Late Fall Lake Paddle

[getnoutside]

One of my fellow Skerriers, David Bixby, and his wife are recent converts to kayaking. He just sent me a quick trip report for a paddle they did on a lake in his home state of Montana. Beautiful scenery alert!!

http://www.get-outside.com/late_fall_paddle.htm

[pat]

Stephen,

I can't get the images to enlarge using Firefox.

[Todd]

The Seely and Swan Valley is on the Eastern edge of the Northern Rockies, a beautiful place, northeast of Missoula and enroute to Glacier National Park further north. The pictures of the mountains could either be Glacier NP or the Mission Mts. The Mission Mts. have glacial features called hanging valleys, they are an awesome site.

Linda's yougerst daughter now lives in Missoula, and when I asked her last fall if they get the same fall colors we get, she mentioned driving to this area to view the Larch. The Larch is an evergreen-appearence tree but changes to bright yellow in the Autumn and then loses it leaves.

Steve's colleague David Bixby has another article about sailing Flathead Lake. Flathead is the largest freshwater lake west of the Mississipi in the Intercontinental US and is near the Swan-Seely- Lindbergh Lake region. An island in Flathead Lake is named Wild Horse Island and people kayak there from shore to commune with wild horses, elk, mountain goats and muledeer. In David's posting, he mentions camping on the island which is forbidden, but apparently David is sneaky.

I'm putting this area on my with kayaking spots wish-list for the summer, and if anyone loves white water kayaking, this is one place to go in May-June when the glacial runoff swells the rivers.