Day 24: Hungry Horse and the Flathead River (Montana)

With got a late start and decided to save Glacier National Park for tomorrow and instead explore the area just outside the park. We started the day by taking a look at some of the stores along the main highway outside the campground.

First, a Western antiques store that was about 95% junk - but it's the 5% that counts, if you can find it. We found some souvenirs and other items, including a Pan Am 747 tie pin. The owner was formerly from Pennsylvania but moved out to Montana on a whim 40 years ago because he got tired of choking on all the government and regulations in Pennsylvania. That seems to be many peoples' story of how they found themselves out here.

Next, a shop all about "Huckleberries," a big local crop, that Sharon wanted to explore. They actually had a pretty cool gift shop as well as a lunch counter where we picked up sandwiches to go. 

Sharon tried, and approved of, Huckleberry Cheesecake fudge.

We headed to the Hungry Horse dam, a few miles up a road. 

 Not as impressive as some of the other dams we've seen, but the view was nice.

The  river the road followed was amazing - clear, fresh, deep, and with some nice rapids. 

So, after lunch we pulled up some maps and devised a plan to go rafting with our inflatible boat. 

We drove downriver and deposited one of our bikes. Then we drove upriver, almost all the way back up to the dam and climbed down a steep embankment with our boat. After inflating it, we hit the river hoping we hadn't missed a waterfall or other surprise in our research. 

Waterfall right where we put in if you look dead center.
And check out how clear the water is.

The rafting trip turned out great - there were some great rapids that we survived. 

The river's current alternated between fast and slow, and the water was amazingly clear. Despite being very deep, the rocks and fish at the bottom were very visible from the surface. 

5 miles are so later, we reached the point where we'd staged the bike. I rode the bike back to the car upriver, picked up the truck, and then met back with Sharon. Everything worked out great. 

Where we left the bike and ended our raft trip.

It was one of the best things we've done on this trip, especially because we had the river nearly entirely to ourselves and we didn't pay an outfitter a fortune to do it for us.

After rafting, we checked out a couple more shops but basically called it a day. We're staying in the same campground another night.

Dessert: Huckleberry pie

Tomorrow, Glacier National Park - for real.

Random Fact of the Day: We met a pair of Swedish grandparents from Gothenburg who were taking their grandkids, who live in Idaho, on a trip up to Glacier National Park. I'll bet we've met half the Swedes in Idaho now!