Glacier Trip - Day 6 - Aug 23
September 21st, 2005
We are leaving Prince of Wales and heading to Glacier Park Lodge today.
Our first choice is whether to take the boost to the top of the first hill. The route for today starts at the bottom of a 6 mile uphill. The thought of starting the ride cold and doing a hill immediately is not enticing. So I (and all the girls) chose to take the van boost. The guys (all of them *snicker*) and Shannah are dropped off at the bottom of the hill. The usual percentage is 10% of the participants do the first hill. Our group is at 50%.
At the top of the hill us ladies are dropped off and I get my bike seat swapped for mine from home. Woot. Now that is a wonderful fix. The ride for us begins with this completely wonderful winding downhill. The scenery is gorgeous and the rode is pretty empty. So turns can be taken wide and enjoyed fully. I stopped a few times just to admire the views. The only part of this leg that was a problem was the long time between St. Mary’s where we dropped off the boys and the next rest stop. Too much liquid in the am starts to kick in and it is decided (me and another rider) that a “blueberry picking” expedition would be a good thing. We find a nice area with bushed right by the road and leave our bikes and head into the wilds. Unfortunately, at this point Bill comes up on us and seeing only bikes … stops to see what is going on. Sigh. No privacy. So we loudly explain about the “blueberries” and send him off. Just as he leaves .. I hear a vehicle approaching … and slowing. Sigh. The support van. Melissa of course spots the bikes, but not people, so she too stops to see what is happening. After waving her off (with the van), we are finally able to finish up with the “blueberries” and get back to biking. Moral of the story, take turns picking berries so that others will not stop to lend assistance. Anyway ….
We continue through some lovely rolling hill and meet up with the van in the valley where we will turn off the main road and take a side road back into the park. The next portion is a 3 mile uphill with no shoulder. Joanne, Liz and I decide to opt for another boost. 37 miles is a respectable distance for a ride through the hills. =)
At the top of the hill, we meet up with Bill and Scott while unloading our bikes. Another glorious downhill on a winding road with no shoulder. Thankfully, we are going the same speed as cars … so no one needs to pass. This was probably the most technical and most exhilirating ride on the road for this trip. I so wanted to ask for a boost back to the top to do it again. I was able to catch up to the boys on the downhill with Joanne close behind.
We decided to do the Two Medicine loop which takes us to the designated lunch stop. It was fun to ride with the 4 of us staying pretty much together. The lunch spot had a lovely little falls coming right out of the rock. Very cool.
We then biked out to Two Medicine Lake up another winding hill (yay) and took in the view and some hot coffee. On the ride back out, Bill almost took out some guys door who had chosen to stop at the end of a switchback and pull over a bit while sitting with his door open. Thankfully for me, I was taking it all slow and saw it. Anyone taking that corner wide would have been flattened pretty readily.
After that … it was all rolling hills again with plenty of “black moo bears” to admire along the way. We rolled up to Glacer Park Lodge and after asking for directions from a security guard … we found the van and our room keys.
This lodge was nice, but again loud. There wasn’t much sound proofing in the doors … so all the kids running in the halls were heard everywhere. The thing sort of reminded me of the lodges you see in the movies from the 50’s and 60’s set in upstate New York.
We had a memorable Mexican dinner in East Glacier. They could only fit a group our size on the patio … so we ate Mexian huddled on a patio bundled up to stay warm. It was a different experience. But the food was good and the margaritas were nummy.