Lakes McDonald and Bowman

After our spectacular evening at Logan Pass, we stayed down on the west side of the park visiting the lakes.  We spent the morning cruising on Lake McDonald. 

Guess who didn't fall asleep this time?!?!

In the afternoon, we drove up to Polebridge, the gateway to a couple lakes in the Northwest corner of the park.

Lake Bowman!! 

I starting talking to a guy taking photos who I learned moved up from Sonoma to Kalispell.  He let me borrow one of his kayaks.  I got to paddle around for a half hour.

Dinner at the Back Room in Columbia Falls based on the recommendation of our friend Scott who grew up here in the Flathead Valley.

Montana Dining!

Lake McDonald Sunset from Apgar Village

Going To The Sun Road

After Whitefish Mountain and a visit to the Hungry Horse Reservoir, around 5PM we drove up Going to the Sun Road.  One of our strategies the entire trip was to take advantage of the long days and visit popular sites late in the day when the crowds were gone.

Looking back down into the valley at the base of the Going to the Sun Road.

We first drove over Logan Pass to visit St. Mary's Lake.

The "dark side", or driving west up the east side of Logan Pass.

Starting around 730PM, we decided to hike to the Hidden Lake Overpass.  A quarter mile in, the stairs were covered with snow.

Coming around the final corner, mountain goats!

We hikers had to stop and respect the goats who were hanging out on the trail.  Progress came to a halt.

GOAT SELFIE

Hidden Lake (it's hard to see in the shadows) from the overlook.

I now hike with poles......going up and down the snow I was the envy of many of the other hikers.

It was slippery going down, so we just decided to slide down on our butts.

By the time we were back to the trailhead at 9PM, we had the mountain basically to ourselves.

Big horn sheep in the Logan Pass parking lot.

Sunset looking back down the valley of Going to the Sun road

Weeping Wall, we took advantage of the water to rinse off the car.

Road to Glacier and Whitefish Mountain

Leaving Banff, next stop was Glacier National Park in Montana.  The drive took us through Calgary.  And yes, we ended up exactly where you expected us to spend a couple hours for lunch.

Turns out, we were in Calgary on the opening weekend of the famed Calgary Stampede.  That explained why everyone was walking around with cowboy hats.

The Saddledome.  And another Olympic host city visited.

The outdoor grounds of the Calgary Stampede.

Crossing back INTO the United States.

We entered Montana along the eastern edge of Glacier National Park.  We took a couple hours to explore the Many Glaciers area of the park.

After setting up camp at the Fish Creek Campground, Onions and I took a drive at dusk to look for animals....hoping for bears.

Alas, we didn't see any bears, but this picture of the snags from a previous fire was pretty neat.

The next morning, needing to do laundry, we went to Columbia Falls for the morning to clean our clothes and then decided to head to Whitefish Mountain.  We took the ski lift up the mountain for the views.

Looking south over the Flathead Valley.

Whitefish Lake

Looking east to the mountains of Glacier.

There are lots of summer attractions at Whitefish Mountain, one of them the Alpine Slide!!!

Totally fun!