Day 44- Glacier National Park

Glacier national park is beautiful. Today I woke up early at the hostel, packed up and went through the tiny place they call Polebridge to see if the bakery was open. I was in luck and got a coffee and enough day old donuts (1/2 off) to feed an army. I was then told that the ranger station that I could get my permit at opened at 8. Turns out this was wrong and they actually didn't open until 9. Even with this inconvenience I made the most of it and found an outlet (that I was unable to find in town) to charge my phone. Once the station opened I went in with the 2 places in mind that I wanted to camp at but they were full. It turned out they were all full except for goat haunt shelters. This was 29 miles in. I told her that's where I wanted to go my first night and she did not think it was a good idea. I set her straight by telling her how many miles I can do in a day and reassuring her that the mileage was no problem, and it turned out not to be. I made it to camp by 7pm. The day was amazing. After walking the road up to bowman lake I was greeted with something out of a fairy tale. The lake was amazing with mountains on all sides. I walked all the way around the lake and then up over browns pass and into the mountains. I went down the other side through a tremendous canyon with lakes all down it and finally got to the Waterton river which was quite wide. It had a cable bridge across that swayed a good 3 feet with every step and started bouncing all over the place after the rhythm of a few steps. I crossed and made it to the goat haunt shelters which are just like a 3 sided garage with a cement floor. I ate and settled in and noticed a boat of tourists came down waterton lake. Apparently there is a shuttle that comes to the visitors center and ranger station here. This area of the national park is jointly managed by the USA and Canada. Even though I could finish the trail tomorrow without much difficulty I decided to go ahead and get a permit for tomorrow night. It will only be a 13 mile day but I should be able to fish and explore the park. Even though I will finish one day later than my 45 day goal, it is much more important to me to see more of the park than trying to rush through the last 25 miles.