semi-random flotsam
While we were away, First Beautiful Niece left for college. No, I don’t know where the time went.
(Of course if we had known her schedule back when we were planning, we would have shifted our trip — but it was too late by the time we learned. We’ll know better when Second Beautiful Niece is heading off to school.) Continue reading “The nieces”
I sleep like the dead (once I get earplugs in) and sleep until after 7am. Mom is already awake. Dad is already up and out.
He comes back at 7:30, concerned because our flight is tomorrow at 7:20 and it won’t let him check in. It takes a moment to realize our mistake: we are on Mountain time; Spokane is on Pacific. Continue reading “In which we cross to Spokane”
We have options this morning – we can get up and on the road early, so that we get to Logan Pass before 8:30, when they might still have parking, or sleep in, have breakfast, and just hope for the best. Continue reading “In which we make record time down the road”
We get up and ready in plenty of time for a bellman to help us get our belongings down three floors, check out, get breakfast, race down to get my mother’s accidentally packed tablet out of the car (ugh), and hop on our Red Bus Tour of Glacier.
We’re on the Grand Circle tour, looping the outer edges of the park to come down Going to the Sun Rd west to east. It will take all day, and we get a late start because two members of the group are no-shows. Continue reading “In which we take a Red Bus Tour”
… under a big sky.
We don’t have to get up early today. Which is good. It’s been a lot of early mornings.
Except I forgot and left an alarm on. Rats.
Our only plan for today involves covering a lot of distance. About 360 miles in all. Continue reading “In which we cover a lot of ground…”
We time our day to depart in time to get coffees at Tumbleweed, just down the street from the Riverside Cottages. They open at 7.
Well, first we see the deer that are right in our own parking lot this am. Then…
We each get a coffee plus a thermos to let us top off through the morning. We originally thought we might cross to Pebble Creek, near the Northeast entrance, for an early-morning animal seeking session (we would so love to see moose) but already the morning is warm, and the 40 miles across isn’t going to get us there in anything like prime viewing time. And we want to see the Terraces we skipped yesterday before it gets appallingly hot again.
So we visit Mammoth Hot Springs upper terraces instead, first walking it, hearing the elk trumpet as rut season begins…
Continue reading “In which the buffalo are plentiful… but have no wings”
We check out of the Old Faithful Inn, with an aim of seeing the Great Prismatic Spring ahead of the crowd. It is a good theory. But it is still early and cold – so much steam is rising from the springs that they aren’t visible.
