Westward

August 2021 took us on an amazing trip through the wilderness of the US West. This journey was 2 years in the making, with the planning originally done in 2019, travel postponed in 2020, and finally actually done in 2021!

What follows is the story of how the trip went, and some of the best photo highlights

We begin our journey at Philadelphia International Airport, where we are all set to get on our 6 PM flight to Salt Lake City, stay the night, and proceed Northbound for Glacier National Park in Montana. Shortly before boarding time for our flight, we hear every travelers favorite words: The plane has a “substantial maintenance issue” and is going to be delayed until after midnight. The original plan was to arrive around 9pm, get a night’s sleep in SLC, and then begin the 10-hour drive the next morning early. We grumbled, got snacks, set up shop in the of our gate, and passed the time with Jeopardy

We eventually arrive at our hotel in SLC at about 3AM local time, sleep for a few hours, and get on the road the next morning.

One of the most immediately noticeable things we saw in the morning in SLC was how intensely smoky it is right now. Evidently there are fires burning in Utah and all of its adjacent states so it’s rather heavy here and visibility is highly limited.

We make our way up through Idaho on Interstate 15-North en route to Glacier:

On the way into Montana, we crossed the continentnal divide (for the first time this trip- we crossed it several more times as we worked our way through the trip):

Stopped at the Lazy B in Augusta, Montana for some dinner. Plenty of cowboy hats, day drinkin, and cursing. Good time.

The grazing lands and cattle out there stretch on as far as the eye can see

700 miles and 10 hours later, we arrive at the Many Glacier Hotel (or is it the Overlook Hotel?), where we’ll spend just one night.

We get dinner and sleep for the night, as we’re exhausted, it’s very windy, and then sun has already gone down.

We’re scheduled to take a boat tour of Swiftcurrent Lake, which leads to a hike to a lake fed by glacier melt. It’s rainy and foggy, but the tour is on, the views are still great, and we want to get to the other side of the lake to see if we can get a peek at Grinnell Glacier.

We finally reach Grinnell Lake. It’s still rainy and foggy, but you can see some glacial-melt waterfalls in the background.

We head back to the hotel and check out.

Our next destination is the Lake McDonald Lodge, but in order to get there, we will have to traverse the incredible Going-To-The-Sun Road. It is 50 miles of non-stop breathtaking scenery which winds way through the heart of Glacier National Park.

The road itself has a rich history, which is worth reading more about than I can reiterate here.

The Lake MacDonald Lodge, where we’re staying, was originally opened in 1913. There’s no wi-fi or cell service, it’s fantastic.

It has a beatiful beach, and the lake is fed right at the lodge by a mountain creek which splays out over the rocks.

We retire with a 6 pack of huckleberry lager (image stolen from google images, couldn’t find a pic!), excitedly waiting for the hike tomorrow morning to Avalanche Lake.

We slept heavy that night after such long travels and feelings of jet lag from the past few days.

7AM is a late wake up in Glacier because the trailheads and other attractions have such limited parking/accessibility that you really need to get there by 6-6:30 AM if you don’t want to circle the lot for who knows how long. We got lucky and found the only open spot at the Trail of the Cedars/Avalanche trail lot.

The trail itself is marked by numerous fast-moving mountain waterways.

You’re rewarded for reaching the end of the trail with views of Avalanche lake, with its cool glacial-blue color and glacial-melt waterfalls.

After hiking back and grabbing lunch at the lodge, we decided to take a kayak out on Lake McDonald for a few hours.

The opposite side of the lake burned pretty badly in a fire a few seasons back

We watched the rest of the daylight fade from a bench near the lodge, with a few more of the aforementioned huckleberry beers

We’re booked all day on day 5 for a ride on the historic Red Bus Tour of Glacier National Park. These buses have been running the tour for over 80 years.

Our driver was a highly knowledgeable, charismatic fellow by the name of Matt. He told us all about the construction of the road, the different mountains and glaciers, the wildlife, the history of the region, and the spiritual significance of many of the locales to the Blackfeet & Flathead Native American people from here.

The views were, as expected, superb.

Remember when I mentioned the Overlook Hotel earlier? Turns out the opening aerial shots from The Shining were filmed on the Going-To-The-Sun Road

We were lucky enough to spot some wildlife as well! Not five minutes into our red bus tour did we see a moose munching on some aquatic plant life.

We also came across a few bighorn sheep that had come up by the road, practically into traffic.

After we get back from the tour, we close out the evening watching the sunset on the lake again.

Having just barely secured a parking spot early for our first hike, we set out before the sunrise for Logan Pass, one of the best hikes in the park, nesteled high up aside Bearhat Mountain. By the time we reach the parking lot, the sunrise is glorious.

We decide to take the Hanging Garden Trail all the way down to Hidden Lake.

This is the view from the lake overlook:

We pass a few more bighorn sheep, headed on their merry way in the opposite direction from us

The views from the side of the lake are no less spectacular than from the overlook, and the smell of the spruce trees is like medicine for your soul.

We head back up the trail, we’re huffing and puffing as it gets steep, and all is going well until we reach a bend where there’s a few hikers on their way down who are pointing at something, which from my point of view is blocked by some greenery. I poke my head out a bit to the side and see a tuft of white fur- they are looking at a HUGE mountain goat, which wants to head down the path that they’re blocking.

This goat is the one of the most ridiculously buff animals I have ever seen, and once it can’t proceed down the trail, it decides to turn back our direction. Dana and I immediately scramble up the very steep hillside off the trail to let it pass us.

It stops less than 10 feet away from me and stares me down for what felt like an eternity, but was probably closer to 30 seconds or so. This was the only picture I could get when it was that close, because I was too busy unholstering my bear spray when it started coming towards us.

Fortunately, the goat decided to keep going down the trail we’d left open for it, and as soon as we got an opportunity, we booked it back up the trail and away.

I will never be able to look at a goat the same way for the rest of my life.

After that ordeal, we decided we’d keep to the water for the rest of the day, so we did some lake swimming and putted around in a small motorboat.

That wrapped up our stay at Lake MacDonald Lodge & Glacier National Park, and what a stay it was.

We spent the next day driving through numerous national forests before reaching our first pit-stop town, Bozeman, Montana.

The views along the way were not too shabby at all.

We finally reached Bozeman in time to do some laundry, eat some dinner, and peruse a little street festival on Main Street.

Crash time, because there’s a long day ahead in the morning.

Our next destination is Jackson Lake Lodge at Grand Tetons National Park, but the only way there from Bozeman is through Yellowstone National Park. Yellowstone is not exactly the type of place you detour around, so we spend most of the day driving through it en route to the lodge.

There’s geysers/geothermal activity absolutely everywhere.

Of particular note is the Grand Prismatic Spring…

…and of course Old Faithful, which was doing its thing right as we pulled up.

We eventually reached our cabin at Jackson Lake Lodge

Every evening people watch the sun set over the Tetons from the back patio of the lodge.

We headed to Jenny Lake, right at the foot of the Tetons, bound for yet another boat tour.

This provided some excellent views of the mountains and some of the glaciers tucked away within them.

We even spotted a black bear (with a cinnamon coat), whose photo I was able to capture by smashing my binoculars up against my phone.

We then went and cleaned up back at the cabin in order to get ready to head to the rodeo down in Jackson Hole.

It was a buckin’ good time.

You will never convince me to ride a bull.

The next morning, we headed back to Jenny Lake and got the ferry to hike to Inspiration Point

We had heard from a few other hikers that there were some moose up ahead, so even though we were actually on kind of a tight schedule for the day, we decided to go up just a bit further on the trail into Cascade Canyon. We ended up turning back before we saw any moose, but ended up spotting a black bear about 50 feet off the trail from us on the way back!

He was going his way, and we were going the other, so it wasn’t too scary of an encounter. Nothing compared to that goat.

Our next stop was the horse ranch at Colter Bay, where we did some trail riding.

Dana rode Conway and I rode You Bet!

We saw a really nice buck on the trail.

The sunset that evening was quite a bit smokier than the prior sunsets we’d seen on this trip. You can just barely see the Tetons peeking through the haze here.

Another early wakeup as we board the van to do some river rafting and hopefully spot some wildlife.

We saw more than a few bald eagles high in tree branches, some beavers, and a bison taking a drink

But the biggest surprise came when where a herd of bison basically wandered right into the road on the way back to the cabin.

At this point, we cleaned up and checked out on the way to our next destination- Lava Hot Springs, Idaho, a pit-stop on our way to Utah.

One last look at the Tetons though.

We headed through a few national forests before we reached the Pioneer Historic Bypass right on the border of Wyoming and Idaho. A 55-mile stretch where we saw maybe one single truck the entire ride.

We arrived at the Harkness Hotel in neighboring McCammon, Idaho, and then headed over to Lava Hot Springs, where there was a pretty awesome pool with some big water slides.

And square ice cream.

…and open fracking pits

We leave the Harkness at about 8am with a long drive ahead of us to get to Moab, Utah, the site of Arches and Canyonlands national parks.

As you can see, it was incredibly smokey (there are huge mountains right here that are completely invisible).

After 5 hours of driving through the desert though, it clears up and we reach Moab.

It’s over 100 degrees out in the heat of day, so we stop by the Arches visitors center real quick and then spend the remaining hours of afternoon heat at the hotel pool.

We wake up early to get to Arches and the views are incredible as the sun rises over the ancient rock formations.

Skyline arch

Pine Tree arch

Landscape arch

Keep your eyes peeled.

Double arch

Balance rock

I could fill up the whole rest of this post with views from Arches because there’s not a bad one in the entire park.

We spent the rest of the day getting out of the intense heat, checking out the town of Moab, and hanging by the pool a bit more.

The next morning, we awoke to rain and fog, but set out for Canyonlands National Park, about a 30 minute drive out of Moab.

Now you might think a rainy day sounds like a bad thing, but it actually turned out to be quite a bit nicer than anticipated. The area gets about 8 inches of rain annually, and we got about 1.5 for this storm. Because of that, we got to see something that few visitors get to see: desert waterfalls

The trails were a bit spooky in the morning fog

Wasn’t really sure what lay beyond Mesa arch

But we move on, the fog lifts, and the resulting views are unbelievable.

Buck Canyon Overlook

Orange Cliffs Overlook

and of course the Grand Viewpoint Overlook

It’s impossible to truly capture the scale of these landscapes in a photo.

The Green River Overlook

Upheaval Dome

We didn’t get to spend much time at Schafer Canyon

…because it started pouring the moment we reached the overlook and we had to sprint back to the car

At that point, we headed back to the hotel for a bit, explored town a bit more, and started to pack up in anticipation of the last full day of the trip.

By the morning, the storm had completely cleared up and we were left with a beautiful last day to explore Canyonlands and nearby Dead Horse Point State Park before heading back to Salt Lake City and eventually home.

Turns out THIS was the view from Mesa Arch once the fog had cleared.

Interestingly, because the rain and moisture had passed, the smoke returned and somewhat obscured the view. This is the Grand View Point, sans rain but with smoke.

The vistas at Dead Horse Point aren’t too shabby either.

Having seen as much of the parks as we could, we made one last crucial stop to check one more thing off the list.

We then caught one more night’s sleep, and hopped on our flight back home

An absolutely incredible journey concluded, we arrived home to our friends patiently awaiting us.

Thank you for reading, and my eternal thanks to my wonderful wife Dana for planning this once-in-a-lifetime trip that I will never forget ♡