On Tuesday we spent the entire morning and early afternoon in a coffee bar at Fairmont hotsprings. It was an administrative morning, catching-up with some pending issues. We didn’t drive a lot and found a nice campground at Norbury Lake. We couldn’t resist a jump into the water which was very cold and therefore we were washed very quickly 😊. Wednesday was again a very hot day (34°C) with a heating breeze in our face. We drove via Elko and Rooseville back into the US, Montana, and decided to ask at the US border, if we could receive an extension of our visum. After a short interview with the customs officer on duty, he decided to prolong the visum with another 6 months, which we appreciated a lot and gave us more opportunities to travel at the east coast of Canada and the US. We were very happy!!!! We drove until the Glacier National Park were we couldn’t find any free campspot anymore, but we easily found one just outside the Park; Glacier campground (what’s in a name!). Thursday was Glacier National Park day. We first stopped at lake McDonald, were we could hardly see anything of the landscape due to the haze coming from the wild fires from California, Washington and British Columbia. We took the ‘going-to-the-sun’road, which reminded us to the roads in the Alps/Pyrenees, small and curvy, this resulted in an average speed of 15 miles/hour because the big stinking V8 trucks are not used to turn their cars and the road had the same width as a single lane on the interstate. Nevertheless we enjoyed the curves and the passing of the trucks. On Logan Pass we hiked to the Hidden Lake and were fortunate to see some wildlife; mountain goats, bighorn sheep, marmots and a grizzly in the distance. Again, we couldn’t enjoy the full beauty of the nature due to the haze. It was really a pity! Because of the heat we stopped at the first campground outside the park. On Friday we woke up early to battle the heat, we passed again the border with Canada where David made a hell of an entrance. While showing his passport, he toppled over and like a domino Veerle felt as well as she was standing next to David. Luckily no harm was done and the customs officer was so kindly to help us to put the bikes up and let us pass easily into Canada😊. In Waterton, we were able to grab the last free campspot and in the afternoon, we did the Lake Bertha hike. On this hike we could clearly experience the results of the Kenow wildfire of September 2017. After a refreshing dive in the lake, we returned to Waterton and ordered tickets for the taxi boat to go to the Crypt Lake hike starting point. (rated one of the world’s most thrilling trails by national geographic – suggestion done by our friend Fred). Today we hiked the famous trail to the Crypt Lake. It was indeed a very beautiful day hike through diverse nature; forest, canyon, waterfalls , steep stone hills and a natural tunnel. Of course we needed to have our swim into the glacier lake; not really a heated pool! 😊
