35 miles
The weather forecast for today was 90 % chance of rain. When we woke up it was raining hard and there was thunder and lightning. Nancy told all of us we shouldn’t leave the hotel because of the lightning. We had breakfast by the trailer and waited around thinking what to do. Ken told us a few options.
All of us trying to decide whether to ride over the pass in very bad weather in the morning-Ken advising us of our options
Some people chose to take the shuttle over Logan Pass to avoid the rotten weather. I was leaning in that direction but when I saw Ed ride off by himself toward Logan Pass I decided to ride with him. We both made it up Steven’s Pass in Washington helping each other up . A total of 5 in the group decided to ride (Greg, Susie, Ken, Ed, and I) and the others took the shuttle.
As Ed and I rode east it continued to rain. I got more concerned as I knew soon we would be climbing and would have to go over a 6,000 ft pass in horrible weather.
When Ed and I made the hairpin turn to climb higher the rain stopped. We climbed steadily for 10 miles in between fog and wind. The views were nice but the clouds obstructed a lot of peaks. We also had to work our way through construction areas limiting vehicles to one lane.
One mile before the top the wind really picked up. We started to get very cold because of the sweat we were generating under our rain gear. When we crested the summit Ed shook my hand congratulating both of us. However, we didn’t go over to the summit sign for a photo because it was freezing by now. We quickly rushed to the Visitors Center. We only went there to get out of the wind and cold.
Once in the Visitor's Center we became disappointed as the building was not heated. Even though we were inside it was still very cold. The only good thing was that were were out of the wind and rain.
Notwithstanding the fact that I had rain gear on I was still soaked and shivering. I changed my jersey but the new one was wet because the rain had seeped through my Camelbak lining.
After staying inside the visitor’s center for 30 minutes we decided to head down the summit to the other side of the park where others in our group had gone. This turned out to be the hardest and most uncomfortable part of today's ride. Ed and I were freezing cold and now it was sleeting. The decent was steep and my hands got completely numb. I could not even work my brakes going down hill. We pulled into several pullouts just to get our feeling back in our hands. Both of us thought we may be in danger of hypothermia.
But as we slowly worked our way down hill it got a little warmer. Ed was taking pictures with his IPhone as I left my camera in my suitcase because I did not want it to get soaked.
We finally got to Rising Sun Lodge. Ed and I went to the restaurant to heat up and have soup and coffee. Ed said because of that experience “we are bonded for life”.
From Going To the Sun Hwy (Taken previous day)
The steep climb up to Logan Pass (Taken previous day)
The steep climb up to Logan Pass taken by Ed's iPhone
Going up to Logan pass by Ed's iPhone
Logan Pass (taken previous day)
Ed and I near St. Mary Lake still with rain gear on, very wet and cold but warming up slowly
Eastern Side of Glacier before Rising Sun finally starting to get warmer
Comfortable after a warm shower and now time to relax
Lodge in St. Mary
Chuck, I think you, Ken and I were the only ones from the group to ride Going to the Sun Road -- who were the other two? What a cold day for warm friendship. Glad we shared this.
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