Banff, Calgary, Waterton/Glacier National Parks (posted from the Visitors’ Information Center at Missoula, MT)

(this post covers the period 29 August through 3 September)

Sunday, 3 September-
Today we headed up the North Fork of the Flathead River at the edge of Glacier National Park. There are two roads following the North Fork, one inside the park, one outside. We had checked with a ranger about taking the inside road but he discouraged us—it’s a very-narrow one-lane gravel road where one or the other vehicle has to back up to a wider spot in the road when two vehicles meet. Also, it’s closed six miles in and runs mostly through burned-over area. We also happen to know from the ranger presentation last night that there’s a new wolf den at Logging Creek and that’s why the road has been closed off this year ( though the official party line is that the road was washed out by spring rains). We wondered if our ranger this morning was trying to keep us away from the wolves but I’m not sure that was the point—he was just providing options. The ranger also recommended that we go to Polebridge, an interesting stop some 27 miles north. When the Inside North Fork Road is open, it can be reached that way but it can also be reached via the Outside North Fork Road and that one is a two-lane with better views of the Flathead River. The point of interest at Polebridge is the Polebridge Mercantile Company, an old-time general store. It does not have electricity but does have a propane baker’s oven that makes fantastic pastries. That sold us.
As promised the Outside North Fork Road soon turned to gravel and it was quite a washboard. It didn’t have potholes, just mile after mile of washboard…and dust. We had left the park and were now in the Flathead National Forest and were in the area burned by a large forest fire. As we crossed the Flathead River, we saw a mini-van parked along the road. And down by the bridge was a young guy taking a bath in the river.
After miles of dust-eating we finally rolled into Polebridge and the Mercantile. It’s an Old-West-style storefront, barn-red in color with the name painted in large white letters on the fake second-floor wall. A sign on the road in said “SLOW DOWN. PEOPLE BREATHING HERE.” We soon realized that it’s a leftover from the Hippie days…and I mean that in a good sense. The two girls in the store were dressed in the long, colorful hippie dresses while the guy wore a knitted hippie-style beanie and overalls with no shirt as he served up pastries. Surprisingly, the place was hopping. The kid was selling pastries as fast as he could. And they were interesting pastries. We tried the spinach-and-cheese-and-poppy-seeds pastry and a potato-strings-cheddar-cheeze-onion-and-parsley pastry. We also bought a dream-brownie-with-walnuts. And in the drink-cooler I found Starbucks Doubleshots...oh, yeah!
Outside, we noticed four people in Hippie-style-clothing bicycling down the dirt road and realized that there are cabins for rent down the road and behind the store. Labashi walked around to the bathrooms and later said someone was playing a guitar in one of the cabins back there. What a great place! The store was out in an open area and had great views north into Canada and east into Glacier. The map of Glacier shows several lakes in the mountains to the east. To the west rose several lodgepole-pine-covered hills. OK, let me go ahead and say it. I wanna be a Hippie too!
After Polebridge we drove back to Apgar and West Glacier. We saw quite a line at the gate, probably an hour’s wait to get in on this holiday. Then we put it in gear to make some miles. We soon were in Kalispell and then on to Flathead Lake. I could easily live in this area—(at least in the summer!)—given its natural beauty. Flathead Lake is a sailor’s dream--- lots of coves and islands, different towns to sail to, all perfect-blue water, a consistent sailing breeze, Rocky Mountains to the east, golden hills to the west.
In Polson, I decided to wash the van to get rid of the dust from our adventure to Polebridge. That only took a short while but I soon regretted it… a few miles later we entered an endless construction zone. It went on for miles. And we were behind four motorcycles and a tractor trailer only doing 25 miles per hour but nonetheless kicking up a cloud of dust. The car-wash guy must love it.
After finally getting to good road, we hit the interstate and Missoula. We checked out the Wal-mart but found a sign saying no RV parking because of a city ordinance. But we’ve seen that before so went in and asked. Sure enough, the ordinance had been challenged and is now interpreted to mean that we can’t park overnight there for more than three days in a row. But this one was a 24-hour Wal-mart and there was another on the south side of town. Again, the no-parking sign. Again, the ‘don’t worry about it’ advice from the Wal-mart folks.
We then went to the nearby Safeway and shopped for supplies (and I LOVE this—the Safeways here have full Starbucks counters in them). Then we found a nearby city park and did our blogging and logging before returning to the Wal-mart for the night.


Saturday, 2 September-
This morning we went to the Apgar Visitor’s Center and considered various possibilities for a hike. We finally chose the hike to Gunsight Pass since part of it is on the Continental Divide Trail. This required a drive back to Logan Pass on the Going-to-the-Sun Road and a descent past Siyeh Bend to the Jackson Glacier viewpoint, a very nice little drive now that we’ve had some experience on the road and know where the tight spots are. I folded in my driver’s side mirror to give me a little more clearance getting by the larger vehicles in the blind curves--- I need all the help I can get staying away from that 1000-foot drop at the outside edge of the turns.
We first hiked down to the Falls along Reynolds Creek and there met a hiker from New York City who was camped there. He has been working on the Triple Crown in sections for years and says all he has to do yet is finish this section into Canada to complete it. Though he looked the part of a long-distance hiker I wondered about his choice of reading material—a book about stock trading—and chatted with him for awhile. He’s either a through-hiker or a very good student of the Triple Crown trails. His trail name is ‘Solo’. He doesn’t keep a trail journal but hopefully I can learn a little about him from others who do. He seemed a very interesting character.
We hiked on for another hour and a half and upon finding a nice little meadow, we stopped for a cookie break and then turned back. By that time is was late in the day and a very gentle, quiet evening on the trail… just wonderful.
We got back to the van at 1815 and headed back to Apgar but all the sites had been taken by then. But we ran into the campground manager and he told us the nearby Fish Creek campground had sites. We found a nice one with little trouble. After attending a ranger presentation about the importance of Glacier National Park at the amphitheater, we went to bed early on this very nice night—it was still 64-degrees outside when we went to sleep at 2200. Last night it had been 40 degrees at this time. Cost tonight was $17.


Friday, 1 September-
After a colder-than-normal night at Waterton National Park, we were happy to have a sunny morning to warm the van quickly. Because of the Labor Day weekend, we were concerned about lines at the border crossing into the US and about a long line at the entrance to the St. Mary’s side of Glacier National Park—our next destination. We therefore elected to take the whirlwind tour of Waterton. We drove up the narrow road to Red Rock Canyon and then drove through the town of Waterton and started back the long road toward Lake Cameron. Along the way we stopped at a picnic area and had a pleasant lunch. By that time it was early afternoon and I was getting antsy to see what the border crossing was like so we cut short the drive to Lake Cameron. The drive from Waterton Park to the US border is a pretty one and we realized that as slow as we were, we weren’t being overtaken by traffic. That’s not normal for Alberta. Mocha Joe is a bit underpowered and climbing hills often means the speedometer drops below 50 miles per hour. In Alberta, that may be a crime—at least judging by the number of cars flying by us even when we’re already a few kph above the speed limit ourselves. So if we’re climbing to the Chief Mountain border crossing and there’s nobody behind us for 20 minutes or so, that probably means there won’t be much of a line at the border. In any case, we took our time and enjoyed the wonderful views.
The Waterton area is very interesting. It bills itself as ‘where the mountains meet the plains’ and that’s a good description. Just above the park are the gently rolling plains. As we drew near to the Waterton region, we started seeing lines of windmills—the new, big, hi-tech ones. We at first thought we were seeing a dozen or so but as we got closer, the line on the far end kept extending itself. I’d guess we saw over a hundred of them as we approached the town of Pincher Creek. The windmills were on small ridges. Then as we left Pincher Creek, the hills started getting bigger… and in the background were the Rockies. And the Rockies just keep getting bigger and bigger until you are in among the tall peaks and into the Park.
Our border crossing was uneventful. There was no line going into the US and only five or six vehicles coming from the US to Canada. Immediately after crossing we were on Blackfoot Indian Reservation lands which were high-elevation grazing lands. We pulled off at a scenic view and had an incredible 360-degree view. We had the endless pines of the national park one way and the golden hills of Montana stretching off into the distance the other.
We made it to the park gateway by 1430 and were surprised to find no line on Friday afternoon of Labor Day Weekend. The entry fee was $25 for seven days or $50 for a national park pass so that was an easy decision—annual pass for us.
We took the famous Going-to-the-Sun Road and stopped at several pull-offs then continued up to Logan Pass Visitor’s Center and took a short walk there. Going down the west side, we stopped at a pulloff and glassed the heights behind us for mountain goats—and saw six of them. After the “you-better-be-real-careful-here” descent, we saw a black bear crossing the road just above Avalance Campground. It was gone before we could get the camera.
We continued to Apgar Campground near the western entrance to the park where we found a good site for $15.

Thursday, 31 August-
This morning was another rainy and cold one so we nixed our plans to see a heritage village in Calgary. Between our search for Wal-marts and our taking the long way out of the city to our Wal-mart last night, we’ve seen much of the town. So today we left Calgary by first taking a tour of the south and west ends of town. Overall, we aren’t big fans of Calgary. Downtown it was much like New York—no parking, everything jammed up and in a rush. Leaving the city took us out to ugly new walled developments where the houses are jammed closely together and you have to battle traffic to leave your immediate neighborhood. We did find a section of the city with nice trees and older-style suburbs but Calgary is now exploding and it’s not a pleasant sight.
But we did enjoy the countryside south of Calgary. We took Route 22X west to meet up with Route 22 and follow it south to Waterton Lakes National Park. The rolling topography soon settled into beautiful ranches, each with a western-style gate, many decorated with elk or moose antlers. And these aren’t show ranches—they are working ranches. And off in the distance is the front range of the Rockies, complete with snow-covered peaks. This is the area recommended to us by Jared-the-shepherd who grew up in this area. It’s fantastic.
We made it to Waterton Park by 1700 and drove into the visitor’s center but then decided we were tired and would save the park for tomorrow. We’re staying the night at a cheaper campground just outside the park, Waterton Springs Campground, cost $17 CDN.

Wednesday, 30 August-
After another restless night because of my sinus drainage, we awoke to a steady and cold rain. Fortunately, we were just planning on driving today anyway. We again got a bit of a late start for our drive to Calgary. On the way into the city we stopped at the Canadian Olympic Center which is still going well after having been the venue for the 1988 Winter Olympics. In summer they rent out mountain bikes and you can still get a luge ride for $6 or try the climbing wall. We were surprised to see how big of a draw it is.
We first did a little scouting of Wal-marts for our campground for the night. Calgary has eight to choose from but we just checked three and found a good one on the outskirts of the city.
We then drove into Calgary to the Glenbow Museum. I saw a parking spot close by and pulled into it but left after seeing the rate was $3.50 per hour. I thought that outrageous until pulling into a park-it-yourself lot where the rate was $4 per half-hour. Fortunately, we found street parking nearby for the bargain rate of $2 per hour.
The Glenbow is a very nice museum and enjoys a great reputation. Some ten years ago Labashi and I had created a photograph which had been part of an exhibition at the Glenbow, so it had special meaning for us.
After our visit to the museum we went back to the van and had supper in our parking spot while the city emptied out at rush hour. Labashi had picked up some felafels and a wheatberry salad in Banff and they were great. Afterwards we drove out to the edge-of-the-city Wal-mart for the night.

Tuesday, 29 August-
I’ve developed a cold or sinus infection that’s driving me a little nuts. I probably just have a cold from not keeping myself covered well enough sleeping next to an open window. I have a drainage that’s causing me to cough but, worse, I haven’t been falling asleep until 0200 or 0300. So because of that I slept in this morning and we didn’t get underway until almost 1100. We drove south to Banff and upon arriving in town we first spent an hour shopping for groceries. Prices in Banff are high so we only bought enough to last two days or so. Since the library was close by I checked with them about a wireless connection and they had one but a better option was to go to a nearby parking lot offering free wireless. That would allow us to stay in the van where we have our notes and where I can easily plug the laptop into a power inverter and keep the laptop battery charged. We had lunch at The Bison Mountain Bistro, which sponsors the free wi-fi. We split a wonderful specialty bacon and three-year-old cheddar sandwich and Labashi bought some duck liver pate for her breakfast tomorrow.
After we did our email and I updated my blog, we went for a walk around the town. Banff is blessed with views of mountains very close by and it’s addictive to just sit on a bench and watch the light change on the mountainside. In mid-afternoon we drove to the Banff Springs Hotel to see how the poor people live. This hotel was even nicer than the one at Lake Louise. The latter has a fantastic, almost unbelievable view but the hotel itself is modern— it’s covered in dryvit, for heaven’s sake. But the Banff Springs Hotel is a classic stone mountain-palace and the interior is massive and impressive. At Lake Louise we kept running into signs saying “this section for registered guests only” and it seemed stuffy. The Banff Springs hotel was a very classy hotel (the standard room rate in-season is $549 per night) yet it seemed low-key and friendly.
We walked through, checking out the shops and restaurants and then I had an inspiration. I saw that the Waldhaus was a German restaurant which sat just off the 15th green of the golf course and though the Waldhaus itself wouldn’t be open for dinner for another hour, it had a pub with a deck underneath the restaurant and overlooking the golf course. I was hoping to sit on the deck and have a glass of port—something Labashi and I had done many years ago on a visit to the Grande Place in Brussels. It had been a great adventure for us to sit at a patio table on the grand square and sip some port.
As it turns out, luck was with us. When I asked if they served any ports, our waitress said they did indeed have several ports and in fact, a tawny port sampler. The sampler consisted of a glass each of 10-year-old, 20-year-old, 30-year-old, and 40-year-old tawny port, all the same brand. That was perfect. And before the port was served, the only other table on the deck cleared out and we had the deck to ourselves as the sun was setting on the mountains around us.
So we had the most wonderful time, each taking the tiniest sip of each sample and comparing it ‘scientifically’ to the others. First we went up the ranks—10, 20, 30, 40. Hmmm. Then we compared the 10 to the 40. Then we tried to determine where the point of economic return was. Does one need to buy the 40-year-old port to have an acceptable one or would the 30-year-old do? After all our silliness, we decided that we were by no means experts on tawny ports and we’d be wasting our money to go for anything older than 20 years. In fact, the 10-year-old stuff was good to us. The port sampler was $27 and we considered it money well spent in this special time and place.
Afterwards we walked back to the van and I remembered that the nearby Upper Banff Hot Springs was open until 2100. The evening was rapidly cooling off and the hot springs would feel great. We drove to the springs at the top of the hill and briskly walked into the building before we changed our minds. Though the pool is outside the temperature of the spring water is 104 degrees F and that was indeed heavenly. We could just lie back and watch the nearby mountain fall into shadows. We had to be careful about submersing too long because you could easily get lightheaded--- all you had to do was stand up to quickly. Since I had gotten too overheated on our last hot springs outing, I tried the cool showers--- they were ice cold. I couldn’t stand directly under the shower but I could splash the cold water on my arms and chest and head to very rapidly cool back down. We lasted about an hour-and-a-half at the hot springs. Cost was $7.50 each plus a dollar each for the clothes lockers.
As it was nearly dark, we drove to the nearest reasonably-priced campground, which was Two Jacks Main Campground. We were warned they had been having problems for the last two weeks with a grizzly sow and her two young ones in the campground but we later learned they hadn’t been seen for a week.