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Several significant things happened recently. Not in order of their importance, I’ll mention them here.I saw the first bears I’ve seen this year: a mother black bear and twin cubs of the year. They put on quite a show for the people in the first car in line of about a dozen cars. That first car didn’t move on, but slowly kept right alongside the trio–must have taken lots of photos! The cubs were so tiny, but pretty independent as they struggled up a bare road cut and munched on grasses and forbs.
Earlier that morning I was trying to figure out what was sitting on the road. It stood up and I realized it was a fox. As I slowed down, I was noting how scrawny and beaten up she looked as she started toward the left side of the highway. Just then 4 tiny, tiny fox kits leaped from the right side of the road! I was right on top of them and swerving every which way to avoid each one as they were going across at different angles and starting from different points along the road—I did, but I find it hard to believe. I was relieved, but sorry that I didn’t really get a chance to watch them.
I spent five nights on the eastern side of Glacier National Park and believe that my favorite area is Two Medicine Lake. But all of the east side is so spectacular—much more so than the west side. The mountains are ragged, high, and, because they are sedimentary, they are more colorful and intricate.
While at Many Glacier I met up with friends Debbie and Dave from Jackson. We had dinner together and they got to see Kairos, my home. But I totally forgot to take their picture to add to the gallery “Jackson on the Road.”
That night was also the one- month anniversary of my being on the road myself. It was nice to have friends to toast that landmark date. I have driven 1,500 miles, averaging about 50 miles a day. I’ve camped (no, I guess I have parked) in 3 national park campgrounds, 1 provincial park, 8 Forest Service or BLM sites, 2 city parks, and commercial parks in 8 towns. I’ve not met a whole lot of folks, but have visited museums, visitor centers and libraries. I am having a great time!
At Two Medicine campground—if your Montana license plate begins with a 7, you have spent at least the weekend here with your family, with all the attendant toys, and headed home around noon on Sunday at checkout time. If your license plate begins with a 38, you showed up on Sunday with 10-20 multiple-generation members of your family for a picnic and afternoon by the lake. At all the places I’ve visited, campers occupy a range of ages, number in their group, and camping styles. But there is a preponderance of families.
I saw another brown thrasher and my first gray catbird. I still see bald eagles, pronghorn, deer—but no elk, yet. Lots of ground squirrels that have a much bushier tail than the Unita ground squirrels. The Columbian ground squirrels are in the east part of Glacier National Park, but I have also seen Richardson ground squirrels farther east. Marmots are around in seemingly unlikely places: the RV park in Cut Bank, Montana. I now know round-leaved alumroot, Bicknell’s geranium and black elderberry. Have seen pink spirea, brown-eyed susan, sweet-cecily, meadow rue, and so many others on just a single walk around Two Medicine Lake. Sorry for the brevity Susan and Frances!
I read a quote attributed to Thomas Berry regarding the “great conversation” that struck me:
“We are talking only to ourselves. We are not talking to the rivers, we are not listening to the wind and stars. We have broken the great conversation. By breaking that conversation we have shattered the universe. All the disasters that are happening now are a consequence of that spiritual “autism.”
Go out there and have a great conversation.