Glacier National Park and Beyond
(July 10-2008)
Our drive through Wyoming to Glacier National Park in Montana takes us through much Indian territory history, and today's lush hay farms. In Montana we saw a lot of hay being cut, dried and baled.
Each of these round bales of hay can weigh from 750 to 1,500 lbs. The large square one's weigh 800 lbs. We saw a tractor with a hay spear (or prong) loading one, but got this picture off the internet.
Maneuvering and loading these large bales could be dangerous.
Enjoying some horse camaraderie.
Two braves lookin' for a cup of coffee?
Glacier National Park
It's getting late but we're almost to Glacier Park.
The East entrance is more or less closed for the night, and signs indicate there's lots of road work going on inside the park. Not far past the entrance is a campground where we spend the night.
We're up early the next morning and after breakfast I take a few pictures. It's a nice place to camp....but time to move out. We went through the park many years ago in our car. The last time we tried (from the west entrance) we were in our other motor home and they wouldn't let us go through, because it was a little to long. You'll see why as you travel along with us. The two lane and sometimes one lane road winds along the mountainside and usually requires repairs from slides etc. There are a couple of tunnels, and workmen are constructing rock walls along the canyon side of the road. However, you can park your motor home and take a tour bus from designated parking areas at both sides of the park.
Here comes a tour bus, and...that waterfall looks like it might get us wet.
Closed the window just in time!
Don't you love these red convertible tour coaches?
In the 1930's the National Park Service developed a program with the White Motor Company of Cleveland, OH, for the production of canvas-topped touring coaches to provide transportation for visitors within national parks. More than 500 vehicles were manufactured in the mid-1930's and were purchased for use in various western national parks including Bryce Canyon, Glacier, Grand Canyon, Rocky Mountain, Mt. Rainier, Yellowstone, Yosemite, and Zion National Parks. While the canvas-topped tour bus experience was replaced elsewhere, the fleet of (red) buses are maintained at Glacier National Park. The buses were ideal for trips across the Going-to-the-Sun Road. The open-air touring coaches afforded visitors a multi-sensory experience. The drivers known as 'Gear Jammers' toured the Reds across the Continental Divide.
Blue green glacier water flowing towards McDonald Lake.
These river rapids are terrific.
This little squirrel's curiosity got the best of him.
McDonald Lake and a tour boat you can take. This lake is 472 feet deep; making it the deepest lake in the park.
It's too bad more people don't get around in America, so that they would know about it's history and how powerful forces of climate etc. are constantly changing the earth's surface. This glacial Lake was formed by a river of ice over 2,000 feet thick that moved down this valley. Lake McDonald is evidence of it's passing. When the glacier receded more than 10,000 years ago, it revealed a changed landscape. The ice had quarried away huge amounts of rocks. A terminal moraine dammed McDonald Creek, impounding Lake McDonald. Glaciers are slow moving rivers of ice. Like conveyor belts they transport large volumes of material. As rocks and dirt pile up along the edes of the melting ice, they form moraines. Material that builds up at the snout is called a terminal moraine; debris deposited along the sides forms lateral moraines. The ridge across the lake and the ridgeline behind behind us are covered by lateral moraines left by the glacier.
Our travels reveal that the United States was once covered by glaciers. They carved the great beautiful valleys we now enjoy while they were melting and moving. Mastodon and wooly mammoth remains have been found all over Canada, North America, and central Mexico. These large, elephant-like animals roamed the earth 26 million to 10 thousand years ago, but suddenly disappeared. Was it because of global warming, or was it something else? Recent studies by scientists in Ohio and New York concluded that tuberculosis may have been partly responsible for the extinction of the mastodon. It was one of the largest land animals living during the ice age. Mastodon belonged to the family Mammutidae, that originated in North Africa, spreading to Eurasia and entering North America millions of years ago. Apparently, they were mostly adapted to feeding on conifer forests that flourished in the cold climate.
The Oakland Museum of California Natural Sciences department brought a nearly complete fossil skeleton (right) of an American mastodon (Mammut americanum), a distant relative of the modern Indian elephant, to the museum in October 1999. The fossilized bones, found lying in their anatomically correct positions at Rustler Ranch in northeastern California, had been virtually undisturbed. The mastodon was discovered by a ranch hand who spied a part of an animal's tooth sticking out of the soil at a stream bank. Further investigation revealed that the skeleton was buried under six to eight feet of soil and occupied an area 10 by 12 feet. Roger Fiddler, owner of Rustler Ranch, removed the soil above the skeleton. He then invited the museum's Natural Sciences staff to help in final excavation and removal of the fossil mastodon. So here we have a brief picture of how different this country was when it was covered with glaciers.
We're leaving Glacier Park through the west gate, and heading for Bonner's Ferry, Idaho where sister Kathy lives.
More glacial information, plus the revelation that the Kutenai Indians farmed a type of tobacco.
A collector or antique farming equipment lives here.
It's just about an early dinner time when we get to this spot by Lake Koocanusa bridge.
I heard a steady, very weird humming. It turned out to be the wind blowing through the metal bridge. In the movie, I didn't turn the right way and the sound is more like a roar. When I faced the opposite direction, the sound is more like the original sound. However, while taking the movie and pictures the wind increased to the point that it almost knocked me down.
We ate dinner and then moved on. The wind was really blowing through this canyon.
The dam and power plant at the lower end.
Bird's eye view of the lake and dam.
We're approaching Libby, and as you can see (below) the wind is trying to blow us off the road.
This helicopter was taking off. It kind of blew sideways and then went up.
As we get closer to Bonner's Ferry firemen stopped the traffic, because power lines blew down. We had to turn around and take a detour.
Debris and rain swirling around us. Some trees down along the detour...
We made it to the highway above Bonner's Ferry, and notice this building that blew down.
It was a tense trip down the canyon, and a relief to reach Kathy's place. Everyone says it was the worst wind-storm they've ever experienced here.
