Day 3: Glacier's Going-to-the-Sun Road

(Days 1 and 2 are here. They both involved waking up before 6 a.m.)

On Day 3 we finally got to sleep in! This is a vacation after all and at nearly 9 a.m. I found myself sitting on the back deck of our little rental cabin, the only one awake, wearing long sleeves, drinking my tea, and flipping through pictures from the day before. We ate breakfast at home, packed lunches, and headed out to drive the famous Going-to-the-Sun Road across Glacier National Park.

As mentioned in previous posts, you need a vehicle registration pass to enter the park at west entrance and drive the road from west to eat. We didn't have one (they get claimed QUICK, like within a few seconds, exactly 180 days out), so we drove the opposite direction, from east to west, entering the park at the St. Mary's entrance. While it was yet another long drive over to get to the east side of the park (about 90 minutes), it meant we ended our journey at the relatively more populated west side where we could play at Lake McDonald again, get a snack or drink, and be only 20 minutes from home. It worked out great, particularly because of the aquatic turn our journey ended up taking.

A marvel of 1920’s engineering, the 50-mile GTTS road spans the whole of Glacier National Park with soaring views, shrinking glaciers, waterfalls everywhere, beautiful hikes along every mile. We listened to our GuideAlong app for its history and stories and fun facts and had to pull over to explore a tunnel with windows built into it.

After another hour or so of driving, with gorgeous views, cool air, no cell service, interesting GuideAlong stories, and a few stops at lookout points, we saw some beautiful water that looked deep enough to swim in. Jumping off rocks is Landon's favorite thing in the entire world (a love that is shared by the rest of the family), so we had to pull over. We changed into suits in the car and Landon was the first one out to scramble barefoot down a path, across rocks, and fling himself off a boulder into the coldest water I’ve ever felt in my life.

It was also some of the most beautiful and most clear water ever, but omg was it freezing.

In the words of Landon, "Mom it's so cold that I kind of felt like I couldn't breathe, but then I could again." Also, "I can't put my head underwater because it feels like my eyeballs will explode." I quite literally put a single toe in and NOPE. That rock wasn't high enough to make the jump cool enough to be worth that kind of temperature shock.

It did not deter James and the kids in the least though and I love that for them. I basked on the rocks like a lizard in my bikini and took pictures of my family.

I truly love how Claire, who battles fears about so many things, will throw herself off a tall boulder into freezing water without hesitation.

After a stop at Lake McDonald for ice cream (for the kids) and a huckleberry margarita (for me), our waiter told us about a “really tall” bridge you can jump off, so of course we headed there next.

Belton Bridge is 40 feet above FREEZING water and yes both boys immediately jumped off:

Now that we were at the end of our day, I decided I didn't mind getting wet. Also, this bridge was really high and the cold plunge felt worth the thrill, so I asked Claire if she wanted to jump with me and she did!

It was so cold when I hit the water that I quite literally couldn’t breathe but I DID IT and it’s important to show your teenagers that you can.

I did not expect my swimsuit to be quite so heavily featured in our National Park hiking trip. I threw it up in the suitcase thinking maybe we'd do a hot spring or something, but no, my little Target bikini got flung into multiple bodies of water and wasn't quite up to the task. It did its best though.

After we finally left the bridge, many jumps later, we drove the 20 minutes home to make tacos back at the cabin, play off the back deck, and sleep. Day 4 would be our long drive to Yellowstone, and we would be leaving Glacier with big smiles and happy, grateful hearts.