an Offering from the Glacier Song Book....

Forest Fire Rap
Wildfire Rap
By Deb Gerace, 2008

I flame, I scorch, I smolder and smoke.
I can make you hot and I can make you choke.
Because of the above I often get a bad name,
But the real truth is, new growth is my game.

When I’m full of myself, and the forest’s on fire,
My thick, smoky clouds build higher and higher.
I look pretty fierce with my sparks blowing ‘round,
Driving out the critters as I race across the ground.

But I can be a sneak as well, just see if I can’t
By creeping through the bushes like an army of ants,
Gobbling up the underbrush and licking up the bark
Of cedars and pines and leaving my mark.

But after I’m finished, just take a second look
And lo and behold, Mother Nature starts to cook
By letting all the tougher trees start greening way up high
Even though they looked like they were starting to die!

(Continued online at Glacier's educational website)

Bye now.

Somehow, I always wind up doing my thing with kids, which is what I'm heading back to Ga. to do, in just a very few weeks.   I hope I can bring Glacier back with me, at least enough of it to whet my own students' appetites for more and maybe someday, when they are older, they will make this incredible journey, themselves.

From the ridiculous to the sublime.....

Before I sign out on this most amazing adventure, I'd like to leave you with a few gems....or something like that.  We are two days away from home and have been slammed with storms since leaving the West.  Another massive one is on its way from Illinois into southern Indiana where we decided not to tempt fate and are staying at a motel tonight in Columbus, which is still reeling from the floods last month.   As soon as I post this, I'm shutting down and bringing in the flashlights and lantern from the Wee Hoose....just in case!  Meanwhile, check out this last (maybe) post:
A few nuggets we'd like to share with you as we approach our final return destination:  This Alien Entertainment complex rather fascinated me.....somewhere in the midwest, which is where we saw more than just a few oddities, such as the one below....
No, not me....this place into which I am beckoning you in this photo - The House On a Rock.  Or rather, built around, under, between and over a big rock, over a number of years and filled with more collections, art, stained glass, mechanical instruments, old books and stuff that defies description, in Wisconsin, of all places.  But the further off the interstate we went in this state, the more quirky-ness we encountered.   Now this 'house' has grown into kind of a village of stuff, from the world's largest indoor carousel to a full mechanical orchestra.  However, Wisconsin has some truly classy attractions, as well.  Scroll down.....
On the same property as Frank Lloyd Wright's Taliesin homeplace, is the first building in which he 'broke the box' of architecture.....a school for the youth of the Wright/Jones families in the valley which still serves as a school of architecture for members of the Taliesin Fellowship today.

On The Road Again...and again, and again!

To my Petite Ya - Ya, L.M.,  I know this is out of sync with this blog page, but this one is for you!  This is me, 'taking out the trash' at the cabin.  We were instructed to drop our trash off at a nearby campground's dumpster.  It was a 3 minute drive or a mile paddle.  No contest!  Miss you, darlin' girl and looking forward to 'taking out the trash' at Allatoona soon!
This marker indicates where Custer probably fell at the Battle of Little Bighorn.  This is another place that evokes a lot of emotion and Mike just finished reading Ambrose's "Crazy Horse & Custer...The Parallel Lives of Two American Warriors," so he got a lot out of this visit.  It is a place in which all Americans need to spend some time reflecting.  For us, The Trail of Tears Museum in The Cherokee Nation in Oklahoma had the same effect.
We decided to try Mt. Rushmore one more time, after being turned off two years ago by the high price of parking in a national park for which we had just bought a yearly pass!  We spent a whole day at the Crazy Horse Monument instead that day.  But this time, we camped at the nearby KOA which had a shuttle so the whole 3 hour evening trip was only $4!   It was impressive....we hiked the base of the mountain walk, visited the sculpture's studio, and the ranger talk, movie, flag lowering ceremony in which all veterans in the amphitheater audience were invited down to the stage and asked to touch the folded flag after they were recognized and were leaving the stage.  We all sang 'God Bless the USA' a cappella, led by the ranger...it was a moving evening.  And the full moon iced the cake.

Today we spent an hour in an RV service bay, wondering if the leak in the fresh water system was going to be a big deal.  So far, not really.  Bill and Rich, at Dakota RV whipped that sucker into shape in no time flat and didn't charge us a cent because they weren't sure that was the only problem.  Looks like it was, since we're now using our water again and it's nice and dry under the Wee Hoose!  After that delay, we hit the road for a little over an hour and then stopped at the world-famous Wall Drugs in the Badlands.  This was a little one-horse drug store that years ago, hit upon the strategy of offering free ice water.  From that bright idea, grew four blocks of arcades, souvenir shops, western art shops, Black Hills Gold jewelry, eateries, giant dinosaurs and jackalopes, etc.  Google Wall Drugs and learn the rest of this quirky story if you don't already know it!

Oh, and by the way....

Forgot to tell you, Tilley has two fawns.  She brought them down to the cabin the other day to show them off, I guess.  We kept Mr. Confrontational out of the way, you can be sure.  No photo yet, needs lightening, since this was around 9 PM.  Stay tuned.  

Laura had this very appropriate cake baked and decorated for me and brought it to our farewell party and jam session at the AIR cabin Sunday afternoon. She, of course, is the education specialist and I don't know how Glacier ever managed without her all those years. I think she's only been there 2 or 3 years now, but she has made an incredible difference. She used to be a science teacher in her other life!

Mike enjoying his last night at the cabin. This is how our cabin usually looks, with laundry hanging out...real homey. We'll miss it - not to mention the lake!!!And then there's me, doing my guitar thing and teaching 'the kids' some new songs...like Kum By Yah. Dear kids, though...so nice. They will live here at Glacier, in dorms all summer, flitting hither and yon on bicycles, working in the gift shop, housekeeping, Jammer Joe's Restaurant, driving the Jammer busses, etc., then go back to California, Texas, Afghanistan, Russia or wherever they came from until next summer. They are amazing. This place could not function without them!
Here stands Mike (Father Goose), cooking burgers and dogs for the interpretive rangers and the Glacier Park Inc. employees who we've met over the past 30 days. Everyone in this photo, with the exception of Laura (in the bathing suit), is under 28...way under 28, (not Mike, of course). Later in the evening, a few GPI people over 40 came...yay! Playmates my own age!

But we all had a blast and Dennis McE will be honored to know that I taught them the entire Scat Rap and it they had so much fun that we took it over to the Lodge for the employees' open mike night at 10:30 PM that nite where it was a great hit! So now we are on our way back to Hotlanta, via The Little Bighorn, then Wall Drugs near the Badlands, then through the prairie then who knows where next? Meanwhile, Daisy and Buddy are hanging in there.....

Winding It Up

One more of a plethora of photos we took at Indian Days. The bad news is - we are departing for Ga. tomorrow a.m. Partied hearty last night at the cabin with rangers and GPI friends and camp hosts friends we've made here. Had one last paddle this morning to paddle the trash down to Sprague Campground, about a mile on Lake McDonald and it has a dumpster. Next entry will be from a campground near Little Bighorn that hopefully will have Wi fi.

We were extended 5 days so we could attend Indian Days in nearby Browning, MT. This is a huge inter-tribal powwow and truly a rapid kaleidoscope of color.

Cold, cold water but it has colors that are so vivid, one would swear there is powdered turquoise in it. Close...it's powder, all right, but from the glaciers.

We hiked 6 miles round trip up to this jewel.....Avalanche Lake.....a cirque lake, fed by a glacier. Can you say 'gorgeous?' I thought you could!

Everyday Life At GNP

And speaking of bears, our dinner companion in the village of Apgar.

On the 4th, it was windy and we couldn't paddle so I did the next best thing - racked out in my kayak on the shore and cuddled my dogs. Not a bad 4th. Very quiet at the park that day but we hear that the town of Hungry Horse sure rocked!

They're not kidding. We take our bear spray whenever we go into the woods on a hike. The rangers gave it to us and taught us how to use it. Most tourists wear the bear bells, but I notice the rangers didn't give us those.....that says something right there! Sounds like Christmas out on the trails! We saw a black bear near Avalanche Lake our first week here, and moose, mountain goats and Dahl's sheep. Ravens wake us in the a.m. (not a soothing sound), and we've heard a loon on our lake. Then of course, there's Buddy's deer.....

Singing in McDonald Lodge...not part of my duties, but they do favors for me and are a nice bunch of folks there. On rainy afternoons, it adds a lot!

This is how I spend most of my late evenings, after performing tunes for the ranger talks. Since all the rangers are too busy to meet, I go to them, sell them on the fact that my music can really 'kick it up' for their talk and then add said music. It's catching on.....I have 3 ranger 'gigs' this week.

Today Laura, Mike and I spent 2 hours in the Discovery Cabin with video equipment and got all the tunes and motions down on film for the GNP Education Website and for a possible CD. We are running out of time but I have been extended 5 days.....must be doing something right!

Second Attempt

I've written about 8 songs and now I'm teaching them to the kids and to the Interpretive Rangers via the Family Programs in the Campground Amphitheaters. My ultimate goal is to create a songbook & CD for teachers who will bring school field trips here.

Now this is a lodge! This is the Glacier Lodge, about an hour or so from here, up at East Glacier, still part of the park. The park has 5 or 6 lodges, but then again, the park is over a million acres and also spreads in to Canada. I do like our Lake McDonald Lodge just fine, however, It's intimate and I am getting to know the employees and they are extremely nice.

This may be all I get to post today, as I was just attempting to add another photo and we lost the signal. Ah, wilderness! I'll shut down and try again later.

By the way, going To the Sun Rd. opened all the way through today....50 miles. The trails at the height (Logan Pass) are still closed, due to several feet of snow.