View Full Version : Score!
So way back in the early spring, I faxed in an application to GNP for a permit to hike the CDT section through the Park SOBO in July. I gave them dates, but said that really, anytime this summer, and any route, would do.
Time passed. I didn't hear from them. I went hiking for the whole month of April, which is when the permit lottery begins. Occasionally I'd be in cell range and check my email, but didn't see anything from the Park.
I got home to Montana and still didn't hear anything. One day I even scrolled through the hundreds of emails in the spam folder to see it if was in there. Nothing, although enough time had passed that emails dating from the middle of April had already been deleted automatically.
Last Friday I was in Apgar for work and had a few spare minutes so I dropped by the Backcountry Permit office. I asked about my application. The ranger dug it out. He glanced and it and said, "You got exactly what you asked for."
Huh? Knock me over with a feather! Woohoo! I'm going hiking for a week in July!
Awesome! Have a great hike. Most of us are envious! :)
Congratulations. Have a great hike!
rocketsocks
06-16-2015, 12:58
Cool, have a goodn'
garlic08
06-16-2015, 15:18
I'm glad to hear it worked out. GNP is the most difficult park I've encountered to get a permit. Even at the Grand Canyon, or at Mt Rainier, both with huge amounts of traffic and permit applications, it just always seems to go better. And at Glacier, at least years ago when I hiked the CDT SOBO, they didn't like to give thru hikers high-mileage days (over ten or twelve miles). By comparison, at Mt Rainier, when I got a permit to hike the 93-mile Wonderland Trail with three nights on the mountain, they almost asked me, "Why so long?" (They get lots of speed hikers from Seattle and Portland. The ranger was an AT veteran, too.)
Will David be joining you?
I agree about GNP being tough to get permits in. The reason I hadn't bothered to check was that I assumed I either got nothing at all, or some cobbled-together mess that I couldn't use with my schedule at work. (As the musician was saying last night during her set in the bar, "Summer is hump time for people in Montana." It's when we make the money that allows us to live here during the other ten months of the year.) I almost reeled with surprise when the ranger told me I had won the lottery--dates and campsites.
Alas, David can't go. He's saving his summer vacation time for a bike ride around northern Idaho in August. I'll be hiking with a friend.
Part of what's so frustrating about the permit system in Glacier is that the net result is almost no one in the backcountry most of the time. I usually get same-day permits and am often told I've just gotten the last site available at wherever. Then, when I get there, the other campsites are deserted. No one shows up. People have reserved and paid, and end up not using the permit. The other thing is that rather than counting the number of people, they give a campsite to between one and four people. So if you apply to hike solo to a backcountry campground that has four sites, you on your own are taking up one fourth of the available camping. Some sites also seem to be reserved for rangers. For CDT hikers, who are usually applying as solo hikers, that makes the permit incredibly hard to get. The system definitely limits the number of campers in the backcountry, but it's maddening for hikers.
garlic08
06-18-2015, 07:53
...they give a campsite to between one and four people....
That brings back a memory of trying to fit four solo tarps in one of the campsites meant for two free-standing tents--an engineering feat!
For a 1400 mile CDT hike I've spent at least 90% of my planning time trying to figure out the first 100 miles through GNP. :)
Do the backcountry campsites use tent platforms?
magic_game03
06-18-2015, 18:04
...Last Friday I was in Apgar for work and …
..."You got exactly what you asked for."
Sounds like an inside job!
Lol. Congrats! I've never applied for a lottery until this year. I broke down and did all the research on Grand Canyon and on my second attempt I got my application acceptance for October. I nearly cr@ped my pants and jumped out of them at the same time. In my five loops I covered of the CDT last year and two loops this year, Pitamakin Lk. to Old Man Lk. is on my top five favorite places, (with Hole in the Wall, Goat Haunt, Coal Cr., and Stony Indian.)
Sounds like an inside job!
Lol. Congrats! I've never applied for a lottery until this year. I broke down and did all the research on Grand Canyon and on my second attempt I got my application acceptance for October. I nearly cr@ped my pants and jumped out of them at the same time. In my five loops I covered of the CDT last year and two loops this year, Pitamakin Lk. to Old Man Lk. is on my top five favorite places, (with Hole in the Wall, Goat Haunt, Coal Cr., and Stony Indian.)
Post bookmarked for future trip. Thanks.
Wayne
Sent from somewhere around here.
No tent platforms. Each site is numbered, and delineated, usually with logs forming the border. They are quite small. It's a challenge to get non-freestanding tents with long tie-outs in them, and very challenging to get more than two tents in them. Quite often the ground is hard and difficult to drive a stake into. You should bring an extra stake or two, in case you bend one beyond usefulness. I've even bent titanium stakes...
BTW, I just had dinner at the Belton Chalet with some folks from the Asheville area last night. They had just arrived for a whirlwind trip to Glacier. Unfortunately, it's too early in the season for them to do most of their bucket-list items. The Highline Trail is closed right now. The shuttle service doesn't start until July. Most of the boat tours haven't started yet. The day before their departure from steamy North Carolina (where it has been quite hot recently), I sent my friend a photo of the thermometer on my front porch showing 40 degrees, advising them not to forget to bring jackets and warm clothes.
It's hard for people from warmer climes to appreciate the shortness of the season at Glacier.
magic_game03
06-19-2015, 16:46
BTW, I just had dinner...with some folks...They had just arrived for a whirlwind trip to Glacier. Unfortunately, it's too early in the season for them to do most of their bucket-list items.
The Highline Trail is closed right now. The shuttle service doesn't start until July. Most of the boat tours haven't started yet…
It's hard for people from warmer climes to appreciate the shortness of the season at Glacier.
Three different Ideas here I'd like to comment on.
First thought, it's great to hear people who have a bucket list for a national park didn't get their way. My conscious tells me that having a strict bucket list devalues the greater good of the park (Yes, even I am trying to figure out what that really means.) Last year I had a bucket list but I was also flexible, so I was able to fulfill my desires. I wonder if you (Marta) somewhere deep down inside also appreciates that Glacier is not a whirlwind, bucket-list kind of place? (I'm not really asking for a response, it's possibly a rhetorical question.)
Second thought, most of the parks that I've been into, on the surface, make it really difficult to do almost anything with out reservations. Yet, once you break through that tough outer shell they are wide open, boundless places. (For example, see how difficult it is to find out about any other trails besides the Bright Angel Tr. in the Grand Canyon through the NPS website. You have to dig through many layers just to find out that other trails exist, and that you don't have to get a 4-month advanced reservation just to camp there. On top of which, every night more than a hundred available backcountry camping permits are not used for other areas, not too far from the main trail!)
Third thought. I wonder how you (Marta) interpret, "shortness of season." I know you snowshoe. And Glacier never really closes. I interpret this statement as, poor saps don't even really know how to get out there and enjoy the park. That last statement just makes me howl. Best time to spot a wolverine, mink, pine martin and a lot of other critters is with a dense mid-winter snow pack.
(sorry for any spelling or grammatical errors, gotta run so I can't review. just read through the mess as best as you can.)
I'm with you, Magic. My own approach to travel is somewhat different than that of the people I was having dinner with. (And will be hiking with from Two Med today. I'm thinking Scenic Point, but we'll decide when we get there.)
The genius of Bill Bryson's much-reviled book is the insight that most AT hikes fail because "It wasn't what I expected." People go into their hikes--or National Park visits, or vacations, or marriages , or lives for that matter--with a script. Failure of the experience to follow that script causes confusion and disappointment.
The more they read and research on the internet, the more likely they are to have exceedingly detailed scripts for a trip…and the less likely those scripts are to be followed. Reading a blog of someone's fabulous hike along the Highline Trail, in which they take the free shuttle bus back to their car, so it's only a 12-mile hike, creates a vision of how wonderful an experience that must be. Alas, what the reader didn't notice is that 1) You can only drive to Logan Pass for three months in the summer 2) the shuttle bus only runs for two of those months 3) the trail itself might be closed because of snow hazards or bear activity.
I've been as guilty as anyone of doing what my husband calls "Fantasy Hiking"--imagining myself doing things that definitely didn't work out the way I envisioned them. But at this point my approach to travel is more like what you talk about. Allow at least a day to get to the Park and set up. Allow a day to scope things out and get oriented. Talk to rangers. Talk to other people you run into. Look at maps. Maybe get a guidebook and check out the hike lengths and descriptions. Look at the weather forecast. Make a loose plan that takes in the highs and lows, and takes advantage of the particular time of year you happen to be there. In other words, if you show up at Glacier in April, the trip isn't ruined because you can't drive to Logan Pass and hike the Highline. There are plenty of gorgeous places to go and things to do…but do bring warm clothes and snowshoes or skis.
The crux of the problem is that question: Is it better to do something less than ideal--take a four-day trip to a place like Glacier NP--or not do it at all? I can't answer that for anyone besides myself.