Glacier National Park Trip Days 1 & 2: The Huckleberry Patch & Grinnell Glacier hike

We left home Tuesday September 3rd early in the morning, at 4 am, to make our 7am flight out of Providence. It was a very uneventful day of flying and we had just enough time on our connecting flight through Chicago to go to the bathroom and grab some nice warm bagels for a late breakfast. 

We landed in Kalispell around noon (their time-- 2pm our time), got our bags, found our rental, then checked into the hotel. 

 We stayed at Beargrass Lodge and RV park. We had a deluxe king room that had a kitchenette inside. 

 We headed out to find food and found that the restaurant Marilyn recommended was just 1 minute away from our hotel. We ate delicious Patch Burgers-- burgers made with their signature huckleberry BBQ sauce, and an onion ring on top. They were delicious! After a full day of travel and only a bagel plus a few snacks the plane handed out I was starving. 

 

We did a quick grocery run, got our fruit cup up and ice made/bagged for our early start on Friday. 

Friday we were up and out of the house by 5 am for a long drive to the other side of Glacier National Park. It took us 2 1/2 hours to arrive at the Many Glacier hotel but we got to drive the Going to the Sun Road... part way in the dark but luckily as we hit the higher elevations and sketchier parts the sun was coming up.

I took lots of photos out the car windows. 

 

We arrived and parked right around 7:30, checked in with the boat shed (which didn't even open until 8-- and we had zero clue about that but the timing was nearly perfect!). We got our return trip tickets and headed out hiking right at 8. 

As it got lighter it did get a bit less foggy... for a while anyway. 

The trail is lovely but it's a good 5-6 miles to the glacier with lots of elevation gain. We didn't think it was a bad hike but the elevation was really starting to make us both feel so tired with just 1 mile or so left to go to the glacier. We made sure to take frequent breaks and sip plenty of water. It was weird hearing my heart beating so loudly in my head. 

 

I loved seeing Grinnell lake; it was SO blue! 

we could even see and hear the waterfall that feeds into the lake!

it was misting and drizzly on the way up every now and then. 

Can you see the bighorn in this photo? You can just see antlers sticking up from the rock near the right hand side of opening between the trees

 

It's surreal to be hiking next to such huge mountains

 

we passed a few waterfalls

 

I have no idea what this plant is called but it reminded me of Suess' truffula trees

the rock walls had such incredible lines of color 

Sadly the weather was a bit against us because the glacier was all fogged in and we couldn't see it! It was around 11:15 and I was starving (it was much too early to eat breakfast when we left the rental but I wasn't really hungry until we were nearly at the glacier). 

 

We sat (and froze!) and ate our lunch. I had my long sleeve hiking shirt, my husband's sweatshirt, and my raincoat on and I was still shivering. We had to check out the icebergs/mini glaciers that had broken off and were closer to us before heading back down.

 

We ( nearly literally!) ran into lots of wildlife on our way down the mountain. We saw a momma Mountain goat and her baby. Then had a bit of a trouble further down the trail with some bighorn sheep that were grazing on and near the trail and did not want to move... they also apparently did not want us to cross anywhere near them. 

 The fog thickened for a bit as we were hiking down. 

I did not even see this guy until my husband told me to pay attention! 

Further down the trail there was a whole grouping of them blocking the path again. 

We branched off the trail to head to the boat launch to take our return boat trip back. 

We signed up to take the next boat back and my husband stopped our Alltrails app; it said we had hiked 9.77 miles 

First we boarded at Lake Josephine, crossed that lake, then we all got out crossed a short little climb (for a total of 10 miles) over to Swiftcurrent Lake. I only took photos of our land crossing and the second boat. 

Many Glacier Hotel 

inside the hotel

We decided to take the Going to the Sun road back across the park; it was pretty foggy until we got on the west glacier side of Logan's pass. Eventually the sun came out and it was real pretty... but I was on the wrong side of the car to take many photos. 

 

 We ended up back at The Huckleberry Patch for dinner. This time we tried the chicken sandwiches; another hit! Then I ended the night with some moose tracks ice cream. 

We were wiped out after our hike but were so proud of ourselves.