Back in the Park

Yesterday I took advantage of my day off and went for a hike in Glacier Park. The clinic just received 2 new students on their 4th and final clinical rotations from Wash U and one of them joined me. We headed out on a long drive to Many Glacier - possibly the farthest possible spot to travel to for a hike, but one of my favorite areas of the park.

We started out on a mild but long 6 mile hike out to Cracker Lake. This lake is known for its turquoise color due to the way the water refracts the light. We traipsed through the trees until it finally opened up into a valley surrounded by jagged peaks. It was super windy and we had to hunker down behind some rocks and a low tree for cover while we ate our late lunch. The views were amazing though and it was a pretty clear day so I snapped some pics while trying to stay upright against the wind. We decided not to spend too much time at the lake though since we could see some low clouds rolling in over the mountains and had heard warnings of a storm coming in that night.

We made it back to the car just as it was starting to spit rain, and began to make our long trek back to Whitefish. All was well until we pulled into a gas station on the east side of the park when I noticed that the steering was a bit off. As I got out of the convenience store I saw the culprit - a flat front tire.... Erik helped me put the spare on in the dark and cold, but we quickly determined that there was not enough air in it to get us home safely. After asking around and having to drive an hour to the next town we finally were able to air it up and then make the even longer trek home... a total of about 7 hours of driving (compared to the 4 1/2 hours spent on the trail) and we were finally back in town, at 11:30 at night. Talk about a long day... But it made for a good story and I came back with some pretty amazing photos, if I do say so myself. Never a dull moment with this gal!

Check out the rest of the pics here!