Hey everyone, we are in Helena this morning (actually last night) and about to go shopping for some food for the next 4 days to get us to Anaconda. Before I take a trip down memory lane I will tell you that we have decided that we will do the Anaconda cutoff route instead of the official route around Butte, which will allow us to stay with our now nearly-perpetual hiking partners, Hui, Vocal, and Mojave. This will also save us 3 days of hiking, so we will get further into Montana/Wyoming before flipping down to Ness's wedding August 19-20 in Durango. So our schedule may be slightly screwed up (At this point I think we will be 1 day ahead, maybe two, starting this thursday when we get to Anaconda).
This last segment was fast and fun and a little tough but mostly beautiful scenery mixed with hail and lightning. We left Lincoln about 9:45 with a nice ride from our new trail angel, Mike. Mike is driving his van along with Irish and Flop, who got to Lincoln on our zero day. Mike drove us all up tot he trail at Roger's Pass and we had a group of 7 to hike to Flesher Pass (14 miles). The hiking was real nice, a big climb and then real easy walking on the divide with great views, some wind, and nice temperatures. When we got to Flesher, Mike was there to pick up Irish and Flop, who would go back to Lincoln for another night, and he had cold drinks and extra water for the rest of us. We ended up hanging out at Flesher pass for two hours. We met a northbound hiker named Mr. Return (Ryan) who was hiking from Butte to Bend, OR via the CDT, PNW trail, and PCT in a counterclockwise loop. We also got some Budweiser from a passing motorist named Tracy, who was definitely a character.
We only did 4 more miles before camping and it rained during the night so in the morning everything was wet and we sortof got a late start considering we were going for a 25 mile day (due to water scarcity). The day started out relatively easy and we took lots of breaks in the morning at water sources and at Stemple Pass, where Mike was again waiting for Irish and Flop and so we saw him again. The latter part of the day had lots of steep climbing and little water and involved a very ferocious lightning and hail storm while we were on a ridgeline, so it was all very tiring, but we finally made it to Dana Spring late in the evening and camped witht he cows.
Yesterday we had about 20 miles to do to get to town and we got up early so we could make it by mid-afternoon. A lot of the hiking was on gravel roads and it was fairly easy until we hit the divide just north of Mullan Pass, where the trail (a jeep road) was intersected by a whole bunch of other jeep roads and trails and there were so many trees it was hard to see landmarks. We got separated from Hui and Vocal (who have GPS) and we ended up bushwacking along the continental divide for about an hour before realizing we were actually on a spur ridge east of the divide and about even with Mullan Pass across a valley. So we lost about an hour going down and then back up to get back on trail (at this point it was about 85 degrees; very sweaty). Too bad my navigational skills are backed by lots of confidence and less actual skill I suppose. After this catastrophe we were running low on water and a little testy (or at least I was) but we soon got to hike past an old narrow guage trestle and on an old railroad right of way, which was neat, and then we found a trickling stream where we didn't expect one, so the afternoon turned out ok.
When we got to Priest Pass we were about ready to start the biggest climb of the day but I got to take a slightly longer break than everyone else (at this point we had found Vocal) because we ran into a geologist (ooh!) who I wanted to talk to for a while and look at his geo-map, which I guess everybody else thought was nerdy, but it was exciting for me.
We got to McDonald Pass about 5 pm, which was later than we had hoped but Mike was there with some cold drinks and a ride into Helena for us, so hitchhiking wasn't necessary. All in all a nice, quick three days. I hope all of you are enjoying your summer as much as I am!
Travis
Monday, July 18, 2011
Thursday, July 14, 2011
Photos
I still haven't figured out photos, hopefully in Helena or Butte I will have time to figure it out and get some pictures available for viewing, as I know that thte scenery is more interesting than my typing.
Made it to Lincoln, MT
Hi everyone, this post may be briefer than anticipated as the library has a 30 minute internet window, 10 of which I have used checking my email already. If there is no line I will be able to flush out the details after my initial 30 minutes is up.
Liv and I made it to Rogers Pass last night about 8:15 and hitched down to Lincoln, MT with a very excited woman named Susie and her mother, grandson, and two dogs. Then we got a room at the Sportsmans motel, where Dan at reception was also very interesting to talk to. It is funny being away from people for so long and then getting to town and talking a mile a minute with such excited folks; we felt very lucky to have such a good night after a long day of walking in lots of rain to get to town.
Our trip from East Glacier was 9 days long, 6 1/2 to Benchmark Ranch (thanks Heckman's for holding a package) and 2 1/2 days to Lincoln. We hiked the whole way with Joel (except the last few hours) and most of the way with Hui and Vocal, which made a nice 5 person team and great group camping. We had very good weather for the entire nine day period except yesterday's rain and thunder.
We had heard that the Bob Marshall Wilderness section was going to be tough and involve a lot of snow and some bad river crossings, but it turned out not to be too bad. The first day we had lots of mud, a theme that would continue for large parts of the section, and our feet were constantly wet but it was more annoying than cold, as it was warm out. The first and second day involved a number of relatively easy crossings of the S. Two Medicine River and then late in the second day we had to cross Badger Creek just below the confluence of the north and south forks, which turned out to be our worst stream crossing. We were hiking with Joel and E.T. at the time and we spend almost two hours trying to find the shallowest place to cross before Liv finally had the bright idea to cross where it was deep and the current was slower, assuming that if we lost our footing we would only need a few quick swimming strokes to get to the gravel bar on the far shore. It turned out to work just fine and none of us lost our footing (though I was close on the last few steps) and we made it across except E.T. who didn't want to try it and decided to hike around on an alternate route that cost him about 7 miles total. We haven't seen him since then, but we think he will probably make Lincoln today, as Hui saw him the other day.
Day 3 we ran into Hui and Vocal about lunch time and the five of us hiked together for most of the rest of the section. The hiking for the next few days was largely in river valleys and in and out of burned areas, but the trail was well cleared and mostly very fast hiking. We did have to go through just a few hours of snow over Keven Mt and Switchback Pass. We have now officially named our five-some the Pirates of Switchback Pass, and we are hoping to catch some other hikers so we can loot their candy bars.
The trail was easy to follow until we got out of the canyon of Spotted Bear River and up onto the bench below the Chinese Wall, a 8000 ft high wall of limestone that is almost 20 miles long and runs right along the Continental Divide for much of the southern Bob Marshall Wilderness (Spectacular scenery!). The wall blocks all the afternoon sun from the terrain to the east and there was a lot of snow, but the routefinding was easy and we had a good time crossing the area.
The funniest occurance of the trail happened the day before we reached Benchmark Ranch, when all five of our group spread out and everyone was walking individually. I was second to last, with Vocal about 10 minutes behind me and Joel ahead of me and I came around a corner and heard a horrible squaking off to my left just before I caught sight of a hawk dive-bombing me with extended talons and I ducked just in time. The hawk was very upset with my presence and tried to attack me twice more, with my hiking poles defending my face from certain injury. After the third attack I just ran as fast as I could to get out of there. When I caught up to Liv and Joel I could see Joel telling Liv a story and gesturing and it was obvious the bird had attacked him too. It turned out that that hawk had tried to attack all four of the boys in our group and hadn't done anything to scare away Liv. Very scary, but at this point a real funny story, and one that Liv is very proud of avoiding.
We picked up our package and spent a few hours at Benchmark Ranch relaxing before starting the easy hike to Lincoln with no snow. We camped 22 miles from Rogers Pass the night before last with a group of trail crew volunteers (thanks guys!) who fed us chicken and stuffing (three Jims=good cooks) and were fun to talk to. We decided we might make a big day out of it and try to get to Lincoln a day earlier than planned and we made it last night, but we had to sit out over an hour of intense lightning and had to endure almost 5 hours of rain/hail/fog/mist and wind in order to get here.
We are now two days behind our initial schedule and feeling pretty good with our rest day today. We are thinking 3 days to Helena from here, so we should be there Sunday night or Monday mid-day, depending how ambitious we get. We are over 260 miles so far from the Canadian Border.
Thanks for those who have commented, I will either come back to the library to get some more computer time later this afternoon or reply to comments from Liv's Ipod Touch from the hotel. Hope everyone in Los Alamos is well with the fire and know I've been thinking about your safety.
Liv and I made it to Rogers Pass last night about 8:15 and hitched down to Lincoln, MT with a very excited woman named Susie and her mother, grandson, and two dogs. Then we got a room at the Sportsmans motel, where Dan at reception was also very interesting to talk to. It is funny being away from people for so long and then getting to town and talking a mile a minute with such excited folks; we felt very lucky to have such a good night after a long day of walking in lots of rain to get to town.
Our trip from East Glacier was 9 days long, 6 1/2 to Benchmark Ranch (thanks Heckman's for holding a package) and 2 1/2 days to Lincoln. We hiked the whole way with Joel (except the last few hours) and most of the way with Hui and Vocal, which made a nice 5 person team and great group camping. We had very good weather for the entire nine day period except yesterday's rain and thunder.
We had heard that the Bob Marshall Wilderness section was going to be tough and involve a lot of snow and some bad river crossings, but it turned out not to be too bad. The first day we had lots of mud, a theme that would continue for large parts of the section, and our feet were constantly wet but it was more annoying than cold, as it was warm out. The first and second day involved a number of relatively easy crossings of the S. Two Medicine River and then late in the second day we had to cross Badger Creek just below the confluence of the north and south forks, which turned out to be our worst stream crossing. We were hiking with Joel and E.T. at the time and we spend almost two hours trying to find the shallowest place to cross before Liv finally had the bright idea to cross where it was deep and the current was slower, assuming that if we lost our footing we would only need a few quick swimming strokes to get to the gravel bar on the far shore. It turned out to work just fine and none of us lost our footing (though I was close on the last few steps) and we made it across except E.T. who didn't want to try it and decided to hike around on an alternate route that cost him about 7 miles total. We haven't seen him since then, but we think he will probably make Lincoln today, as Hui saw him the other day.
Day 3 we ran into Hui and Vocal about lunch time and the five of us hiked together for most of the rest of the section. The hiking for the next few days was largely in river valleys and in and out of burned areas, but the trail was well cleared and mostly very fast hiking. We did have to go through just a few hours of snow over Keven Mt and Switchback Pass. We have now officially named our five-some the Pirates of Switchback Pass, and we are hoping to catch some other hikers so we can loot their candy bars.
The trail was easy to follow until we got out of the canyon of Spotted Bear River and up onto the bench below the Chinese Wall, a 8000 ft high wall of limestone that is almost 20 miles long and runs right along the Continental Divide for much of the southern Bob Marshall Wilderness (Spectacular scenery!). The wall blocks all the afternoon sun from the terrain to the east and there was a lot of snow, but the routefinding was easy and we had a good time crossing the area.
The funniest occurance of the trail happened the day before we reached Benchmark Ranch, when all five of our group spread out and everyone was walking individually. I was second to last, with Vocal about 10 minutes behind me and Joel ahead of me and I came around a corner and heard a horrible squaking off to my left just before I caught sight of a hawk dive-bombing me with extended talons and I ducked just in time. The hawk was very upset with my presence and tried to attack me twice more, with my hiking poles defending my face from certain injury. After the third attack I just ran as fast as I could to get out of there. When I caught up to Liv and Joel I could see Joel telling Liv a story and gesturing and it was obvious the bird had attacked him too. It turned out that that hawk had tried to attack all four of the boys in our group and hadn't done anything to scare away Liv. Very scary, but at this point a real funny story, and one that Liv is very proud of avoiding.
We picked up our package and spent a few hours at Benchmark Ranch relaxing before starting the easy hike to Lincoln with no snow. We camped 22 miles from Rogers Pass the night before last with a group of trail crew volunteers (thanks guys!) who fed us chicken and stuffing (three Jims=good cooks) and were fun to talk to. We decided we might make a big day out of it and try to get to Lincoln a day earlier than planned and we made it last night, but we had to sit out over an hour of intense lightning and had to endure almost 5 hours of rain/hail/fog/mist and wind in order to get here.
We are now two days behind our initial schedule and feeling pretty good with our rest day today. We are thinking 3 days to Helena from here, so we should be there Sunday night or Monday mid-day, depending how ambitious we get. We are over 260 miles so far from the Canadian Border.
Thanks for those who have commented, I will either come back to the library to get some more computer time later this afternoon or reply to comments from Liv's Ipod Touch from the hotel. Hope everyone in Los Alamos is well with the fire and know I've been thinking about your safety.
Monday, July 4, 2011
Schedule and such
Also, we are now two days behind our schedule and planning an extra day to Benchmark Ranch, so we will be three days behind. If you would like to know where we are, plan accordingly (to send cookies!).
Next post will be from Lincoln, MT, as there are no computers at BMRanch. Have a good ten days without us!
Next post will be from Lincoln, MT, as there are no computers at BMRanch. Have a good ten days without us!
Glacier National Park
Liv and I arrived in East Glacier today after six days in the national park. We started from the Chief Mountain trailhead, which is on the US side of the border about 200 yards from Canada. A potential Triple Crowner named Joel started with us and was with us for three and a half days. Overall I think we had a good time both physically and enjoyment-wise.
The trail from Chief Mountain descends to the Belly River and then goes up the river's drainage. The first day we hiked about 10 miles, starting mid-morning, and stopped for a rather long lunch and a nice chat at the Belly River ranger station, the only backcountry ranger station in the park. The ranger there was very friendly and I really want his job, though I doubt he will give it up anytime soon. The hiking was pretty flat and very beautiful, with mostly cloudy skies and mountains peaking out all around us. After lunch we stopped at Dawn Mist Falls for a little while and then reached our campsite at Elizabeth Lake in the early afternoon. The rest of the afternoon we lounged around and it rained for about an hour and a half. Then we made dinner and it started raining again, so we all turned in rather early and had a rainy, windy night (dry in our tents).
The next day we climbed a few thousand feet up to Red Gap Pass. There was a bit of snow in the trees on the climb, but once above treeline there was very little snow. The trail was easy to follow, though it was steep near the top and the wind was howling and gusting at what I would conservatively estimate at 50 mph. There were steps where my moving foot actually ended up behind where I had picked it up. We finally made it over the pass and out of the wind and had a descent through more snow and trees, but we weren't slowed down too much and we then had a really nice cruise on dry trail for a few miles to Poia Lake, where we had lunch. The rest of the day we climbed over Swiftcurrent ridge with only a little snow and then descended to Many Glacier Campground, where we took showers at the lodge. Joel knew some people that worked at the restaurant, so we got free beer and free pizza. A fourth thru-hiker, E.T., joined us late in our dinner. The evening was again very windy and I didn't get much sleep, but Liv slept through it all as always. The total for this day was 18 miles.
The third day we went up the valley of Cateract Creek and over Piegan Pass. It was to be a short, 13 mile day to the Going-to-the-sun Road, but the pass was not easy. About 5 miles of the approach were completely snow bound and we could not find the switchbacks up the pass, so we just went straight up a snow slope for about 1200 ft, which I thought was the easiest option but Liv did not enjoy do to the fear of falling and sliding all the way back down. At the top of the snow slope we again found the trail and ran into E.T., who we had somehow passed and who had found a better way up through the trees than our open slope. The four of us climbed the rest of the pass together and had a few scary snow crossings, including one that Liv and I scrambled around for fear of falling on the steep, hard-packed snow. After we finally reached the top of the pass we all decided that the best way down was straight down the valley and out to a bend in the GTTS Road, as the rest of the trail was completely covered in snow and would have involved a lot of side-hilling in the snow with nobody's tracks to follow. The descent involved a lot of sliding on our butts (or feet) and then a rather easy walk almost completely on snow down the middle of the creek valley to the road. We reached the road about 2 and had a late hot lunch (left over dinner from the free pizza night) and then roadwalked to where the cars were allowed to drive to before hitching to Rising Sun Campground (minus E.T., who walked on the trail further).
We camped at Rising Sun even though it was not on the trail because when we obtained our permit the ranger said that a section of the trail was closed and that we would have to roadwalk around through St. Mary's and the Rising Sun CG was halfway through the roadwalk. The trail turned out to be open when we got to the road, but we went to Rising Sun anyway because our permit was for that campsite. That night, the three of us decided not to go over Triple Divide pass the next day as planned because it would have been a very big day with a pass at the end of the day and we had heard reports that the pass was scarier than Piegan Pass, which had scared us.
So the fourth day we roadwalked to St. Mary's in the morning. At St. Mary's, Joel left us to hitch-hike into E. Glacier due to a knee injury. Liv and I continued roadwalking south on hwy 89 and 14 miles and then walked the Cut Bank road to Cut Bank Creek CG (24 miles total roadwalk). The road was fast walking, but the cars were annoying and the shoulder was skinny. We also both have worse toe blisters after the roadwalk and we had very sore feet by the end.
The fifth day we got back on the trail (with 2.5 extra miles from Cut Bank CG to the trail versus our planned itinerary) and then went over Pitamaken pass. I think this was our best day in the park. We had nice weather and a good trail to start with and then when we hit snow, Liv had some excellent navigation and we made good time on the first snow in the valley to Morning Star Lake and then on the climb up to Pitimaken Lake. The last 1000 feet of climbing to the pass was partly snow and partly exposed talus with the trail switchbacks pretty easy to follow. I hiked up a little higher to CutBank pass to get some photos and then met Liv just below Pitimaken for the final snow crossing, which turned out to be nice soft snow with good footprints from previous hikers. The top of the pass was beautiful and not windy, which made us linger a little longer than the other passes. The descent was unfortunately very scary, as we lost the trail and I mistakenly led us down a slope I thought the switchbacks were on but we ended up having to down-climb through a short cliff band and then we had to kickstep down a steep snow slope for about 50 yards before finding a good run out to safely slide the rest of the way down. The 1.5 mile descent ended up taking well over an hour and being the scariest part of the day, especially because dark clouds moved in while we were trying to safely descend. Once we made it down thoug the rest of the afternoon was easy hiking first on snow then on dry trail down another river valley and over a small spur ridge to Two Medicine CG, where the hiker/biker sites were situated at the far end of the campground from the trail, both in the evening and in the morning. In all we hiked 17 miles on the fifth day.
Today we hiked 10.5 miles over Scenic Point and down to the town of East Glacier. The morning's climb to Scenic Point was long, but well graded, and the hike to town was easy, mostly dry and snow-free, and had great wildflowers and views of the plains. We are now in town and have beds at the hostel for tonight, we've both showered and laundered clothes, and we found Joel, who is debating what to do about his knee. We are hoping he enters the Bob (Marshal Wilderness) with us tomorrow.
Overall we had a great time in this section and Glacier National Park is definitely a beautiful place. We saw a moose the first day, two black bears the second, one black bear the third, a bald eagle, elk, deer, marmots, pikas, chipmunks, lots of scat from many animals, and a great ranger talk on the illusive wolverine, though we didn't see any wolverines. We also saw a lot of wildflowers, many of which I don't know the names of. We haven't seen any grizzlies yet, and I think we both are ok with that. We got along pretty well and besides the rain the first night and the constant wind the first three days, our weather hasn't been too bad. The last three days have been warm and sunny and the weather is supposed to continue. We are looking forward to entering the Bob, where the elevations are a little lower and hopefully more snow-free, but we are worried about a number of big creek crossings that will not have bridges like in the national park.
Blister update!: Liv's heals are healing (one of her favorite jokes) and have not regressed at all. We have discovered 2nd skin, which she has been using every day and it seems to be working, though it does come off sometimes in the afternoon when feet are wet from snow melt/streams. She has bet me a fig newton that they will be completely healed in 2 more days, and even though I am looking forward to eating that fig newton I do think that her heals will be like new within another week. My little toes are about the same as when we finished our shakedown hike, still blistered but not awful. Liv's toes are also blistered, but she hasn't lost any toe nails yet! The balls of my feet are a little blisted from the road walk but they haven't gotten any worse and I expect them to be better tomorrow. Other than that, no injuries to report!
The trail from Chief Mountain descends to the Belly River and then goes up the river's drainage. The first day we hiked about 10 miles, starting mid-morning, and stopped for a rather long lunch and a nice chat at the Belly River ranger station, the only backcountry ranger station in the park. The ranger there was very friendly and I really want his job, though I doubt he will give it up anytime soon. The hiking was pretty flat and very beautiful, with mostly cloudy skies and mountains peaking out all around us. After lunch we stopped at Dawn Mist Falls for a little while and then reached our campsite at Elizabeth Lake in the early afternoon. The rest of the afternoon we lounged around and it rained for about an hour and a half. Then we made dinner and it started raining again, so we all turned in rather early and had a rainy, windy night (dry in our tents).
The next day we climbed a few thousand feet up to Red Gap Pass. There was a bit of snow in the trees on the climb, but once above treeline there was very little snow. The trail was easy to follow, though it was steep near the top and the wind was howling and gusting at what I would conservatively estimate at 50 mph. There were steps where my moving foot actually ended up behind where I had picked it up. We finally made it over the pass and out of the wind and had a descent through more snow and trees, but we weren't slowed down too much and we then had a really nice cruise on dry trail for a few miles to Poia Lake, where we had lunch. The rest of the day we climbed over Swiftcurrent ridge with only a little snow and then descended to Many Glacier Campground, where we took showers at the lodge. Joel knew some people that worked at the restaurant, so we got free beer and free pizza. A fourth thru-hiker, E.T., joined us late in our dinner. The evening was again very windy and I didn't get much sleep, but Liv slept through it all as always. The total for this day was 18 miles.
The third day we went up the valley of Cateract Creek and over Piegan Pass. It was to be a short, 13 mile day to the Going-to-the-sun Road, but the pass was not easy. About 5 miles of the approach were completely snow bound and we could not find the switchbacks up the pass, so we just went straight up a snow slope for about 1200 ft, which I thought was the easiest option but Liv did not enjoy do to the fear of falling and sliding all the way back down. At the top of the snow slope we again found the trail and ran into E.T., who we had somehow passed and who had found a better way up through the trees than our open slope. The four of us climbed the rest of the pass together and had a few scary snow crossings, including one that Liv and I scrambled around for fear of falling on the steep, hard-packed snow. After we finally reached the top of the pass we all decided that the best way down was straight down the valley and out to a bend in the GTTS Road, as the rest of the trail was completely covered in snow and would have involved a lot of side-hilling in the snow with nobody's tracks to follow. The descent involved a lot of sliding on our butts (or feet) and then a rather easy walk almost completely on snow down the middle of the creek valley to the road. We reached the road about 2 and had a late hot lunch (left over dinner from the free pizza night) and then roadwalked to where the cars were allowed to drive to before hitching to Rising Sun Campground (minus E.T., who walked on the trail further).
We camped at Rising Sun even though it was not on the trail because when we obtained our permit the ranger said that a section of the trail was closed and that we would have to roadwalk around through St. Mary's and the Rising Sun CG was halfway through the roadwalk. The trail turned out to be open when we got to the road, but we went to Rising Sun anyway because our permit was for that campsite. That night, the three of us decided not to go over Triple Divide pass the next day as planned because it would have been a very big day with a pass at the end of the day and we had heard reports that the pass was scarier than Piegan Pass, which had scared us.
So the fourth day we roadwalked to St. Mary's in the morning. At St. Mary's, Joel left us to hitch-hike into E. Glacier due to a knee injury. Liv and I continued roadwalking south on hwy 89 and 14 miles and then walked the Cut Bank road to Cut Bank Creek CG (24 miles total roadwalk). The road was fast walking, but the cars were annoying and the shoulder was skinny. We also both have worse toe blisters after the roadwalk and we had very sore feet by the end.
The fifth day we got back on the trail (with 2.5 extra miles from Cut Bank CG to the trail versus our planned itinerary) and then went over Pitamaken pass. I think this was our best day in the park. We had nice weather and a good trail to start with and then when we hit snow, Liv had some excellent navigation and we made good time on the first snow in the valley to Morning Star Lake and then on the climb up to Pitimaken Lake. The last 1000 feet of climbing to the pass was partly snow and partly exposed talus with the trail switchbacks pretty easy to follow. I hiked up a little higher to CutBank pass to get some photos and then met Liv just below Pitimaken for the final snow crossing, which turned out to be nice soft snow with good footprints from previous hikers. The top of the pass was beautiful and not windy, which made us linger a little longer than the other passes. The descent was unfortunately very scary, as we lost the trail and I mistakenly led us down a slope I thought the switchbacks were on but we ended up having to down-climb through a short cliff band and then we had to kickstep down a steep snow slope for about 50 yards before finding a good run out to safely slide the rest of the way down. The 1.5 mile descent ended up taking well over an hour and being the scariest part of the day, especially because dark clouds moved in while we were trying to safely descend. Once we made it down thoug the rest of the afternoon was easy hiking first on snow then on dry trail down another river valley and over a small spur ridge to Two Medicine CG, where the hiker/biker sites were situated at the far end of the campground from the trail, both in the evening and in the morning. In all we hiked 17 miles on the fifth day.
Today we hiked 10.5 miles over Scenic Point and down to the town of East Glacier. The morning's climb to Scenic Point was long, but well graded, and the hike to town was easy, mostly dry and snow-free, and had great wildflowers and views of the plains. We are now in town and have beds at the hostel for tonight, we've both showered and laundered clothes, and we found Joel, who is debating what to do about his knee. We are hoping he enters the Bob (Marshal Wilderness) with us tomorrow.
Overall we had a great time in this section and Glacier National Park is definitely a beautiful place. We saw a moose the first day, two black bears the second, one black bear the third, a bald eagle, elk, deer, marmots, pikas, chipmunks, lots of scat from many animals, and a great ranger talk on the illusive wolverine, though we didn't see any wolverines. We also saw a lot of wildflowers, many of which I don't know the names of. We haven't seen any grizzlies yet, and I think we both are ok with that. We got along pretty well and besides the rain the first night and the constant wind the first three days, our weather hasn't been too bad. The last three days have been warm and sunny and the weather is supposed to continue. We are looking forward to entering the Bob, where the elevations are a little lower and hopefully more snow-free, but we are worried about a number of big creek crossings that will not have bridges like in the national park.
Blister update!: Liv's heals are healing (one of her favorite jokes) and have not regressed at all. We have discovered 2nd skin, which she has been using every day and it seems to be working, though it does come off sometimes in the afternoon when feet are wet from snow melt/streams. She has bet me a fig newton that they will be completely healed in 2 more days, and even though I am looking forward to eating that fig newton I do think that her heals will be like new within another week. My little toes are about the same as when we finished our shakedown hike, still blistered but not awful. Liv's toes are also blistered, but she hasn't lost any toe nails yet! The balls of my feet are a little blisted from the road walk but they haven't gotten any worse and I expect them to be better tomorrow. Other than that, no injuries to report!
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