| MONTANA Day 3: The Attack |
| Continue to Day 3 |
| Continue to Day 4. |
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| The horrible night's sleep by all was quickly forgotten in the morning. We ate a big buffet breakfast, and spotted bears on the mountain next to the lodge area. We boarded a boat to take us across Swiftcurrent Lake, where we would hike a quarter mile to another boat across Lake Josephine, where we would hike a little over a mile to Grinnell Lake. After the first boat ride, we got off and the 20 or so folks headed up the trail through the dense woods. Within 100 yards, the front of the group contracted and yelled "Bear! BEAR!". Sure enough, a bear ran down the hill and darted across the path right in front of Louise. Phew. Then the group yelled "THERE'S ANOTHER ONE!!". With Maddie safely behind me, I fumbled to get the camera out of the case, and the lens cap off, and the power on. Meanwhile, a second bear rumbled down the hill, stopped on the path, looked right at us, thought about it for a moment, then ran on. I didn't get the picture, but below is an artists' rendering of the event. As you can see from the relatively short snout, the bears were probably grizzlies. A close grizzly encounter impressed a lot of folks we talked to, but all literature suggests that getting killed by a black bear is equally painful to getting killed by a grizzly. |
| Louise |
| Mike |
| Maddie |
| Some among us probably could have used a change of underwear, but we trudged on, secure in the knowledge that we'd probably have to kick the bear and insult his mother to get him to attack a group of more than 2 or 3. Eventually, anticlimactically, we arrived at Grinnell Lake, a pretty green lake under a waterfall of glacial thaw. All these lakes are green due to the suspension of minerals from the eroded rock. |
| We hiked back to the lodge, had a light lunch, and rented a canoe for a paddle around the lake. We had printed a list of about 40 Glacier-area birds before our trip, but here's a complete list of the birds we saw on the entire trip: Merganser Junco Crow. We had a lot of blank spots on our bird-watching list. We had a different room the second night, this time in the far quieter annex. An added bonus was the view out of our room's back door: |
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| Maddie napped, and I went out for a walk above the lodge, looking for good views. The bear encounter had me spooked, so I made it quick. There were a few nice overlooks, and a front rolling in over the far mountains made the vista change dramatically. I hurried back, and eventually we had a pretty big storm. Unlike metro DC, you can actually see lightning up to 10 miles away (limited only due to the mountains), wait a long time for the thunder, and then have it rumble for half a minute as it bounces off all the rocky slopes. Had elk chops for dinner. |
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| Continue to Day 4. |