Glacier National Park – Page 26 – Disney Creativity and Innovation Keynote Speaker

Saved Glacier from flopping

mountains — Still up on Swiftcurrent Mountain at the Fire Tower. This photo is looking Southeast towards Logan Pass. Mt Gould dominates the skyline. Swiftcurrent Glacier in foreground. It would be 2018 before i summited here. Once you summit you never see Glacier the same way again. It is still a wish to bring Chapin and Cheryl here and to Mt Oberlin – both peaks sit at 8,200′.

Saved Glacier from flopping?

Yes.

Here’s what happened with Glacier…

First Summer, great.

Drove rental car along the 50-mile Sun Road and stopped at all the overlooks. Stopped at Lodges, had a meal, browsed the shops, sat in the lobby. Great adult activities. For a new teenager, iffy at best.

Chapin agreed to return a second Summer. Can’t recall why. Probably him feeling he had no choice.

He did not want to return a third Summer.

Asked him why and his honest answer, “It’s boring.”

This was the defining moment in the Glacier love story.

Made him a promise, if he’d return a third year, we would not drive around and do all the boring stuff.

He agreed (probably still thinking he had no choice).

In 2015, we began parking the car, getting out and staying out, and hiking a trail.

This changed everything.

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This website is about our HOME. This is the fifth of five daily, differently-themed blog posts about: (1) mind, (2) body, (3) spirit, (4) work, (5) home. To return to Mid Life Celebration, the site about MIND, click here.

There’s something about Glacier

cartoon of mountain life — Cool t-shirt.

notes on a napkin — Notes while Jody Maberry and i had lunch at Two Dog Flats restaurant at Rising Sun Motor Inn. Was explaining my disdain for pontificators. Used the war historian versus soldier analogy. A war historian has never fought in a war, yet positions themself as an expert. To which Jody added…

There’s something about Glacier.

Perhaps it was the stunning and surprising imprint that Summer-of-1973 morning. Awakening and walking out the Swiftcurrent Motor Inn door and having my 14-year old mind blown by the sunrise igniting The Many Glacier Valley in a natural grandeur never seen before.

Final answer.

But wait, that was the just the catalyst.

There’s more to it.

Perhaps tomorrow.

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