"How do you fancy a helicopter ride?" asked Steve. He was joking - I didn't realise. "Why not?" I said, "I did those cable cars." So he booked it.
Riding in a helicopter hadn't found itself anywhere near the list of things I want to do before I die, but I'd rather walked into this one. And it was one of the most amazing things that has happened to me. For a start there were no bumps or jolts or mighty swoops. We wore headphones which played classical music over which the pilot occasionally pointed things out. It was like being on a magic carpet floating through the mountains. Pics here. Quite the worst bit was landing because that meant it was all over.
Very difficult to describe the sensation, but I realised that for the whole flight I hadn't thought about anything other than what I was looking at. No "did I leave my straighteners switched on?" "what shall we have for lunch?" thoughts and, not even once, "what if we crash?"
So having seen the National Park from above we drove the car back along the Going to the Sun road, out of the park and back in through a different entrance to Many Glacier. We stopped off for a couple of walks and saw a grizzly bear and her three cubs.
But that helicopter ride. It was something else.....
