We lucked out in that things are blooming a little early this year so we’re witnessing the mountainsides at their peak. There’s an abundance of blues and purple of varying varieties as well as a few different types of yellows. The oranges and reds seem to be less common. From the Black Hills to here we have also noticed wild roses that seem to closely approximate the KnockOut or Carefree varieties (shrub roses).

After the Beaver Ponds trail (which we still managed to do in 3 hours even though we were pretty much walking zombies at the end) we decided to forego our steady diet of sandwiches and eat at the little grill that they had in the town area of Mammoth. My chicken sandwich was pretty good but Tom’s burger was burnt worse than he does sometimes. As a nice bonus though I found a pair of sunglasses that I like enough to replace mine (the arm snapped in half a couple of days ago and I’ve been squinting non-stop since then.) As I close yet another parenthesis I once again implore all of you to not judge my writing style/skills based on this blog as I am pretty much going stream of consciousness…and trying to look for wildlife while Tom is driving.

The afternoon at Mammoth ended with a walk to the top of Mammoth Hot Springs…which was a disappointment. They were drying up when I was here 8 years ago and today there is water flowing in only a few spots. I’m not sure if this is a natural occurrence or a result of human influence on what is a very fragile ecosystem. Fortunately, that was our last bit of walking for today as Tom has developed a sore leg. The day off tomorrow will be a nice break.

Today we are driving through the Lamar Valley in hopes of seeing wildlife. So far, we’ve seen a lot of buffalo (there’s a huge herd along the river) which is pretty cool but we were hoping to see bears or wolves…we’re always on the lookout for something different. So that’s it for today. I probably won’t have much to say tomorrow (except about how nice it is to be at the hotel.)

Brandon: if you’re reading this, I’m going to try and give you a call soon (when I have a signal…if I can find your number) but we’ll be out there on the 14th if you want to come hang out downtown and maybe join us for a Tiger’s game.

Rewind: I forgot to mention that we saw a buffalo on the road while driving to Artist’s Point the other day…and it almost charged some people who were standing on the bridge as it crossed. The funny (for me anyway) part is that it was heading up a trail to a picnic area and I could see that the people sitting down and eating had no clue that it was coming. I’m sure that will make a great story.

PS: Tom wants me to add that one of the reasons we are looking forward to the hotel so much is that it has a personal bathroom.

View from Mystic Falls Hike - Notice the Steam Everywhere

View from atop Mt. Washburn

Grizzly Mama + Cubs

A Land of Extremes

“It seems like there should be dinosaurs here.” -Tom

Yellowstone is truly a land of extremes. This morning (7/8…Sunday I think) we started our day with a hike to Mystic Falls. Getting to the trailhead involved following a boardwalk over mini-geysers, fumaroles, and bacteria pools. As the steam rose around us we marveled at what early settlers must have thought as they first came upon the area. Of course, many of these early visitors (often trappers in the area) were ridiculed when they shared their stories back at the taverns of civilization. The hike was a pretty strenuous jaunt uphill to an observation point that overlooked the Old Faithful area and all of its geological hyper-activity. From then we continued down to Mystic Falls…waterfalls just don’t seem to get that old to me.

This afternoon we drove north, stopping at Artist’s Point for some pictures of the falls as they cascaded through the canyon. The canyon walls themselves were amazing; the colors ranged from a bright yellow to oranges and brick red. This little trip was also interesting as I almost saw a man fall off the cliff while he tried to sit on a rock for a picture.

After we got a campsite in the Tower Falls area and had a late lunch (real gourmet today…chicken breast, butter/herb noodles, corn) we decided that we still had enough time to do the Mt. Washburn hike. The view was supposed to be fantastic and guidebooks all but guaranteed a sighting of bighorn sheep. Alas, the trip was a failure in this regard as the sheep were apparently hiding in the valley today, but the view was absolutely marvelous. This was another strenuous hike with a (no exaggeration) continuous uphill the whole way. We did top out at over 10,000 feet (I’ll have to look at the picture of the sign to be certain of the height) so it really felt like we accomplished something. The fact that we did the whole thing in just under 3 hours means that we’re pretty tired now.

While in the parking lot after the Mt. Washburn hike we ran into a guy who was telling us that they had seen a grizzly mom with her two cubs just up the road. We left right away with the hope of seeing her before she moved on. Fortunately, our wildlife-viewing luck returned from its bighorn sheep sabbatical and we indeed came upon the grizzly on the hill above the road. She was making her way up the hill and the cubs were running around this way and that. It is amazing how effortless their movements look for being such a large animal.

Tomorrow we’re going to drive through Lamar Valley in the evening and hopefully see some more animals (we just keep checking them off the list!). Again, you’ll have to adjust for the dates because this won’t be posted until 7/10. If these posts seem like they are getting wordier (maybe they always seemed that way to you, or maybe you’re like Tom and just like to look at the pictures), just bear with me; I usually keep a journal on vacation and it seemed redundant to do the blog and the journal so this is serving as both.

I almost forgot! Last night we took a walk along the river by our camp (some bugs had hatched and the fish were jumping like crazy) when across the bend there was about 5-8 doe elk and 5 little fawns laying around and browsing in the grass. With the mountain in the background and the stream in the foreground, it really did look like a painting. Alas, you will have to take my word for it because we didn’t take the camera for the hike.