Known to Native Americans as the "Shining Mountains" and the "Backbone of the World", Glacier National Park preserves more than a million acres of forests, alpine meadows, lakes, rugged peaks and glacial-carved valleys in the Northern Rocky Mountains. Its diverse habitats are home to nearly 70 species of mammals including the grizzly bear, wolverine, gray wolf and lynx. Over 270 species of birds visit or reside in the park, including such varied species as harlequin ducks, dippers and golden eagles. Glacier Park's varied climate influences and its location at the headwaters of the Pacific, Atlantic and Hudson Bay drainages have given rise to an incredible variety of plants and animals.
One of the most amazing highlights of Glacier National Park is a drive on the Going-to-the-Sun Road. This engineering marvel spans 50 miles through the park's wild interior, winding around mountainsides and treating visitors to some of the best sights in northwest Montana. Fortunately we traversed the road early one day and a hour or two after we had driven past the area know as the"weeping wall" (pictured below) there were several rock slides which struck several cars, trapping them and inflicting some minor injuries. The road was closed for two days to clear the rubble.
The landscape is a hiker's paradise that is traversed by more than 740 miles of maintained trails.
Our first day there, no sooner had we driven into the park, a pretty good sized black bear ambled across the road in front of us. By the time I got to my camera, it had disappeared into the trees.
While the Going to the Sun Road was closed we were able to drive to the entrance of the hiking trail up to Avalanche Lake. It's a great and somewhat challenging hike about 3 miles (mostly up) to the lake. Along the route encountered the Avalanche River running down from the lake.
Once we arrived we enjoyed the lunch Diane had packed and enjoyed the beauty of the lake and the 5 mountain waterfalls feeding it.
We did a few other shorter hikes, always watching for signs of Grizzly Bears. It's suggested that you should carry "bear spray" to discourage a charging Grizzly and "bells" to alert and not startle them.
They also told us how to determine the difference between Black Bear and Grizzly poop. Grizzly poop smells like bear spray and has bells in it! <grin>
The rest are just a few pictures of the beautiful and remarkable scenery we saw.
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