DAY 21
Week 3
GLACIER NATIONAL PARK (Montana, USA)
Tuesday July 11th, 2006
TODAYS MILEAGE – 137 miles or 220 kilometres
TRIP MILEAGE – 2068 miles or 3328 kilometres
It may have me a taken a while, but today was spent exploring the Going-To-The-Sun Road.
After being up until midnight getting Monday's blog update sorted, I got up around 7AM with the aim of getting an early start on checking out the 50 mile long Going-To-The-Sun road. It's an engineering marvel in it's own right, made all the more impressive that it was originally built in 1916.
As luck would have it, I pulled into the Avalanche Creek trailhead around 8AM, just in time to join a Park Ranger guided walk to Avalanche Lake. This was very informative, but took a fair amount of time to cover the 2 mile inbound hike. As the ranger had only just undertook quadruple bypass surgery 8 weeks ago, I decided to let it slide this time. 
Once you cleared the forrest and hit the beach of Avalanche Lake, your breath was taken away by the sheer size and beauty of the scenery. My photos simply do not get within a bulls roar of what your senses try and take in. It's one of those "must see" for yourself things.
I headed on back to my car after spending some time snapping away. The ranger said I simply must do the "Trail of the Cedars Nature Trail" on the return journey. To be honest with you, after being in the Jarrah forests of south-western Western Australia (below Perth) and seeing 500 year old cedars, Trail of the Cedars was not up there on the "wow" factor for me. It was OK, but I wouldn't go out of my way to do it again.
From Avalanche Lake I pointed the Trailblazer in the general direction of the much vaunted and talked about "must see" Logan's Pass on the Continental Divide. It was most under-whelming to me. Basically it was a trinket/gift shop with toilets that allowed you to walk up to a snow pack. Add to that, you had to drive the car park for 20 minutes and participate a few rounds of combat park space snaffling and you know why I'd bypass the place between the hours of 9AM to 3 PM.
I pushed on further to the town of St Mary on the Eastern side of the Continental divide. The countryside changes considerable to being one of rolling plains as compared to densely forested on the Western side of Logan's Pass.
One thing that struck me, in my two days of being here, is the clarity of the water in the lakes, rivers and streams. You can look into 6 feet of water and see clearly to the bottom. I thought the waters of Kootenay Lake in British Colombia (Canada) were beautiful and emerald in colour. It doesn't hold a candle to waters in the lakes of Glacier. Everywhere you look, you see defined layers of clear, turquoise, emerald and green, like a onion in a way, but you can see clearly through them. The water is by far the best tasting water I have ever had.
It was about 1:30PM and I was on the fang a bit, but after yesterdays mustard custard episode, I thought I'd play it safe and grab a burger at the Resort at Glacier - St Mary's. They have take-away fast food joint called the Curly Bear Café, but DO NOT EVEN BOTHER STOPPING as the staff there are pretentious, arrogant and up themselves. My $9.00 burger comes out 26 minutes after being ordered and colder than a igloo roofer. Should you have the temerity to ask them to make you a hot burger - good luck. I got told by the "Executive Chef", in his own words "we're busy, so it is what it is". - you have been warned.
From there I shot up North to Many Glacier resort on the Swiftcurrent Lake. It looks as if someone picked up a Swiss chalet (lock, stock and barrel) and transported it to Northern Montana. It was impressive to say the least. You can tell why people travel for far and wide to relax in some of the most beautiful countryside that the big fella upstairs could lay on.
I got back to Apgar and went looking for an internet connection to update the web site/blog. I had to travel 6 miles (10 kilometres) outside the park to avail myself of someone unsecured wireless internet connection. As I was sitting in the car park of this particular business it struck me how far technology has come in the last 10 years.
When I first got to the United States, I was worried if I was going to get mobile phone service in the middle of Woop Woop. Now I'm scrounging around for DSL wireless service. Go figure.
Oh, and for those of you who have wireless internet connections - SECURE THEM!!! Lest you want to explain to your spouse how those porn sites got visited or even worse - how your a victim of identity theft!!!
That's if for me today, 137 miles (220 kilometres) later and I'm going to grill up a nice Elk filet, accompanied by a baked potato with a light feta cheese sauce and sweet corn on the cob.
Chow down baby!!!
• GLACIER NATIONAL PARK (Montana, USA)