The Hawkins Family: Glacier

I ended up getting the chance at another trip out west to Montana this summer! My friend called me up and wanted to do the Glacier Half Marathon. I said ABSOLUTELY! It was her first half marathon and the first time either one of us had been to Glacier National Park. It was definitely a trip I will never forget! We hikes over 50 miles in 4 days. We saw the most beautiful things and amazing animals. I will never forget this trip!

Day 1: Well my day 1 started in Hilton Head Island, SC. I was there for the week with my kids, nephews, Mom and sister. My sister kindly took me the Savannah airport at 6:30 am for my flight and her and my Mom stayed in Hilton Head a few more days and got my kids safely back home! This was 1 of 4 airports I saw on Day 1. I flew to Atlanta to meet my partner in crime, Angie. We had brunch at PF Changs and then took our flight to Salt Lake City, Utah. We only had about 30 mins at Salt Lake before we boarded our last plane. It was a short flight to Kalispell, Montana. We arrived and got our rental car and stopped for a delicious dinner at Backslope Brewing in Columbia Falls at an amazing burger joint before we headed to East Glacier to settle in our motel. We stayed at the Circle R motel and it was just perfect! It was right in the center of area with lots of food choices and local grocery. We went to bed rather early so we could get a super EARLY start in the morning!

Our yummy food at Backslope

We stopped on the drive in to see the beautiful water!!

The grocery and Two Medicine Grill, our favorite breakfast joint!

Just across the road was the East Glacier Lodge, owned by the National Park. This is where our half marathon would finish also.

Looking down the street from our motel

The side of the Circle R motel and Serrano's Mexican Restaurant

Day 2: We got up bright and early and had breakfast at Two Medicine Grill with the locals. The food was great and very filling for a day full of hiking. We headed up to Grinnell Glacier trail in the Many Glacier area of the park. It was a beautiful and breathtaking trail! It's about 11 miles round trip, 5.5 up to the top and 5.5 back. But, as we got closer to the top, we learned the trail was impassible without ice picks and other snow and ice equipment, so the last mile and a half we missed out on. The trail conditions were too dangerous to continue. It was still an amazing hike with incredible views! After the hike we headed to the St. Mary entrance to continue hiking. We took the famed Going to the Sun road as far as we could, which was about 12 miles. The road is still being plowed from a winter of heavy ice and snow. We were disappointed, but there was still so much to see! We loved our hikes in the St Mary area! We started with St. Mary Falls followed by Virginia Falls. We then hiked Sun Point and Barring Falls. The waterfalls were super full from snow melt and a stunning greenish blue from the glacier melt. They were mesmerizing! After a full day of hiking, we had the best dinner at a local family diner called Johnson's. It was fantastic! They offered and amazing hiker special served family style that hit the spot! We finally made it back to our motel and hit the hay after 10 pm.

Bacon omelette to start the day at Two Medicine Grill

We stopped on the side of every road to take pictures!

Hiking the Grinnell Glacier Trail.

Looking across the mountain to Grinnell Glacier

Waterfalls all along the way up

We were able to pass through this particular snow and ice glaze, very carefully. If you slip its a long way straight down!

This is where out hike came to a halt. You can't tell from the picture, but this was a steep angle straight down the mountain and needed ice equipment to finish.

The wildflowers at the top of the mountain were blooming!

Looking down at the stunning Grinnell Lake!

Huge sheet of ice and snow at the base of the mountain by Lake Josephine

A look at the boat shuttle across Lake Josephine

Our first hike at St. Mary to the waterfall. The forest was burned last year from a fire started by lightening.

New growth on the forest floor, including 100's of Beargrass!

Turquoise water at St. Mary falls! So beautiful! Our hike started out rainy, but the rain cleared up quickly!

Virginia Falls

That is what Virginia Falls looked like from our parking spot!

Barring Falls

Sun Point, high above the lake!

We got to see a gorgeous rainbow on our way out!!

Going to the Sun Road, only a few miles were open on the St. Mary side

Our dinner at Johnsons which started with turkey soup and warm bread!

Day 3: After such a huge full day of hiking, we were tired! But we got up early again and hit the trails! We new the next day we had the Glacier Half Marathon, so we were going to take it easy. Well.. wouldn't you know as luck would have it.. we ended up on one the hardest, most amazing trails in all of Canada. We had decided ahead of time to drive an hour north and visit Waterton National Park. There are parts of Glacier that can be reached only by boat on Waterton Lake. Goat Haunt, on the other side of the lake, is located in the USA and has several good short hikes. As we arrived in Canada we were greeted by bears, a fox and a scenic drive! We learned that most of the park and trails, over 75%, were affected by the 2017 fires. The lake, town and trails we were interested in were not a part of the fire. The town there was great! I would love to go back and stay in Waterton some time. We headed to the boat dock for tickets across the lake to Goat Haunt and our hiking for the day. Well, Goat Haunt was still closed from the snow/winter! So the only option was a scenic 2 hour cruise across the lake, or a 15 min boat ride over the Crypt Lake trail head, with a pick up time of 5:30 pm. We decided to attempt the Crypt Lake trail and see what it had to offer. We were dropped off about 10:15 am, so we had about 7 hours to trek up 2,300 feet and 12 miles round trip (with a side stop at Hellroaring Creek and the gorge). We finished the trail with 45 mins to spare, but it was crazy! I have never hiked anything like this before! The trail went straight up quickly. 19 switch backs to start, then another 18 switchbacks half way through. In the last mile, you get a full view of the 600 foot Crypt Falls before scaling a mountain, climbing a 6 foot ladder and crawling through a 60 foot cave, only to be dangling over the edge of cliff straight down! Then, a scramble over the rocks with a steel cable to assist you in the last climb! When you finally reach the top, the beautiful Crypt Lake awaits, tucked away inside the mountains. Its an amazing award for the trek up! Unfortunately the snow and ice are still heavy up top so the trail around the lake was a death trap. I wasn't able to get Angie to the top with me either. We had to cross a very icy and snowfield ledge that she did not feel comfortable crossing so after some insisting, I headed on without her. The climb back down was much easier and we took the side trail through Hellroaring gorge, which was full of amazing views! When we finally got back to the dock, we kicked off our boots and put our tired feet in the icy cold water of the lake. We finished with time to spare and we were able to enjoy the serenity of the lake while we waited for our boat ride back to town. We ate at Pizza of Waterton for dinner. Angie had pizza and I had a delicious turkey, bacon, apple sandwich! As we headed out of Waterton, we were able to watch a momma bear and 3 little babies in the field at the park exit. We had such an amazing in Waterton! But we had a VERY early start to the next day weighing on our shoulders.

The first two bears we saw entering Waterton National Park!

We watched a red fox run down the road for a little ways!

The boat ride over to Crypt Lake landing.

The trail head for Crypt Lake

The first of several falls we saw on the trail.

Some of the 37 switchbacks!

Another waterfall along the way up

Taking selfies of this insane climb!

One of the several snow crossings along the mountain side

This is the toughest crossing. Angie tapped out here. One wrong step and down the mountain you go!

Approaching the ladder and cave on the mountainside

On the left corner are hikers coming up behind me.

Crawling through the 60 foot cave

End of the cave

The cave end dropped straight down!

I looked back across the mountains and could see a little dot of blue-green, it was Angie!

Heavy snow up at the top surrounding the lake.

I was at the very top of the 600 foot waterfall!

The gorgeous Crypt Lake at the top of the mountain!

There was still ice chunks floating in the lake

Making my way back down the mountain

Lots of crazy rock scrambles.

The little ground squirrels were all over this trail! Even in the high elevations!

Hellroaring Creek and gorge! The beautiful glacier water was blue green!

Breathtaking!

Almost back down the mountain to the dock

Relaxing on the dock waiting for the boat back to Waterton

Toes in the water..

Leaving the dock

Mama Grizzly and THREE babies!

Loved watching the trains across the plains as we headed back into East Glacier each day

Day 4: Race day! This race was put on by Vacation Races. This is my 4th race with this outfit. Their races are destination races in National Parks! I have completed the Smoky Mountain, Grand Teton and Yellowstone half marathons as well. This was Angie's first Half Marathon. She did great!! This particular race required a shuttle from Browning to the start line. The race started at 6 am. The shuttles began at 4 am. In other words, we didn't get much sleep. We were up at 3:45 am and on the road by 4:15 to the shuttle parking. Not only were we tired, but we had already hiked about 25 miles! And our legs were feeling it. But we just kept going! It was totally worth it. The race was ran on the Blackfeet Indian Reserve. Actually the whole town of East Glacier is Blackfeet Reserve. Most everything east of the National Park is Blackfeet. The Blackfeet tribe actually started our race with a tribal chant! The chief was there also to speak and kick off the race packet pick-up. It was so awesome getting to here the local Indians chant. They were also the police escorts for our race as well as in charge of keeping bears and moose at bay. We also learned a little later on that they would be good at taking care of drunk drivers on the course! Halfway through the race we encountered a speedy truck swerving through our race course. A little later on we saw the truck and the Blackfeet Indians and learned he had been taken to jail! Talk about a race first! This was also the first time I have ever been pelted by hail in a race. As we climbed to the top of the mountain, we encountered about 5 mins of hail! The weather stayed pretty nice other than that and we finished with plenty of time to spare. We received our medals and headed back to the room for a shower! After the race and a quick lunch of leftovers, the rain set in. We decided a 2 hour nap was a MUST. After our nap we headed down to Two Medicine (another section of Glacier) for some light hiking. We wanted to see as much of the park as possible and it is a REALLY big area to cover. So we had to hike now, rest later! In Two Medicine,, we hiked Running Eagle Falls first. It was a short hike to a beautiful waterfall with Indian background story. After Running Eagle Falls, we drove down to Two Medicine Lake and hiked to Paradise Point and to Aster Falls. The hike started just behind the boat dock at the lake and it was just beautiful! After we saw the falls, we headed back down to the trail head and along the way we were able to run into a moose! It was awesome! He was just walking along the field and crossed the trail right in front of us! It was great! Then, as an added treat, we saw a momma moose and her calf on the road on the way out! The animals were really moving that evening. We made our wayback to town for dinner at the Mexican restaurant called Serrano's. It was a really long wait, there were lots of runners in town still, but the food was great! It was a long day and we were both exhausted. But we still had one more full day of hiking we could take advantage of before heading home!