Saturday, October 31, 2015

Conni – 08-04-14 Banff Trip – Glacier Park


Glacier Park encompasses over 1 million acres. Today we crossed the park on the Going-to-the-Sun-Road, the only road that bisects it. It is 53 miles long and goes over the Continental Divide at Logan Pass at 6646 feet. The two lanes are very narrow and winding, so passing is virtually impossible.
Of interest, per Wikipedia: “The road is one of the most difficult roads in North America to snowplow in the spring. Up to 80 feet of snow can lie on top of Logan Pass, and more just east of the pass where the deepest snowfield has long been referred to as Big Drift. The road takes about ten weeks to plow, even with equipment that can move 4000 tons of snow in an hour. The snowplow crew can clear as little as 500 feet of the road per day.”

 
 

There were lots of wild flowers, including one that reminded us a little of the bluebonnet.

 

There are over 200 waterfalls within the park. Of course, we only saw a few.

 
The main attraction, of course, is the glaciers. While there are many, most have been lost to warming and that trend continues.
 
 
 
 
 
 

 
 
 
 
 
 
Of course, there are many lakes and rivers too. Bentley enjoyed some of that really cold water. Well, maybe Mary enjoyed it more. Hard to tell.
 

 
 
 

 
 
 
 
 
Probably half of the road was under construction – read: dirt. This caused us to take a different and longer route back to St Mary. All of it was beautiful.

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