Glacier National Park

Emily woke up and was again down in the hotel lobby by 6:00am to see the sunrise light up Swiftcurrent Lake. I was about 20 minutes behind her and do admit, it was fantastic! We were back in the room by about 7:00am to finish packing and had the car packed by 7:45. This allowed me to get few great photos of the Many Glacier Hotel in its surroundings. Trust me when I say that the photos do not do this place justice!

We checked out and went to the boat dock were we found out that we were able to make the 8:30am boat across Swiftcurrent Lake and therefore onto the ranger led hike to Grinnell Glacier! We also learned that the second boat (the one across Lake Josephine) was broken down. This added a mile or so each way on the Grinnell Glacier hike. This was our first time to be on a ranger led hike but really enjoyed it! Hiking with a ranger and our group of about 45 forced us into a much easier pace than we normally take. She had stops all the way up to explain things during the hike, like geography, plants, animals, etc, and those stops really helped us from getting tired. They seemed to be timed well and make it where we could better plan rests in our solo hikes. We met a couple from Dallas on the hike and they were nice to visit with for the day. They had a 1 / 2 year old that was staying with his parents in Tulsa while they were on their trip. We made it to Grinnell just before 1:00pm but did take two lengthy stops of about 20 – 30 minutes apiece.

Grinnell was everything we thought it would be and more! The hike took us up on a a lift edge for a good portion of the hike and the views of the glacier and the turquoise blue water it produced was nothing short of amazing! We highly recommend this hike! There was a big horn sheep at the glacier that didn't seem to like the people there but thought the grass was good enough to say. The park rangers were working at keeping him away from the hikers.

We left Grinnell Glacier about 1:30pm with park ranger Kaitlyn and about half the group as the rest either stayed longer or left before us. Since we still had a drive over to Whitefish, we felt like we couldn't stay too long. We stopped at the pit toilets for Kaitlyn to service them for about 15 minutes. Luckily for us, the boat across Lake Josephine was back running so that saved a mile on the hike back. We made it to the boat across Lake Josephine a little before 3:45. As we walked around the bank Lake Josephine, we were treated to moose enjoying the lake! The two boat rides were much enjoyed on our tired legs and they took us back to Many Glacier Hotel.

We got back to the hotel and on our way out at by 5:00pm. We hit the Many Glacier Ranger Station for Emily to get a passport stamp and were headed to Whitefish. We stopped at the St. Mary visitor center for a Star Party ticket that was to be the next evening and drove the Going-to-the-Sun Road. We passed through Logan Pass at 6:20 and got to the Hampton Inn in Whitefish at 7:45. While checking in, the hotel staff pointed us to downtown Whitefish for dinner. There were quite a few cool restaurants! We went to Truby’s, a wood fired pizza place then quickly crashed at the hotel.

Grinnell Glacier Hike - 8.6 Miles round trip (including the additional mile for the boat being out of service on the way up); 1840 ft elevation gain

Safe Travels,
B&E

Back To Day 4
To Day 6