Glacier National Park our first National Park on the Fall tour
Finally, the northern hustle is over. 1400+ Miles in 4 days was a trek. I feel that when we travel fast, we miss out on road side stops and small towns, this trip felt different. Although we were in a hurry, I think we hit the sweet spot of miles and time traveled. I am sure we missed out on some fun experiences in smaller towns, along with Points of Interest. However we matched our timeline and didn’t have any debilitating dips. The dip we did have was handled quickly. Our stops on the way up to Glacier were Yermo, St. George, Ogden, Deer Lodge.
We have 8 days at a fancy KOA Resort. The accommodations are impressive. Sauna, pool, adult pool, bar, restaurant, nature trails, live music (every night) and lots of flowers. I am glad we wont be towing for a while, we are ~4 miles from the west entrance to Glacier National Park.
Driving the Going to the Sun road on day one was a great experience. Seeing Logan’s Pass was impressive. I made the decision to not ride the whole route on the bike. The cliff drop offs and the sharing of the road with cars and RVs felt dangerous. I did get the opportunity to ride in the park daily. The route up to MacDonald Lake/Lodge was enjoyable and sharing the road was made easy with many polite drivers. Donna got her first long(35 miles) ride on “Svetlana” a gravel bike. Donna was exhausted after the mileage and I am not sure we would have remained friendly if another 2 miles was on the agenda. Together we rode many other trails and loops while at Glacier. I thoroughly enjoy riding bikes with my wife and am excited she has the opportunity to ride.
Logans pass we saw mountain animals we had never seen in person. A Mountain Goat and Bighorn Sheep.
We hiked avalanche lake and witnessed a yearling black bear swimming and foraging. The bear was across the lake, I am glad we were not any closer.
Glacier has substantial Ranger Talks scheduled. We often travel in shoulder season. Related to the parks this means that published information about planned activities might be lacking or winding down for the season. With the lack of published information, we get the opportunity to engage with rangers and information booths. We enjoy talking to park rangers.
The cycling in Glacier was awesome. We sought out and rode all the trails allotted for bicycle access. We also got the opportunity to ride on the Going to the Sun Road.
We ventured out twice away from the park and the campsite. I wanted to change Donna’s tires to tubeless and I needed valve stems to complete the work. I traveled over to Colombia Falls to visit A7 Cycles. The bike shop was well stocked with parts and the staff was awesome. I was able to acquire what I needed and had Donna’s tires switched over in the afternoon. Riding Gravel is new for Donna, having tubeless allowed here to get the tire pressures down and she felt more comfortable riding on the fire roads. While visiting Colombia Falls I stopped at Backslope Brewing for lunch. I was impressed by a chicken sandwich and salad.
We then made a trip to a local distillery. The spirits were good and we purchased bottles for gifts and consumption.
Location
Starlink
Worked great. I think I need to remove the starlink stub as mostly it works perfect. I should just write a network tester and graph the reports on the performance. Tagging with TODO here so I get around to it.
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