The week before our trip to Glacier, Todd pulled his hamstring while overcompensating for his injured foot. He panicked and committed to daily ice baths to try to recover quickly enough for our hiking extravaganza. Sometimes he was able to convince the kids to suffer with him. Not only did this result in lots of soggy towels and wet bathroom floors, but there was a good amount of bragging/mocking from the warm shower afterward because no one stayed in as long as Todd did.
Jack and Gemma had copious amounts of sleepovers with each other over the summer. How could I say no?
Gemma and Jack participated in Chess Club at the Nelson's house again, although we traveled so much this summer that they were only able to attend two or three times.
All three kids attended volleyball camp at Granada High for a week. Unfortunately, it fell during a huge heat wave and the temperatures were at or above 100 degrees, so that put a hard slant on the experience.
Vlad and Luna moved back to California so we had them over for a visit. They spent the night with us and woke up to 4th of July, starting the day with Neil Diamond's "America" and flag fruit pizza for breakfast. Hazel painted festivities on faces on nails for all who were interested.
Every time I bite into a homemade hamburger, I wonder why we don't make those babies more often? They're so delicious!
Hazel counted our change and found we had over 25 bucks, so we went out for ice cream and blew it but it felt like we got it for free.
Livermore didn't do city fireworks this year, so we went to Tracy to see them. We bought a ticket to park in a lot by the show, but they closed the gates 30 minutes before the ticket said they would because the lot was "full." We were up a crick! We drove around trying to find a spot in an unfamiliar town and ended up with a super cool, memorable location - on a walnut shell hill. I was wearing flip-flops and the walk up and down was a tiny bit excruciating, but we could see lots of personal fireworks and the city show and had a spot all to ourselves. It was cool.
A day later, it was off to the races. Our original flight to Glacier got modified, and as Todd and I looked at our new options, bumping up to first class was only a few dollars more per person - I really don't know why, but it was - and in a moment of glamour, we went for it. Everyone had a roomy seat, lots of leg room, double the snacks, and sodas in real glasses.
It was a harsh slap back to reality when we picked up our rental van. It smelled like smoke, had a half-drunk koolaid drink in the door cupholder, and a janky headrest on the right side middle row seat. We jimmy-rigged it with baggage tags and bought duct tape to try to fix the situation, but no matter what we tried, whoever was sitting there (usually Gemma) got smacked in the back of the head every hour or two when the headrest came loose. We had to make do, however, as we had already lost an hour fighting with the rental company over them trying to charge us double what we had signed up for online and there was no one else to get a car from.
We stayed our first two nights at Apgar Village Lodge on Lake McDonald. It is right on the lake - a deck outside the door and five feet of rocky beach below. We had spectacular views inside and outside our room. The water was super chilly, but that didn't stop my crew from getting in to check it out. We skipped rocks and went for a sunset walk that evening.
Sunday we went to church and then found lunch at the Outlaw Diner - we felt obliged to speak in Western cowboy accents until the meal was completed.
Todd and Hazel had woken up early Sunday morning to go on a hike while the rest of us slept. When they got back and showed us pictures, I recognized their location and realized they had done one of the hikes we had planned to experience as a family - Avalanche Lake. Much to Hazel's chagrin, we all went back and hiked it together. Gorgeous! The hike took us along the river much of the time, and through forest.
The lake itself was stunning. There was a young woman there taking photos for her Insta, and we couldn't help but imitate/mock her a bit. The kids were excellent models!
For months, Todd expended great effort trying to get us a reservation at the Sperry Chalet, an exclusive and rustic abode that pretty much looks like it was dropped by helicopter on the top of the mountain, complete with mountain goats, pit toilets, and home-cooked meals. Rejection after rejection email flowed into my inbox, but Todd never quit, and at last he was rewarded with a one-night offer. He claimed it was "the trip of a lifetime, inside the trip of a lifetime."
The hike up was reported to be quite challenging. 6.7 miles and over 3,000 miles of elevation gain - super steep, rocky, and exposed to the sun much of the time. Claiming it was for his ankle and pulled hamstring, but really probably because of a deep desire to make Gemma's dreams come true, Todd booked a horseback trail ride up for the entire family.
Gemma loved every second of it. Jack's horse wouldn't stop snacking on the foliage on the sides of the trail. My horse ... At first, we nicknamed him Gassy Ben because, holy cow, he was farting up a storm at the corral before we took off. But his nickname didn't take long to evolve into Naughty Ben. He could care less what I was directing him to do, he was constantly nibbling on the forbidden foliage, when it was time to go fast he would hold back, and when we were waiting, he was pushing on the horse's butt in front of us, impatient to keep moving. But the worst of it was when we crossed a stream and he refused to move on. Impervious to my kicks and cajoling, he stood there for a solid five minutes and our guide had to walk into the water and pull him out by the reins.
Naughty Ben got a feed bag put on him so that he couldn't eat the plants along the trail. That didn't stop him from trying.
We crossed a second stream and Ben stopped to drink for so long that there was a large gap between us and Hazel's horse. He took off at a GALLOP to catch up. I thought I was going to die while pulling on the reins and shouting, "No, Ben! No!" It was ridiculous.
Our room was more comfortable than I expected: two queen beds and a twin, a little table, and plenty of hooks for our backpacks. Since there was no electricity, I had imagined we'd spend the evening with head lamps, but we were so far north it never really got dark until well after we fell asleep each night, so that wasn't really an issue.
The views were awesome and the food was, too. There were massive amounts of bugs out, though, which kept us from sitting on the rocks staring out at the scenery for long. We mostly enjoyed it while on the move, hiking.
There were mountain goats out and about, and Gemma totally hung out with them. They never quite let her touch them, but they didn't mind hanging out right next to her otherwise. They had a couple babies with them, so that was pretty cool.
We hiked to a waterfall, but there was no bridge at that point. Todd started making a makeshift crossing with rocks, but I was terrified one of us would slip and fall down the mountain (it was pretty steep!) and so we turned around and went back to the chalet from there.
The hike back down the next day was easily the worst part of the week. Easily. It was soooo steep and my knees were screaming at me. I had to move really slowly and a couple times I had to stop and rest because my legs were literally shaking. It was super discouraging and I was worried I would hold the family back and we wouldn't be able to go any of the other great hikes we had planned on. (I cried a little bit.)
But, hey, a marmot screamed as I walked by so I actually turned and saw it. We got a sweet video of it, too.
This flower literally growing sideways out of a crack in the rock inspired me with its resilience.
And there were wild strawberries growing along the trail, which tasted incredible, like little skittles. Jack stayed by my side for the entire, excruciatingly slow hike down, and we enjoyed a lot of strawberries together.
I survived, and our afternoon plan was to drive the Going to the Sun Road, so I got to rest my weary knees. It was a complete 180 for me emotionally - stunning mountain views that just seemed unreal. I could not stop drinking them in. It felt like we were in Switzerland. Pictures do not do the place justice, but I tried.
One feature on the road is called the Weeping Wall. It's a spot where water is always cascading right into the road. Todd opened the sunroof and crossed to the wrong side of the road (there was no oncoming traffic) and everyone reached their arms out and got splashed. It was super cool. This is one of the parts Todd remembers from when he visited Glacier as a kid.
(The waterfall on the road on the right side of the picture is the Weeping Wall.)
By the time we reached St Mary's Falls, we were well-rested and ready for an adventure. We hiked about a mile to the waterfall and lake. Everyone cliff-jumped, and Todd and Hazel jumped off the bridge. Hazel probably jumped 8 or 10 times. This was one of her major highlights from the whole trip.
The Going to the Sun Road took a couple hours to drive. It was heaven the whole time. Stunning mountain views nonstop for hours. Heaven, I say.
Gemma fell asleep waiting for a meal more than once on this trip. We wore her out! Not one peep of a complaint, however. She was positive and friendly always. Such a gem.
After the Sperry Lodge, we stayed the rest of the trip at Many Glacier Hotel. It was this gorgeous, Swiss-inspired place set right along a darling lake and surrounded by mountains. This whole park was surreal. The bad news was we were on the trip during a heat wave and none of the lodging had air conditioning, so it did get pretty hot with nowhere to escape but the icy lakes. Even the biggest rooms at the Many Glacier Hotel only had a double bed and a twin, so we had to get two rooms for our family. The kids absolutely loved having their own place. Each room had a phone, so we got lots of prank calls. Todd and I were not welcome in the kids' room; they felt so powerful having full, stinky, sloppy ownership of their own space.
There was a trail that circled Swiftcurrent Lake. We took it two or three times. The kids also loved playing hide and seek at the hotel, so we spent quite a bit of time staying close to "home" and relaxing. Todd and I even took our hiking camp chairs out to the lake and read our books for an hour or so by ourselves.
Our grand finale was a 10-mile (roundtrip) hike to Iceburg Lake. We left early in the morning to beat the heat as best we could. This hike was extra enjoyable because although it was long, there was only a half a mile with steep elevation gain, while the rest was quite gradual, and the scenery the entire way was jaw-dropping. I felt like Maria in The Sound of Music, spinning in circles and singing "the hills are alive." Words and pictures really cannot capture the feeling of being in Glacier. They just can't.
I LOVE this picture; it really captures the mood of this trip. The kids were super buddy-buddy and silly with each other. It was so happy and satisfying to see that. On this hike, they kept ahead of Todd and me and wiggled their "gyatts" at passing hikers for laughs.
Halfway up the trail was Ptarmegan Falls. The trail up to this point was mostly covered, while the next half gave stunning mountain vistas.
We felt well-rewarded when we reached the lake and could see that it still had iceburgs floating on it. Apparently, the week before we came, it was completely covered in a sheet of ice. I'm sure it was only a week or two later that all the ice was melted and it looked similar to other lakes we had seen. We came at the perfect time.
Our daredevils, Hazel and Todd, jumped in the lake. You know, just for bragging rights. It was shockingly cold, easily the coldest body of water we experienced in Glacier. Actually, Todd jumped onto an iceburg, wobbled it back and forth trying to decide if he could use it to get back to shore like a boat, realized it was instead floating further away, and then dived in from there.
One jump wasn't enough. We found a sheet of ice and Hazel jumped onto it, breaking through and, in the process, cutting her legs in hundreds of places. Todd quickly followed her, but didn't suffer the same injuries as she had cleared the way for him.
Gemma and Jack stuck to walking knee-deep in the water and stirring it with sticks.
They discovered that there were billions of little icicles growing underneath the sheet of ice. You could reach in and scoop up a handful. It was super cool!
Gemma also peed in the lake. It was too cold for her to want to squat in to do her business, but she had to sit in it and swish to clean up anyway when she was finished.
We all saw this large buck on our way out.
I loved this hike so much.
When we made our reservations over a year ago, we didn't know for sure when youth camp or other conflicts would happen, so we grabbed dates over a few different weeks. We ended up with overlapping visits and lots of nights at lodging that we needed to cancel when we figured out when and where we wanted to go. Todd's parents happened to be visiting us when we were discussing knocking those extra days off, and they said they would love to take a couple nights. It was fun to have our visits overlap and be able to see them and go out to dinner together in such a beautiful place. The kids also loved having another room they could prank call.
We lucked out and saw a bear on our last morning there. We were in the car - no danger.
We left early enough our last day that we could drive the Going to the Sun Road again from the opposite direction, crossing through the park on our way to the airport instead of going around it. It only added an hour to our drive time - absolutely worth it!
We let Hazel drive a portion - what an accomplishment for a permit driver!
We stopped for one last hike - Hidden Lake from the Logan Pass Visitor's Center. We saw mountain rams in the meadow. We were up so high in elevation that there was still snow on the trail - a significant amount. We were not prepared for that, in our tennis shoes instead of hiking boots. We had to admit defeat and turn around without reaching the overlook to the lake.
We had choices about how to get down: shuffle slowly and hope we didn't slip, or slide on our booties like we were sledding.
Gemma was so excited to show me the bathroom stalls at the Swiftcurrent Motel restaurant because they were her favorite color - teal!
Oh man, these pictures are not all consecutive! That's what happens when I'm pulling them from three different phones (mine, Todd's, and Hazel's). Not worth the switch. Let me catch you up on what else we've got here. First, views of the Many Glacier Hotel from the trail around the lake. I was trying to capture the grandeur of the setting.
Next, we had fun playing on the dock halfway around the lake. We came prepared to jump and made some great memories.
Silly shenanigans I want to remember. Everyone was just so happy on this trip. It was so fun to spend that time together.
Hazel ordered BBQ duck wings for dinner two nights in a row. Apparently, they were amazing.
The kids liked to put the chain across their door before opening it so Todd and I couldn't come in. Seriously, having their own room was a major highlight.
What a beautiful place. Honestly, I was a little worried Glacier wouldn't live up to the hype after a year of planning the trip (and several more years before that dreaming of it) - but it still exceeded expectations and was a trip of a lifetime.
Gemma reached into her pocket and was delighted to discover she'd put a patch of goat fur in there from Sperry Lodge! Soooooo gross. What a souvenir!
More Going to the Sun Road pictures. Sigh.
The failed Hidden Lakes hike.
As we passed the Weeping Wall this time, all the kids poked their heads through the sunroof to feel the water. They stayed up there for a good portion of the road afterward, waving at cars and laughing maniacally.
When we got to the airport, we discovered that our flight was delayed. Sad, but what a glamorous airport to wait in! I had a read-aloud book for the kids, too, thank goodness.
The airport had a collection of Glacier art. Here's one last shot to try to see the setting of the Many Glacier Hotel.
We flew home on a Friday, had dinner with Chrissy's family on Sunday, and the kids and I spent Monday driving out to Utah. Hazel helped me out and took a two-hour chunk in the middle of the drive. It was quite helpful.
The kids begged me to stop at Maverick's. Hazel had a memory of this milkshake machine from a time she went in with Aunt Laura and the cousins. Not gonna lie, it was pretty good. Good thing we don't have Maverick's in Livermore.
We spent Monday night with Chris and Jodi. They made us a delicious dinner and we took a nice walk through their cute Daybreak neighborhood. Um, they have a temple within walking distance from their house.
Tuesday we took Hazel to BYU. We came out to bring her to volleyball camp. She spent the first two nights in dorm housing, so we set her up in her room and took a quick look at the museum of art before saying our goodbyes.
Jack, Gemma, and I explored the campus for a couple more hours before driving up to Smithfield to visit my parents. We checked out the science building, the library, and the Wilk. The recruitment was successful; Jack told me that before he didn't want to go to BYU because that's the cliche thing that every Mormon kid does, but now he knows why and he wants to go there as well.
The kids were so stoked that the library has printable stories like the San Francisco library does, until they printed a few and saw that they were all basically conference talks. lol
Jack tried out VR at the library.
It was Gemma's dream come true to explore a library with more than one level. Her bubble did burst a little bit, though, when she saw how much of the library was study areas and not just rows and rows of children's books.
While up at Smithfield, we went swimming at the Logan Aquatic Center with Elise and Ethan.
We also got massive ice cream cones from Casper's.
And we visited with Grandma Holley.
The second half of the week, Hazel was doing a position-specific camp and that did not include lodging, so I picked her up from campus at the end of the day. We spent that first night at Grammie and Poppa's in Midway. We were pleasantly surprised that Beany and Spohie were also there.
The other two nights we slept at Missy's. Todd flew out and hung out with everyone for a couple of days and then supported us in the exhausting drive back home.
Gemma was glad to reunite with Ginger.
We hosted the ward's youth up at our cabin for a summer activity. Todd took a small posse early to help him set up the zip line at Utica Reservoir. I drove a van full of kids and met up with them there. The kids brought sack lunches and we spent the whole day there, zip lining and kayaking and paddle boarding.
We spent the night at the cabin. The girls slept indoors and the boys slept on the deck.
Saturday morning, Todd led the majority of the group (everyone who was interested) in a mountain biking ride.
We hung out at Bear Lake in the afternoon and then drove home. Short and sweet and super fun.
We turned right around again two days later and sent everyone camping. Jack went to boys camp at China Camp and Camp Liahona. The first stint was with only his age group from our stake, with surfing as their main event. The second half of the week our stake boys combined with another stake in the Bay Area so they'd have a good number of youth to have a camp experience with. Jack came home with lots of positive reports. He had a great time, especially with the surfing.
Hazel and Todd went up to Camp Richie for girls camp. Todd worked the rock climbing and rappelling area. Hazel was a youth leader in charge of a group of 3rd year girls. Reports were mixed. Hazel has never really loved girls camp; she always seems to have more fun at coed activities. Todd felt super sick all week and was disappointed how that held him back from socializing beyond the rock wall in the evenings. Judy Pickett adopted him into her 7th year group, though, and that made him feel really special. He joined them in their skit and that was a major hit for the week.
I took Gemma and Clara up to the cabin for our own "camp" week. The girls were in heaven, playing dragons and Harry Potter almost constantly. I did convince them to hang out with me some of the time, though, playing card games and reading a book aloud to them. They spent hours and hours at the lake; they never wanted to leave. They made an incredible sand castle world. They also spent a lot of time on the little green kayaks, paddling around. They made a game where one of them would stand on their kayak and wobble it back and forth, creating wakes, while the other held on to the end of theirs and pretended they were on a bucking bronco, holding on for as long as they could before losing their grip.
Todd's rope swing was popping. There were people using it constantly. How satisfying!
We were there during the Bear Valley Music Festival, so we were able to enjoy the art show. We also soaked up the stars each night - the conditions were just right for a stunning show each night.
We did have to cut our cabin week short so I could travel back to Utah for my Grandpa Bingham's funeral. Gemma stayed with Clara at her house and they continued their adventures. I got to spend some time with all my siblings, nieces and nephews, my parents, my Grandma Holley, and a lot of my extended family from the Bingham side. I was especially grateful for the 30 minutes I got alone with my dad as we walked around the block. I am grateful I could be there for him.
Isaac wanted to have a family Olympics, so I helped him gather everyone who was willing to participate and we had a few track and field events: a 400 meter race, shot put, long jump, etc. Doug gave demonstrations, I announced in a wild British accent, and Isaac swept the podium with the most gold medals. Everyone who participated was a real winner in the hearts, as it was close to 100 degrees outside and not a small sacrifice to come out and make Isaac's dreams come true.
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