September was filled with adventure and discovery as we visited three major national parks.....Glacier, Yellowstone, and Grand Teton.
Glacier, the least visited national park by tourists, was the most appealing to us. In 1932 Canada and the United States made Waterton Lakes N.P. and Glacier N.P. the world's first International Peace Park.
We approached the park through Kalispell, Montana located about 35 miles south and stayed at Apgar Campground in West Glacier. We "dry-camped" for seven days and hiked the Hi-Line Trail on the Garden Wall near Logan Pass, Trail of the Cedars, and Avalanche Lake Trail near Lake McDonald. Don caught a few rainbow trout which made his day. After a nice drive on route 2/89 north, we arrived at the Many Glacier entrance.
Here we took the boat tour on Lake Swiftcurrent and Lake Josephine at the base of Grinnell Glacier and enjoyed a nice picnic. Wildlife was scarce but we did see moose and marmot.
Yellowstone National Park has five entrances. From the west, West Yellowstone, Montana,
from the north and northeast, Gardiner and Cooke City, Montana, from the east, Cody,
Wyoming, and from the south, Flagg Ranch, Wyoming (which is north of Grand Teton Nation-
al Park). We spent five days dry-camping at Madison Campground and three days at West
Yellowstone, Montana in a private campground. We tried to include all the regular stops such
as Old Faithful Geyser, the lower-middle-and upper Geyser Basins, the Grand Canyon of Yellowstone, and Mammoth Hot Springs. We sighted a cinnamon black bear, bison herds, and elk herds. The temps were comfortable during the day but dipped to the 30's at night.
A four mile hike brought us to an amazing two hundred foot waterfall called Fairy Falls. While hiking we were joined by a rather large bison also hiking the trail. Don enjoyed fishing the world-famous Firehole River and the Gibbon River.
We only spent three days at Colter Bay Campground in the Grand Tetons. We took the Jenny
Lake boat ride to the base of Cascade Canyon Trail, hiked up to Hidden Falls and Inspiration
Point, ending at the Cascade Canyon Fork. When we returned to Jenny Lake Lodge, we had
hiked a total of 11 miles. On day two we took the scenic drive around Jackson Lake, and spent day three in Jackson Hole where we enjoyed barbecue at "Bubba's."
Our greatest joy was a visit from our daughter, Jennifer and grandson,
Brandon while staying at East Canyon RV Resort in Henefer, Utah. The
resort is located minutes from Salt Lake City. It's loaded with ammenities
such as two swimming pools, mini-golf, horsebackriding and most important
a wonderful playground just steps away from our coach. Brandon is 21
months old now and has discovered his ability to run! Jen was worried
about tiring us out, but we reassured her that visiting Meme and
(Popeye) Pepe was just what we needed. Our son, Mark will be joining us at Zion National Park next week and to stay connected with family, we'll be in Texas in eight short weeks for the holidays.
