Day 5: Into the Wild Part Deux: He Lives!

Tonight was a night for laundry, a cheesesteak (absolutely awful), and figuring out the next leg in the journey. Today's photos are up, so go crazy. Again, if you just want to click that link (yes, those words in different colors link to other stuff, I've included a bunch in this post.)

And an early tangent: if any of you know someone at Google/Snapfish/Facebook; can you please let them know that its driving me nuts having to update things in 3 places. Its a friggin' headache, and I'll explain:

I use google for the blog because I don't want to force people to sign up for Facebook.

I use snapfish for pictures because every digital picture I have is on snapfish and don't want pics in separate sites.

I use facebook for quick updates, mainly to let folks know where I'm at.

None of them want to work together to make my life easier. Monoplies are sometimes OK.

OK, back to life in Northwest Montana.

After getting Annie out for a long walk, I dropped her on a lounge chair and headed towards Glacier. One of the guys suggested Bowman Lake, a pretty remote part where I'll get some good views without a ton of visitors. I had no idea what "remote" meant, but I found out pretty quickly after arriving to Glacier.

I entered the park and wandered around until the pavement ended and a gravel road began. I had no idea how long there'd be gravel, and I wasn't going to let some chipped paint get in the way of a cool day. About 1/2 mile in to the drive, the road started getting bumpy, and it continued to be bumpy for the next 3 hours. You're probably reading that thinking, "how bumpy are we talking about?" I'll describe what it was like using a metaphor from shopping at your local Mall.

You know that feeling when you're looking for a parking spot, don't recognize a speed bump, and get jostled in your seat? That's what it was like, on about an every 30 second interval throughout the course of the drive. So not exactly a relaxing easy drive.

I first hit Polebridge, a small town that sits just outside the park entrance. When I say small, I mean two buildings small. A bakery and a bar. I walked in to the bakery and had a great sandwich with the shop owner (from Milwaukee).

I got to the Park Entrance, and purchased my official 2009 Season Pass for $80 to access our National Parks. Between Glacier, Yellowstone, the Tetons, I'll probably pay for it on the trip, and I figure it'll help make sure parks like this don't get messed with. Getting back to the drive, the Park Ranger told me when I arrived in the park that the road to Bowman Lake is about a mile away...yet somehow a mile passes, two mile passes, three miles pass, and I'm officially committed down a long, gravel, windy road that would continue for about 10 miles. Remember, that's 10 miles on a road that a Honda Accord is not built to handle.

Sometime in those 10 miles, I thought about JP's question a few days ago about the soundtrack for the trip. And as I got further and further in, I found myself listening to the soundtrack from Into the Wild. In case you aren't familiar, the film was based on a John Krakauer novel about a young kid who checks out in to the Alaskan wilderness after graduating college. It's an excellent book, and the story is both inspirational (follow your passion in life) and depressing (you don't have to die pursuing something you love). And the soundtrack is very good as well, which could bring me to a Tangent story about my mom and how she bought me the soundtrack but that's not interesting. All you need to take away from that last paragraph is you should either add it to your Netflix Queue, read the book, or buy the album on itunes. Regardless of your age or how you live your life, its a story we can all relate to on some level, just not to that extreme.

Back to the drive, it really got me thinking that this was the furthest "off the grid" I'd ever been by myself. No cell phone access, no street signs, no pavement, just trees, mountains, meadow, lakes, rivers, and some wildlife. Being "away from it all" can be a freaky experience. For starters, if something happens to my car, I'm screwed. Second, if I get out and a Bear or Mountain Lion crosses my path, I have no idea what to do. Everywhere I look there are signs for bears and wildlife, and while it'd be great to see one, I'm not ready to call it quits just yet. So coming back to the whole Into the Wild thing, my goal today was to make sure I walk out alive.

As I continued along my drive I continued a book on audio that was recommended by Connor, a coworker from Group Health, that sounds dry but is very interesting. Guns, Germs, and Steel is essentially an analysis of our evolution as a species, and why european/american cultures have amassed so much more than counterparts in less developed areas. Assuming you don't buy the Adam and Eve thing, it really is crazy to think about how we got settled around the globe as we evolved from primate. Of course, we've always heard the "white, anglo-christian" version in history classes, but being in these parts today I've had a greater appreciation for the toughness of humans who survived in some climates/regions. I'm here in the middle of summer and can barely swing it with 2 gallons of water and a car--imagine living in -50 below temps, with feet of snow on the ground, and no way to know where your next meal is coming from. THAT is toughness. I guess there's a National Geographic project going on that I've been told is pretty interesting if you're curious to learn about where you originated from. I think they want a paid DNA sample to give you an answer, so I'm OK knowing I originated out of Prentice Women's Hospital in Chicago on March 13, 1977.

The coolest part of today was hanging down by Bowman Lake, and I'm doing my best to bring you all with...here's a video (trying something new here).

Its on to Yellowstone for the next big highlight, but I'l make a few stops along the way as I head down tomorrow, and of course will keep y'all in the loop with words and pictures... In the meantime I'm lucky enough to catch this week's Breaking Bad while doing laundry...easily my favorite show these days.

hope you all are doing well,

D









has her own taste in music, as do I. She has her taste in movies, as do I.