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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