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Scaling the mountainside along this hewed diagonal appeared even more foreboding.... |
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but I was wrong again. A stone wall, which ended at Ptarmigan Tunnel, bordered the trail. The gold patch like the one above and to the right of Steve gave the tops of some mountains a gilded look. Finally seeing it up close, we learned it was lichen. |
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Like Steve, I sat on the wall - about a second. Concerned that the weight of my backpack would conspire with the wind to tip me over the side, I sat long enough to marginally convince myself I'd faced my fear of heights. |
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Layers of rock at the Ptarmigan Wall signify the passage of time. |
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Entering the tunnel. (a much doctored photo) |
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Beyond the tunnel lies Ptarmigan Lake and Mt. Wilbur to the right. Late in the afternoon we rested at Ptarmigan Falls where we'd stopped during our first day hike to Iceberg Lake. Coming full circle, we felt more clear, confident and centered from our week in the mountains, as though we'd sat a 10-day meditation retreat. |
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| On our last day in the park we weren't ready to slouch. After long showers, a scrumptious vegan meal at The Park Café in nearby St. Mary and a night in a real bed, we arrived at Grinnell Glacier trailhead at 7 a.m. On the hike to Grinnell Glacier we passed another wonderful creek. See the wildflowers amidst the falling water? |
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Grinnell Glacier is the larger glacier in this photo. We've read that it's about 300 acres in size, although from we were it looked much smaller. |
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Steve finding a new use for hiking poles, which, along with Ace bandages, saved our knees. |
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We lunched on boulders at Grinnell Glacier Lake, and drank its unusually mineral-rich water. The glacier was, indeed, much more impressive up close and personal.
An interesting phenomenon of this trip was how quickly and dramatically views changed with each stretch of trail, each seemingly redundant switchback, each oxygen-depleting climb and knee-jarring descent. We anticipated little and walked mostly in silence when we weren't admiring the weight and texture of a large, sluggish toad; chuckling at Ptarmigan chicks as they frantically scurried on the trail ahead; whispering to a doe as it moseyed near our campsite; or whooping as we refreshed ourselves in cold valley lakes. Despite sometimes having long miles ahead, we stopped or paused often to observe what we knew too soon would be a memory. Our backpacking trip was an excursion into a place that was unspoiled, a place that resonated pitch perfect with our inner essence.
Sometimes, we even felt ourselves . . .
. . . merge with the mountains.
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Thank you for joining us on our adventure. In case your hiking boots are calling from the back of the closet, we're including the park's website.
Glacier National Park web page.
Click here if you'd like to hike these trails again.
Narrative: Jordan Dye
Web page design (my first effort): Steve Shealy ............ www.SteveShealyPhD.com
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