Day 16

This morning we broke camp then went up to the community building for breakfast. Again, all standard stuff, eggs, bacon, sausage, toast, pancakes, coffee. After breakfast it was back to business. We were headed to the Going to the Sun Road in Glacier. We stopped at the McDonald House so I could see it first hand. It is indeed impressive.
From here we started our trek across Logan Pass via the Going to the Sun Road. We made a stop at the Glacier viewing area. It is set up with a wooden boardwalk that runs up into the mountain about 1.5 miles. This takes you onto the glacier and the surrounding mountain side. Doug, Sandy and Jim hiked the whole way to the top. There they had encounters with Mountain goats.

Sandy and the kids.



 Doug had a rather close experience with a mountain goat. Apparently the goat didn't care if Doug was there or not. He had places to go, and goats to see, and he was going.

 Jim and Doug in a pocket in a glacier.
Below a view from the top.

Once we were back at the bottom of the board walk, we mounted up and were off again on the Road to the Sun. This would prove to be a very interesting ride.
The views from the road are just fantastic.

Every where you looked there was something different to see.
At times the road had a small stone or wood guard rail, other times it had none.

 

Small waterfalls seemed to be around every bend, and there were lots of bends in this road.

 This one below is known as Weeping Wall.

 Below is the "helmet heads" That tenacious group of bikers that just keeps on going.

 Around some bends in this road, however, there were to be some surprises.
Construction was everywhere. Many sections were one way only. except, sometimes they weren't exactly clear on where the one way ended. Sometimes you weren't sure until the cars showed up coming at you.
 Notice, the road is hard pack dirt with some small amount of gravel tossed on top.

 Remember, we're riding this road that is narrow, winding and very high in the mountains, sometimes with a guardrail, sometimes not.

 Notice here that one side is wet. In this location, only one side was wet. Other areas the whole road surface was wet. That's because, someone,(this has to be a govt. job) decided that it would be a good idea to SOAK DOWN THIS HARD PACK DIRT AND GRAVEL ROAD! What happens when you add water to a hard packed dirt road? All together now....IT GETS REAL SLICK! That's what. Some genius decided that it would be a great idea to soak down this high, narrow, winding, mountain road. You know, the one that might or might not have a guard rail on the steep mountain drop off side.
Speaking of this guard rail, mostly it was a stone wall about 18 inches high, sometimes a wooden rail about the same height. Let's think about this, on a motorcycle that's just below the knee. Now they water down the road. With this guard rail, the bike slides on the wet road surface, slides into the guardrail breaking the riders leg. Now, without the guardrail, the rider just plummets over the edge, has a nice comfortable drop of 300-700 feet then smashes into the rocks. The end. Think about it, with the guardrail at this height, instead of a comfortable fall, the rider is now in excruciating pain for those 300-700 ft. of falling, of course, ending the same way.
Who designs this stuff. Must be a govt. worker some where.
Any way, we made our way across the Logan Pass and down the eastern side of the Continental Divide. 

We stopped at some of the interesting sights along the way

Me and Doug somewhere on the eastern side of Logan Pass.

Day 16 ended here at Great Falls KOA. The spot was very comfortable. A couple of Moose Drool Beers and burnt popcorn, we were all set.
Until tomorrow.