Glacier National Park

What fun to finally visit the one park i’ve REALLY wanted to see! It is so beautiful up here. No words of mine could ever do it justice. One can’t help but feel utterly content and at peace in this place.

We had a very early start to the day. The main road through the park, Going To The Sun road, can get very busy. More to the point some of the stops along the road can fill up very fast. So we were out the door before 7 knowing that it would take us about an hour to get to Logan’s Pass, the high point on the drive. Logan’s Pass is one of those places that fills up fast, usually the parking lot is full not long past 8. So we drove straight there making note of things we wanted to stop and see on the way back. We get to the pass plenty early. There are many people there, but room for us still too. We had wanted to stop at the visitor center, primarily to pay the park entrance fee. The booth was unmanned when we passed through so early and the autopay station required a better cellular signal than we could get. Alas, the visitor center was not open yet. So we decided to hike on up to see the hidden lake. It was about 1.5 miles each way. The path continued on past the viewpoint down to the actual lake, but it was closed beyond the viewpoint because of bear activity. Bears up here can be big - as in grizzly bears. Anyway, we weren’t entirely properly clad today. The weather in West Glacier was supposed to get up to about 75, it was 50 when we left. So we wore shorts and t-shirts with some warmer long sleeve shirts/sweatshirts on top. We neglected to take into account the elevation change from down low to up in the pass. By the time we got up to the pass it was a whopping 43-45 degrees, and there were clouds, and a breeze, and a light rain from time to time. No matter, hiking will warm us up! That was sort of true on the way up, because that mile and a half was all up hill! By the time we got to the top though, the wind kicked up and we were all pretty cold. I gave Alex my sweatshirt and he practically ran back down the path! As we weren’t planning on leaving the park until the end of the day I stopped in the visitor center (now open) and bought myself a sweatshirt because I was FREEZING! I didn’t want to take my sweatshirt back from Alex, he needed it :).

Anyway, the view at the top... we caught a very brief view of hidden lake in a break in the clouds. It’s all beautiful, even if shrouded in clouds and mist. We did see a funky large whitish animal we couldn’t Quite make out. Turns out it was a big ol’ marmot. So that was cool. Mike checked about the entrance fee we still hadn’t paid, the rangers said just to take care of it at the end of the day on our way out (we did).

So now that we were a little warmer we headed on up the road a bit further. There were some waterfalls we wanted to see. It’s now nearly 11:00 and the park is getting busy. There was no parking in the one lot we needed so we headed on. Found another place a bit further up. There was a waterfall a short hike from our parking area, but we wanted to see some other ones as well. So, we hopped on the shuttle which took us back to the other full parking lot. Was a nice hike down to the waterfall. The water was so clear and such s pretty blue. It did not disappoint. From there we decided to head to yet another waterfall, it wasn’y Too far away. The weather was nice and cool and sunny. So now it’s time to head back to the shuttle and grab lunch. Only, the shuttles only run every 30-40 minutes. It was just a fluke we caught the one when we needed it. So we opted to skip the shuttle stop and continue hiking around the lake, down by s beach area, up to another waterfall and back to our car, all in the same 30-40 minutes we *probably* would have waited for the elusive shuttle. Picnic lunch time, as we had covered a full 10 miles in hiking already.

The rest of the day was continuing along the Going to the Sun road to the end and then back again. A little more hiking, a few more stops. Started to rain a bit before we got back to the cabin.

Grilled some dinner, relaxed for the rest of the evening. Everyone is exhausted.

Alex took a gazillion pictures today, it will be fun seeing them when we get home. It’s 9:15 at night and the sun hasn’t even begun to set yet. That’s still do strange! Time to call it a night. More adventures tomorrow.