An Avalanche and the Long and Winding Road

We had early morning plans again for Wednesday. Sherri and I woke up at about 6am, made a full breakfast for the kids, and then went on a 10 mile run. Ok, not really…we actually put our heads back on our pillows. No words spoken between us, I think we both figured our hike could wait until we all got some well-needed rest.

We all finally got up at the crack of 10am. We headed to the lodge for some breakfast, which we ate outside of our cabin while the girls played on the hammocks.

After breakfast, we filled up Camelbacks and bottles, put on our hiking shoes, and headed back into Glacier National Park. We stopped and parked at the trail head of the Trail of the Cedars Nature Trail.  There are three different hiking options at this trail. You can either do the Trail of the Cedars loop (0.2 miles), the Avalanche Trail loop (0.8 miles), or the trail to Avalanche Lake (4 miles). We chose the Avalanche Lake hike. We all agreed that it was the most beautiful trail we have ever hiked. Hence, the eleventy billion pictures that follow…

That's a canister of bear spray on my hip. Take that, bears!

Something I never thought I'd say: "Ok, all three of you stand inside that tree!"

We arrived at Avalanche Lake, and soaked in the breathtaking beauty.

A butterfly loving on Emily

Roots of a tree that fell over. Awesome.

The kids did great on the hike. We were concerned about the heat given the fact that we started our hike about 4 hours later than we wanted to, but we were happy to discover that the large majority of the hike was in the shade of the trees. 

For lunch? dinner?, we headed back to The Huckleberry Patch. We got there at the same time as two tour buses with what seemed like 8,327 people in them. There was huckleberry pie and ice cream being served up left and right. It was huckleberrymadness. Being ever the proper tourists, we had an assortment of huckleberry products, and made sure that no one left without eating something with huckleberry in it. Which is about as difficult as breathing. The huckleberry au jus sauce for the French Dip was a bit unsettling. It was tasty, but the huckleberries floating in it were interesting. Huckleberry. Huckleberry. Say that 100 times and it sounds weird. We've had our fill of huckleberries….for now at least.

After lunch? dinner? we went back to the cabin, showered, and got ready for our next….um….adventure. Our plan was to take our yearly family photo somewhere beautiful. We asked one of the guys who worked at the lodge where we should go. He told us to head up to Bowman Lake. He claimed it was his favorite lake, and that it was absolutely gorgeous. Just a short drive up the way... 

Dude, what in the @#$@# was he smoking?! 

Let me see if I can help you experience this trek….

Picture yourself driving down a gravel road (about 3/4ths the width of your car) with eight zillion minor speed bumps. Take a turn about 0.02 miles and double back. Take another turn about .05 miles and redouble back. Add dust flying everywhere and do this for about an hour and a half. Along the way, look for signs that aren't there to point you toward the most-beautiful-lake-of-ever that the GPS can’t point you to because you’re in the middle of BFGNP. Stop occasionally to precariously balance your car on the edge of the cliff so another car can pass. Ask those people if you are headed in the right direction. Get confirmation, but still never get there. In retrospect, you’ll realize that the reason they said, “You’re almost there…..it’s worth it” is because they want you to suffer the same ridiculous fate that they did. Drive for about another seven thousand miles. Stop at a mercantile/bakery in the middle of nowhere and ask where the lake is. Get misleading directions from the owner, who must have also been tricked into going up here at some point, and who also makes it sound like “you’re almost there.” Turn into a clearing, expecting to see a lake. Do that 157 million times. Finally, find a parking lot for the lake where the lake is still not visible. Walk to the lake in your nice picture clothes carrying all of your camera gear. Walk to a clearing where you finally see a beautiful lake. Not the most-beautiful-lake-of-ever, or even of Glacier National Park, mind you. But still, beautiful. Take pictures, turn around, and relive the magic all over again. 

Boy was that ever fun.  I’m not going to post any pictures here, because if we’re lucky, we got a couple for our Christmas card.

Our planned 1-1.5 hour jaunt turned into 3+ hours.  We got back to the cabin at around 10pm (still light out!).  We told the girls we’d make s’mores when we got back, and although we were tempted to ask for a rain check since we had a very long day ahead of us on Thursday, we went ahead and made a campfire. We roasted some marshmallows and sandwiched them between graham crackers and chocolate. 

It’s funny….with all the stuff we’re doing on this trip, it’s the moments like these campfires that are the most meaningful and special to me.