Riding A Storm Across the Mountains

Recently, I've been thinking a lot about where I was exactly a year ago. A year ago, I was on my honeymoon with B, covering many thousands of miles in this, the world's coolest vehicle.

That's a 1987 Volkswagen Vanagon Westfalia, for those of you who don't know (affectionately referred to as "Westy" by those of us who do know). The top pops up to create sleeping space, and this genius little vehicle has a stove, refrigerator, and all sorts of random storage space.

But a day ago yesterday, we were not in this vehicle at all. And in fact we were using our own legs to propel us up a mountain and to one of the quickly disappearing glaciers in Glacier National Park in Montana.

I recommend that you click on that picture above to see the enlarged version, if you can. It's absolutely stunning. Montana is stunning. When I was in college I took the train home from Saint Paul, and I still treasure the memory of seeing the Rocky Mountains rising out from the flat fields of wheat... it was one of those moments that reminds you just how incredibly small you are in the grand scheme of things. What forces could possibly have lifted so much rock from the prairie?

But let's talk about feeling small... the hike to Grinnell Glacier made me feel so small. The picture below was taken from our lunch site at the glacier.

We had started our hike at the far end of the second lake you can see. I don't remember how far it was to reach the glacier, but I do remember thinking that at least one of us was not going to survive the trip back down. It was a long hike.

But what an amazing journey. Maybe I'll post about our honeymoon in further detail this month. It's certainly been on my mind a lot. Our lives have changed quite a bit in the past year, since we're now happily ensconced in Queens and are both gainfully employed. Of course, I miss the mountains, as always. This is the curse of having grown up in the West.