Glacier National Park to Yellowstone

Hello Dear Friends!

We've done so much since we last posted that it's hard for me to remember where to begin.

Let's see... our last post was in Whitefish. After that, we drove to Glacier National Park and spent the night just outside of it. We saw our first sign of sun since Washington, and the brightest, fullest rainbow I've ever seen. The area around Glacier was hit by a huge forest fire not too long ago, so the whole place was a forest of charred, dead trees, but in some strange way it was actually beautiful. We cut part of my mane there, and maybe the birds that are returning will use my hair to build nests.

The next day we entered Glacier and obtained a permit to do some backpacking. We got all our stuff together and found the trailhead, which turned out to be a heavily trafficked route for horseback tours. And mind you, it's been raining for the past week. Basically, the first several miles of the trail were a trough of mud and horse poo. It was almost impossible to traverse, and by the end of it I never wanted to see another horse again. Or I did actually, but only to punch it. Our destination (Cracker Lake) was gorgeous though, so totally (mostly) worth it. The mountains reared up impossibly high behind an impossibly blue lake. It looked tropic (but felt like an iceburg). We got lucky and had some sun upon arrival, but it actually rained all night, so the next day, after trekking back through all the horse crap and rain, we decided to push on instead of going on another backpacking trip in the park.

After driving through some cities in middle Montana, forgetting Evan's debit card at Subway and going back for it, and staying the night in a few rest stops, we arrived at Yellowstone National Park. The first thing we noticed about Yellowstone is that the people who live around there and work there are really quirky. One guy we met at a rest stop (who was also travelling the country like us) was convinced that sulphur fumes are really dangerous, and y'know...maybe he was right. Maybe too much exposure makes you a little batty. Everyone was really nice though. If the people seem strange, they're nothing next to the landscape. Yellowstone is like another planet. The very ground boils and steams, and there are vibrant colors and strange shapes everywhere. We went backpacking in a canyon in the park, and we'd be hiking in full forest and come out in a clearing with blinding white soil and steam rising. You could walk next to a small hole in the ground and hear water boiling and gurgling inside. There was also so much wildlife. On this same backpacking trip we saw a grizzly bear foraging a few hundred feet from us. Driving along the road we spotted elk and bison, grazing right in full view.

Yellowstone is very touristy. To stop at any one of the "villiages" means battling crowds, eating tastless and expensive fast food, and wading through tons of souvinirs. We stopped to watch Old Faithful erupt, and we were elbow-to-elbow with families from all over the country and the world. Despite this, the backcountry was actually pretty private. Each of the camping spots were for only one party, which means we got to be alone on both the overnight trips that we took. We actually would have stayed longer in Yellowstone, because we liked it a lot, but I got sick on the last day (probably a bit of sun stroke, but i dunno), so we headed out to hang out in Jackson, Wy (where we are now) and get our energy up before heading back to Grand Teton National Park, which we are going to do today. Evan has aspirations for a 38 mile backpacking trip through those incredibly steep mountains, and we'll see if I'm up to it (actually, i'm trying to knock it down about 10-20 miles), but that's what we may be reporting to you next. We hope all is well and wonderful and maybe even sunny in Arcata, Mt Shasta and Seattle. Love to you all!