George Grinnell, as I talked about in an earlier post, thought glaciers were a geological wonder. He called the glaciers the “jewels” in the crown. He wanted to set aside land to enjoy the glaciers and to conserve the landscapes and now the glaciers that form GNP’s snow-capped crown are close to extinction. We got up early yesterday to see the sunrise and to get a spot at the busy Logan Pass. We got there by 7:00 am and got one of the last parking spots. Luckily we were coming from the St. Mary side and that’s not as busy as the west side. We wanted to take the Hidden Lake Trail which had been closed for several days due to bear activity and finally the trail to the overlook at least was open. That’s only about a 3 mile hike (round trip) to the overlook and the hidden lake but when we got to the top, the fog was so heavy we couldn’t see the lake. So…we climbed back down and had lunch and walked around a bit and climbed up a little later. We saw two Bighorn sheep at the top and that made it all worthwhile.
We hiked up to Hidden lake in the early morning since we had to get here early to get a parking place. Little did we know the clouds would be so low we wouldn’t be able to see the lake once we got to the top. But…we did see two bighorn sheep; a male and female so the 3 mile hike was worth it. The wildflowers along the way were also amazing as this was the only place where we saw so much color in the park. We had lunch and hunted for mountain goats then headed back up the hike for the second time to find the lake. Nothing like a 6 mile hike to find a hidden lake!!
We didn’t want to leave as our parking spot was hard to come by so we wanted to make sure we saw everything on this time. Logan Pass is one of the most popular spots in the park and luckily we were camping at the east entrance and the lines were nonexistent so getting here early was super easy.
After completing the hike (twice) we drove to Sun Point to check out the last of the 3 hikes to the waterfalls. We did St. Mary and Virginia the previous day and wanted to complete the trio waterfalls by completing the Baring Falls hike near St. Mary. We were still on the hunt for moose and were hopeful this would be the hike where we found them but that didn’t work out!! Still it was a beautiful hike. The color of the water was amazing and looked photoshopped! The minerals in the water make the water a greenish color and combine that with the purple mountains and blue skies…well that’s a beautiful sight!! Here are a few photos from the Baring Falls Hike and Hidden Lake Hike.
Now we’re off to Polson, Montana and then Yellowstone and Tetons. Keep following us to see our adventures.
Camping Konneys 
We were at Logan pass yesterday at 7 am also! Th3m went on out the St Mary side we saw lots of bears! Polson is nice! We enjoyed The Shoe restaurant and The Raven which is on the road toward big Fork. Don’t forget to pick up some local cheese at Polson Cheese shop. The Farmers market is downtown Polson on Friday morning!
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