This past week my family (including parents, siblings and their families) held our annual July 4th retreat in Montana. My parents have a great little farm outside of Helena along Little Blackfoot River, and we spend the week mountain biking, water tubing, fishing, fixing fences (and other chores), hiking, lighting fireworks and just about everything one can imagine in the beautiful outdoors of Montana. I do go through a little technology withdrawal as my cell phone (ATT service) does not work for the most part, and we generally try to stay unplugged (from the TV, computer, etc.).
This year we were especially "unplugged" as we spent three days in Glacier National Park. Glacier Park borders Canada and is often compared to the Swiss Alps. The visit and views did not disappoint, and I think we all came away thinking we had never before seen such beautiful mountains and vistas. While we didn't see any bears (though we were definitely all heads up on the hikes), we did get some up close sightings of mountain goats, big horn sheep and a few moose.
One of the highlights was staying at the Many Glacier lodge. Many Glacier, which was first built as an attraction by the Northern Railroad to get people to use their railroad to head out west, is now operated by the US National Park Service. The hotel, which stays closed all winter long (with one caretaker holed up all winter), is supposedly the inspiration behind Stephen King's "The Shining".
Back to work tomorrow. However, for those lucky enough to have some free time this summer, I definitely recommend a trip to Glacier Park, a stay at the Many Glacier, and a drive up the Going-to-the-Sun Road.
Going to the sun...where else can you do that? Saw they just got another big snowfall.....looks like a blast. Maybe we can have a meeting there?
TT
Posted by: tom troja | July 07, 2008 at 06:59 AM