Glacier National Park

Water here is not as milky. But it still retains that turquoise tint. The mountains are more lush too: the trees along Cedar Trail was covered with lichens like in the rain forest of Olympic National Park. The western side of the mountain must be getting dumped as the air rises to go over the 10,000 ft peaks. West Glacier gets 30 inches of rainfall annually while St. Mary on the eastern side gets measley a couple.

As we traveled eastward to Calgary, the landscape quickly turned flat as if the Rockies never happened.  Series of farms turned into ranches as we approach Calgary, a town known for cattle drive and stampede in its glory days. The mountain meanwhile ran away from us in southeastern direction and became invisible by the time we got to Calgary. The Rockies became visible once again past Fort McCleod as we travel south from Calgary. By the time we got to Cardston, we could see the peaks in the distance.

We got to St Mary, the launching point for Going-to-the-Sun Road, in the afternoon. We meant to leave Canmore before 7AM so that we would arrive at St. Mary by noon, but the hotel didn't serve breakfast till 7AM, so we were already an hour behind schedule when we left. We didn't spend much time in Calgary other than a quick charging stop. It was pouring and there wasn't much to look other than Bow riverfront anyway. But the stop for the Tesla charger and a bad Chinese take-out in Ft. Mcleod took an hour.

Luckly, Going-to-the-Sun road wasn't too long. It is only 85 miles, or 5 hours of drive including stops at a dozen points of interest.  We still had daylight left when we got to Moose Creek RV Resort past West Glacier, where we camped for the night.

I can't think of any scenic drive that matches this Going-to-the-Sun road. And there are scenic ones that we've driven through: Yosemite Valley drive, Zion National, From Prescott to Sedona, Grand Canyon Rim drive, etc. But the views from the harrowing Logan's Pass was more visceral. Maybe the cool temperature and lushness may have something to do with it.

We could've easily set up a base camp at Moose Creek and spent another day exploring and hiking Glacier national. Some dufus on the Net said that Banff is incomparably better than Glacier National, and I only scheduled 1 day in Glacier based on that misinformed opinion. I'll have to come back here, camp out and hike. Perhaps even backpack through the wilderness if I ever recover fully.