A BEARY good day at Glacier National Park

It was a chilly morning as my sister and I left Kalispell, MT enroute to Glacier National Park.  Before leaving town, we stopped at a grocery store and picked up sushi for lunch.  We were surprised to find a guy making sushi at 7:00 am, and he gladly made us California roll to go.  We had wanted to get to the park early to beat the crowd, although being off season, I didn't expect traffic to be too bad.  I was hoping to see some animals, and things started out with a bang. As we drove into the park through the west entrance, a black bear ran across the road in front of the car we were following!  It disappeared into the trees so there was no chance getting a photo, but it would be a good omen for things to come. We knew there would be many other opportunities to take pictures, so we kept our eyes open. After about ten minutes of driving, we pulled off the road to take in the sight of McDonald Falls and McDonald Creek.

There were low clouds for most of the morning, which made picture taking a bit of a challenge.  It was easy to appreciate the turning of the leaves and the beautiful fall colors, though.  We were scanning the cliffs for mountain goats when I actually spotted two tiny white specks in the distance.  Peering through the binoculars confirmed it...two mountain goats.  They were pretty far away, but I still managed to take a few pics.  I think you can still tell they are mountain goats!

The main road through the park is called Going-To-The-Sun Road.  I guess it may have seemed that way as we steadily climbed.  In fact, it DID seem to get sunnier as we got closer to Logan Pass.

Before we got to the visitor center at Logan Pass, I spotted a turnout with what appeared to be a metal walkway leading to a viewpoint.  My sister wanted to bypass it, but I insisted on stopping, thinking it might be worthwhile.  Boy, did that turn out to be an understatement.  As we reached the viewpoint, we saw the visitors there looking at something among the trees below.  That something was a female grizzly and her cub!  Now, that's something you don't often see in a national park!  I ran back to the car to get the binoculars and quickly spotted the bears.  We then proceeded to take a lot of photos of the bears, hoping that at least a few might come out.  My point and shoot camera may be small, but it's mighty!

As we traveled down the eastern side of the park, we continued to enjoy the beautiful views, including the cloud shrouded Jackson Glacier.

Before leaving Glacier, there were yet more magnificent sights.  Here are St Mary Lake with Divide Mountain in the distance, and East Flattop Mountain.

Tomorrow, we'll be taking in a little bit of history.  After dealing with fairly mild temperatures, it looks like things are going to heat up.  Not too much I hope!