Trip to Glacier National Park

*Warning* This will probably be a long post.  I’ll do my best to break it up.  I’d suggest grabbing a cup of coffee to keep you awake through the details. 

Wow.  We did a LOT this past week, and had a GREAT trip.  Truly, it was fantastic.  Ethan flew in almost two weeks ago (more on his time here later) and then last Friday the three of us packed up the car and headed east towards Glacier National Park, where we met up with Aaron’s parents for a week-long trip.

The trip had a lot of highlights, so I’ll pick the top few for each area we visited:

ON THE WAY TO GLACIER

Day 1 started off with an incredible surprise.  Driving through the hot Washington dessert on I-90, I leaned against the window to take a nap and glanced at the car we were passing on our right.  I instantly recognized the driver as Shirley Davidson, mother of my best friend from kindergarden through 8th grade (Amanda Davidson), and her dad, Dennis asleep next to her.  The Davidsons were also good friends with my mom, and our families spent a lot of time together when we were growing up, until they moved away to Bozeman, Montana, before my 8th grade year.

After a little jumping up and down I told Aaron to pull up beside them, and stuck my head out of the car (at 75 mph), waved my hands, and yelled to get her attention.  After an initial confused look, her eyes got really wide, and she mouthed “Makeba!?”  We pulled over on the side of the road in the hot middle-of-nowhere dessert and talked about how crazy it was to see each other.  I hadn’t seen Shirley and Dennis in over 12 years!  I expected it to be difficult to try to catch up, but (props to Shirley) it turns out that they have been keeping up with our blog since we moved to Seattle.  They even asked how my back was doing.  After a little more visiting we got back in the car (and out of the sun) and headed our separate ways.  I was SO happy to see them after so many years.  And don’t worry Shirley, I’m planning a visit to Bozeman in the near future..

As part of our dessert experience we checked out a petrified forest (which wasn’t really a forest), and took some cheesy pictures with a giant dinosaur outside the souvenir gift shop.  Great fun.  After the long boring dessert we stopped for lunch in Spokane and quickly checked out Riverfront park.  I made Aaron and Ethan take a picture in the big Radio Flyer wagon before getting back on the road. 

To break up the trip, we stayed the night in the Northern Idaho Panhandle, in a town called Sandpoint on Lake Pend Oreille.  The lake was beautiful, and it was nice to see some more of the Northwest.  The next morning we headed Southeast into Montana and drove through the Flathead Valley area and Flathead Indian Reservation, which is home to the National Bison Range.  Armed with a zoom lens and two pairs of binoculars, we took the 19 mile loop through some pretty steep hills, and spotted two herds of bison, some antelope, and a few big horned sheep.  Toward the end of the loop we came upon a herd of Bison that were fairly close, including a lot of babies. 

WEST GLACIER

We stayed in West Glacier our first two nights at the park, where we met Aaron’s parents at the train station across the street from our hotel.  The first day we did an easy 4 mile hike to Avalanche Lake, which was fairly boring until the very end, when we were rewarded with some pretty amazing scenery.  The lake was a crystal blue color, and various waterfalls cascaded down the mountain surrounding the lake.  Not a bad place to sit and enjoy a PB&J.

The other highlight of West Glacier was the same evening, when Aaron, Ethan, Mom Greene and I rented kayaks on Lake McDonald.  The lake is huge, and over 400 feet deep.  We paddled out all the way to the middle and enjoyed the 360 degree views of forests, rocks and snow covered mountains.  It was a peaceful first day in the park.

LOGAN PASS/ LAKE ST. MARY

At 6am the alarm clock was a rude awakening, but it was important to get up to Logan Pass before the parking lot filled up.  We made it by 8:30 in the morning and joined a ranger-guided hike (3 mi) to Hidden Valley Overlook.  Ranger Bill was super cool (a retired science teacher) and led us through some thick snow fields, over a pass to an amazing viewpoint above several glacial lakes.  As we rounded a bend in the trail, I looked up to see a large white mountain goat directly in the path in front of us.  Before long we realized that they were all around us – we probably saw more than 2 dozen near the top of the cliff.  Along with the mountain goats, we spent time with two marmots, some ground squirrels, and a bunch of big horned sheep.  Later that day we went on a boat tour of Lake St. Mary and took a short hike to Bering Falls, before heading to Many Glacier for the night.

MANY GLACIER

Many Glacier was by far my favorite part of the park.  Our first day there, Ethan, Aaron and I got up early and caught a boat across Swiftcurrent Lake, hiked a 1/4 mile to Josephine Lake, and caught another ferry across.  From the boat dock we started what became a 10.2 mile hike to Grinnell Glacier and back.  The weather was amazing, the scenery was fantastic, and it was just a really fun day.  We hiked hard up the mountain along several ridges, until we came to the base of a snow field.  From here we basically hiked straight up until we got to a cliff that overlooked the 3 lakes we passed (Grinnell, Josephine and Swiftcurrent), and came right up to the base of the receding Grinnell Glacier.  The glacier was once connected to a larger glacier above it (called Salamander Glacier), but the two split a few decades ago, and more and more gravel-like rock is replacing what once was moving ice. 

We hiked all the way to the edge of the glacier but decided not to follow the group that walked out on it.  The melted parts of the glacier are forming a large lake, and through the broken ice we could see bright blue patches of water and a river forming underneath.  Between the edge of the glacier and the cliff were a herd of big horned sheep, who hung out with us for a while on the rocks.  The view was just amazing.

On the way back we went a little slower, but found the snow banks a little harder to handle on the way down.  We also learned that the little waterfall we passed under on our way up had turned into something a bit more powerful.

 

 

As we were rounding one of the last corners of the trail we heard some yelling above us, and turned to see a small Grizzly Bear walking up the path toward where we had just been!  Thankfully a ranger was in the area and was able to keep people back while coaxing the bear to move in another direction.

The next day in Many Glacier the weather was a little crappy, so we slept in and hung around until the afternoon, when we took the same boat ride with Aaron’s parents and walked to Grinnell Lake.  The following morning we decided to check Fishercap Lake (near our hotel) for moose before driving north.  When we turned the corner at the lake Aaron jumped and pointed, and ta-da, we had a moose sighting.  A small female moose was feeding right in the middle of the lake. 

WATERTON LAKES NATIONAL PARK

Waterton Lakes National Park is an International Peace Park with Glacier NP, but in Alberta Canada.  We drove up across the border, did a scenic drive to Cameron Lake, and then headed toward the Prince of Wales Hotel.  My favorite memory from my last trip to Glacier (when I was 13) was the Prince of Wales.  While it wasn’t quite as large as in my memories, it was just as impressive and beautiful, and the wind at the top of the peninsula was just as strong as I had remembered.

Before the trip I made reservations for “high tea,” so we got dressed up and took in a meal of finger sandwiches, sugar cookies, truffles, little cakes, chocolate covered strawberries, and of course the Prince of Wales tea.  Though it may have been a bit pretentious, I absolutely loved it.  And after Aaron’s mom said it was a highlight of the trip for her, I was even more glad we spent the money.

To burn off our sweets, Aaron, Ethan and I hiked a streneous mile up to the top of Bear’s Hump, which overlooks the Prince of Wales and sits at the very top of the valley.  I was panting by the top, but the views down Waterton Lake were incredible, and well worth the climb.

The next morning we took a boat all the way from the top of the lake to the bottom (called Goat Haunt).  When we landed we decided to do an easy 5 mile hike to the Kootenai Lakes.  After hiking through customs to the U.S. (how cool is that?) we had a long, boring and muggy trip.  The bugs attacked me. The weather wasn’t all that great, but once we reached the lakes, we forgot about our complaining.  At least four bull moose stood in the middle or on the side of the lake, with their heads buried in their lunch.  Every 3 to 4 minutes, one would thrust its head out of the water, turn to look at us, and pose for the camera with water streaming down its face and antlers. 

LAST DAY

Our last day involved a lot of driving, but we did make a stop at the Izaac Walton Inn, which is one of the original chalets built for the Great Northern Railroad.  This was a must-see for Aaron’s dad, and he was not dissapointed.  The hotel was covered with old pictures of railroad workers, visitors, and memories from days when the railroad was the only way to get to Glacier.

That evening we stayed in a somewhat run down hotel, but the pool made up for it.  We jumped in, raced, played around and acted about 5 years old for a straight hour.  I have a feeling we’ll all have good memories from our last night of the trip.

Now that we’re home, I’ve got to get ready for a busy month.  I’m starting work as a camp counselor in the mornings, and working my normal job with Communities In Schools in the afternoons.  I better go write my lesson plans for tomorrow.

I hope I inspired some of you to visit Glacier N.P.  There are only 25 glaciers left, and they are receding rapidly.  Most scientists think they’ll all fall out of glacier status by 2020.  I’d go see them before they’re gone.  And even without the glaciers, the park is beautiful, and well worth a visit.

CLICK HERE TO SEE MORE PICTURES FROM OUR TRIP.