The alternate title for this blog entry might be "Ascending into our 39th year". Some of you will remember last year's entry - "Zipping into our 38th year". This year we climbed, and climbed, and climbed, as we took a few days to visit Waterton Lakes and Glacier National Parks. We enjoyed glorious hot weather, beautiful views, lots of exercise, and of course, a glass or two of wine at the end of the day to lubricate our aching joints.
But we began our short journey locally, visiting something neither of us had ever seen before - the swinging bridge in Souris. We have both heard about this our entire lives, and now we can say that we crossed and recrossed this famous bridge.
Waterton Lakes National Park is beautiful. It reminded us of Wasagaming in Riding Mountain, but was a lot smaller. On the patio overlooking the lake at this restaurant we celebrated anniversary number 38.
The rich and famous stay at this landmark hotel on the cliff. We stayed in the campground!
Even the gas station is very much like the one in Wasagaming. The movie theatre, though, hasn't nearly as much character as the one in Riding Mountain.
The deer have right of way throughout the townsite and the campsites. They were very well behaved, however, and were content to munch on grass rather than ask for handouts. On one middle of the night venture to the bathroom, however, I was rather startled to run into one of these guys right outside our camper door!
When I woke up in the morning, and unzipped my "window" in the camper, this is what I saw. Glorious!
"Bear's Hump is a trail almost straight up, beginning at the information centre. It leads to a cliff from which you can see the entire valley. Not quite a kilometre, but the grade makes it challenging, at least for me!
We "ascended" Bear's Hump, and stood about 2/3 of the way up this rock.
At the top of the climb, looking out onto the lake, with the townsite below.
Can you find our camper? (Hint - it's right by the lake!)
While we had wonderful weather, we also saw some glorious skies. This is an example.
Beargrass - I had never seen it before. It is strange, but very interesting.
The male climber of the duo with a snow "chair". This was quite a bit smaller here, on our way back, than it was on our way up the trail.
Yes, the path does go that close to the edge, and the drop is deadly. Can't say I was all that comfortable with a lot of it. It would be a long way down before something stopped you.
Another mountain valley we saw on one of the hikes.
We stopped for lunch after 3.5 miles into this hike, and ate by the glacier.
The wild flowers were in their glory - so many kinds I hadn't seen before, as well as a few familiar ones.
We saw a few creatures, like this woolly marmot (one of several)....
and this guy relaxing just above the trail.
Beauty and majesty.
A couple of days in Great Falls completed our trip. From our campground we could see forever.
All in all, it was a wonderful, albeit short, trip. One more part of the world to say we have experienced, and this one is very close!
