Day 14: Glacier National Park Continued

The morning is chilly, which means that it's hard to get out of the covers that are covered by our sleeping bags. As soon as we are out of bed, Red makes her coffee in her percolator and Yellow prepares his hot chocolate. We eat inside the RV. The temperature rises pretty quickly with the sun. We really wanted to do the Iceberg Lake Trail that Lonely Planet speaks about in high esteem, but due to the yellow knees and the red ankles we will be hiking on a flat surface today, which still has its share of great scenery.

 

We plan to hike to Grinnell Lake instead. We leave the campground on foot and head toward the Many Glacier hotel, which would be a beautiful place to wake up with the beautiful landscape in front of your eyes. We continue on the Swiftcurrent Trail by walking the wooded shores of Swiftcurrent Lake and Lake Josephine. Further into the valley is Grinnell Lake, that we reach after walking on wooden planks above swampy grounds and crossing a furious torrent on a suspended bridge, three feet above the actually trickling water. Grinnell Lake is magnificent, surrounded imposing mountains and hiding Grinnell Glacier from our eyes.

 

We decide to have lunch there until some mosquitoes start attacking us. We retreat back to the trickling torrent and eat there. We walk back on the other sides of the lakes. The trail is less wooded, but is swarmed by vegetation. Again there are some thimble berries among others. It's pretty busy because of the boat tours that take tourists around the lakes.

After walking for 8 miles, we get back to the campground around 3pm. That gives us a good amount of time to relax. There is no electricity neither are there showers at Many Glacier Campground, so we are left to our own devices. We fill up a bucket with fresh cold water and wash our faces, hair, and other extremities. We repair the yellow bike's rear tire and write a bunch of thank-you letters with the company of our new pet ground squirrel.

 

Then we make some phone calls at a pay phone, as we haven't had cell phone service in 4 days. This transaction end up taking all of our change. We go to bed with the sun again after a very relaxing evening.