Just can't quit Montana

We woke up yesterday still at the campground outside of Glacier and realized that "holy crap, it's already Sunday and we are still in northwestern Montana!" So we made one final trip to Glacier; Marianne, Christopher and Claire got their Junior Ranger Badges; we ate ice cream for lunch and we visited the Discovery Cabin which has a whole bunch of animal pelts and skulls that are there for the kids to touch. You would never believe how heavy the bighorn sheep horns are. I would estimate that they weigh between 30 and 40 lbs. I was able to lift them, but they were seriously heavy. Grizzley bears are not soft, but black bears are. Mountain lions are so incredably soft as are grey wolves. The wolves have the thickest fur.



I owe you all a correction from a prior post. My description of huckleberrys was actually a description of juneberries. We learned this while on a trail yesterday in Glacier. We came upon a woman in the woods who was picking something and the kids asked her what she was doing and she told them she was picking huckleberries. We told her about the tree we found the prior day and she told us "oh I know that tree, those are not huckleberries those are juneberries." She then offered us some of the huckleberries she had picked and they were very similar, but there was no issue with the seed like there was with the juneberry. I am including pictures in this post of both berries so you can see why we were confused. I did not take these pictures, I got them off of the web. The first picture is of juneberries which grow on a tree, the second picture is of the huckleberries which grow in a patch or a shrub like a blueberry. So the interesting thing about this woman is that she lives one mile outside the park. She is about maybe 60, and she bikes in to the park, picks her berries and goes home and bakes herself a pie with them! She told us she often rides her bike in with a picnic lunch and then parks her bike and hops on the shuttle and eats her lunch up at Logan Pass. All I can say is...what a life!





So we drove out of Glacier and we made the decision to head south and we are planning to fish today in Townsend/Canyon Ferry Lake in Townsend, MT. It is pretty windy so we probably will not take out the canoe. After fishing we are heading down to Yellowstone and we are going to go see Mammoth Hot Springs which we missed last time we were in Yellowstone. I know we will not be capable of passing through Grand Teton without stopping and we are planning to try to stop by Dinosaur National Monument. Then we are going to head for home. I will keep you posted on our progress. It is sure to be a slow circuitious route. I hope the next time you hear from us, it will be from inside or near Yellowstone. If we do camp in Yellowstone, we will not have internet access and you will have to wait until we come back to civilization to do a new post.