Hungry Horse Reservoir

We had a great afternoon completing our exploration of the Hungry Horse Reservoir. It took us two days, but we drove the entire 116 miles around the reservoir and stopped at every campground and boondock camping area. The campgrounds cost $13/night. The boondock areas are all free. Some of them even have pit toilets. We decided that we would prefer to camp on the west side since the camping areas there have much more panoramic views and are looking at the dramatic mountains of the Flathead Range that run through the Great Bear Wilderness.

Hungry Horse gets its name from a story of two draft horses that wandered off into these mountains in the winter. They survived and were found  some days later very skinny and very hungry.

We drove counter-clockwise today starting at the dam. Early into our exploration we spotted an Osprey nest high atop what appeared to be a tall lodge pole pine. This was a burn area and recovering beautifully. I was able to get some good pictures. The mountains behind her in the close-up are Great Northern Mountain and Mt Grant. Stanton and Grant glaciers are just out of sight.

I love the mountain ash especially when it is heavy with bright red berries. That especially true when my picture shows Great Northern Mountain in the background. We had a snack at this spot - a boat ramp near one of the campgrounds. The view was spectacular. The reason that it appears a bit hazy is smoke from forest fires far to the west. 

This picture is looking at a small inlet on which there was an unnamed (boondock - no charge) campground. It had enough room for 5 campers. The reason that we know that is that that is how many there were. You just have to know it's there. I took GPS coordinates so I can mark it on a map and we can find it again. I put the truck into 4 wheel drive to get out. The climb was just short of 300 feet in less than 1/2 mile. You can see how narrow the road is, and there's a rather big drop if you get off. 

Actually driving along the west side of Hungry Horse reminds me of driving the Going-to-the-Sun Road except this one is gravel and the drops are only 2-300 feet as opposed to 800-1000 on the Going-to-the-Sun. But, as the old saying goes, 'it isn't the fall that kills you. It's the sudden stop.'

Our new hometown, Columbia Falls, is just over the mountain (Columbia Mtn) from the entrance to the Hungry Horse National Forest, and it is about 7-8 miles from the west gate to Glacier Nat'l Park. Since we have explored every road that went down to the lake, we want to start exploring roads that head up into the mountains and start making notes on the geology of these areas. It is a magnificent area.