Winds Howling

On the third day of our recent trip to Glacier National Park, we hiked the Iceberg Lake Trail, which takes you up to a lake nestled in a shady crook of a mountain, riddled with gradually melting icebergs.

Starting from the Many Glacier Hotel, it was about a 12-mile hike and took about 7 hours in all. Here it is from beginning to end, photographed and timestamped.

10:25: On the way to the trailhead, we crossed a bridge over a waterfall outside Many Glacier Hotel.

11:30: About an hour into the ascent, here’s our view.

11:50

Here are photos of all the animals we saw during our recent trip to Glacier National Park. We saw moose, mountain goats, bighorn sheep, Columbian ground squirrels, potentially both a black bear and grizzly bear, a ptarmigan and its babies, horses and some deer.

7/19

08:59: Bull moose — while getting off the first of two boats that took us to the Grinnell Glacier Trail.

10:49: Mountain goat on Grinnell Glacier Trail.

We just got back from a trip to Glacier National Park, the highlight of which was a roughly 10-mile hike up to the Grinnell Glacier and back. We started from the Many Glacier Hotel and took two boat rides on the way there, which shaved off a couple of miles, but walked all the way back down. It took about nine hours in all. Here it is from beginning to end, photographed and timestamped.

08:03: Lined up outside Many Glacier Hotel for the boat ride across Swiftcurrent Lake.

08:42: After crossing Swiftcurrent Lake, we traversed a brief patch of forest to reach a second boat on Lake Josephine.

08:50

08:59: When we reached the other side of Lake Josephine, everybody got excited about a moose.

09:23: Looking back at Lake Josephine as we start the ascent.

Rolling Stones — Foreign Tongues
Released July 10

I don’t think I’ve ever listened to a full Rolling Stones album before. Not being much of an aficionado, I was pleasantly surprised by how much I liked this very late entry to their catalogue. There was a genuine sense of creative energy. Mick Jagger’s vocals are always grabbing my attention for a new reason, never shying away from doing something just because it sounds funny. I loved his elongated line-ending words on ‘In The Stars,’ folky drawl on ‘Ringing Hollow,’ increasingly unhinged shrieking on ‘Never Wanna Lose You,’ and moments that sounded like fun-drunk attempts at The Bee Gees or Frankie Valli. The track list covers a lot of ground — old-school blues (‘Rough and Twisted,’ ‘Beautiful Delilah’), shades of 2010s pop (‘Never Wanna Lose You,’ ‘Divine Intervention’), a ‘Rock Lobster’-adjacent novelty song (‘Mr. Charm’), a pretty strong emotional ballad (‘Back In Your Life’) and an immediately detectable Amy Winehouse cover (‘You Know I’m No Good’). It’s slightly inflated by a handful of songs that don’t seem to add much, but this was a good one overall.

Madonna — Confessions II
Released July 3

I like this album quite a bit while I’m listening to it, but it doesn’t stick with me when it’s over. Songs are catchy as long as they’re playing but don’t get stuck in my head for long. I’ve put this album on in situations where “chill beats to study and relax to” would also have served the purpose.

Electronica by pop stars is usually pretty lame and watered down compared to the real stuff, but I thought this was actually some pretty capable production with plenty of surprises, like the square wave solo on ‘Bizarre.’ There is a satisfying amount of acoustic instruments layered into the electronica, like the trumpets on ‘Betrayal.’ Still, it does occasionally sound like lobby music for a PS2 racing game (‘Bring Your Love’) or the jellyfish rave music from SpongeBob (end of ‘Danceteria’).

Margo Price — Days of Unrest
Released July 3

This was a pleasant surprise, but felt like it could have been more. Apple Music’s promo copy makes much of how Price “champions her causes on [this] collection of protest songs,” but the tracklist was so short and padded with instrumentals that it hardly had an opportunity to be anything at all before it was over. The Bob Dylan universe has a heavy footprint here, with a Woody Guthrie cover featuring Joan Baez and a cover of “Maggie’s Farm” that’s as good as any version I’ve heard. It felt overall like a half-finished thing, but it sounded pretty good and I enjoyed it while it lasted.

There’s a consistent Southwest, mariachi-infused flavor; one song (‘De Colores’) is entirely in Spanish. The acoustic band has a loose, authentic feel and sounds great. Three of nine tracks are devoted entirely to their instrumental work. It’s really refreshing to hear such organic instrumentation — that’s one of the most appealing things about the album to me.