TP Trails

3 Days and 3 Nights in Glacier National Park (3 nights at Avalanche Campground)

After staying an extra day in Missoula, Montana, we actually left for Glacier National Park. We arrived in Glacier around 9 am on the west side of the park (Apgar Village). We briefly stopped in the backcountry office to figure out potential options; at this point, we were still undecided whether we would do backcountry here. Cracker Lake was high on Patrick’s list, so we decided that we would try to get the last remaining campsite spot early the next morning (see below). Once we figured out the backcountry situation, we continued another 30 minutes or so to Avalanche Campground. We picked this campground because it seemed to be a bit more central within Glacier and had been filling up in the early afternoon the last few days (Glacier National Park website is great and tells you the time that campsites fill up each day, which is very helpful). We got site A31, which was a great spot! It was located on the outside loop, so there was no one behind us, and close, but not too close to the bathrooms. Our selection was confirmed when the group across from us applauded our choice, noting that they have been coming to this campground and staying at either the site they were in or ours for the last 10+ years. Note that we only paid for one night because there are no refunds, but you can easily renew before checkout the next day. Since our schedule (depending on backcountry) was up in the air, we ended up paying one night at a time.

We quickly set up our tent and headed off for the “Going to the Sun” road. Absolutely beautiful views! We drove as far as the Rising Sun campground and stopped at Saint Mary Lake for a quick turkey sandwich lunch on the water. Then we turned around and looked for a parking space at Logan Pass to do the Hidden Lake hike. It gets very crowded here, so you often have to drive around patiently until you get lucky with someone pulling out. Fortunately, it didn’t take us too long since it was already mid-afternoon. The Hidden Lake hike is approximately 5.2 miles, 1,300 ft elevation gain. You can do a shorter hike to the Hidden Lake overlook, which is also beautiful. The second half of the hike is nice because a lot of people turn around at the overlook, so the lake is less crowded. Both Patrick and I loved this hike. We saw a lot of wildlife – mountain goats (two which got into a small fight), big horn sheep (a group crossed the path right in front of us!), Colombian ground squirrels, and hoary marmots. At the lake, Patrick jumped in (albeit briefly, glacier lakes are freezing), I dipped my toes, and we ate a snack on the pebbly shore. We spent about 3.5 hours on the hike, including our long break at Hidden Lake. After this, we headed back to our campsite for dinner – sausage, peppers, and onions with salt and vinegar chips, followed by s’mores over the fire.

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The next morning, we woke up early to attempt backcountry permits and get over the Many Glacier area where we planned to hike for the day. Since we were headed to Many Glacier anyways, we decided to go to the backcountry permitting office in St. Mary. The office in Apgar handles roughly 75% of the backcountry permits for the park, and as such, people line up as early as 4 am (you are not allowed to line up earlier) for a 7 am opening time. We figured St. Mary would be much less crowded, so we could get there closer to 7 am (and therefore sleep 2 hours longer). Turns out this was the right decision because we arrived at 7:07 am and walked right up to the counter. We would have been there right at 7 am, but the park map shows the historic ranger station, which I mistook for the backcountry ranger station. At St. Mary, they handle backcountry permits in the Visitor Center (but in Apgar, there is a separate office). Unfortunately, the last site at Cracker Lake was snagged, so we ultimately decided to not do backcountry. We weren’t disappointed though, because we had a lot of great day hikes on our list as well, including Cracker Lake. The trail head for Cracker Lake is in the lodge parking lot. Apparently, they close the road early when the parking lot fills, so be sure to arrive before 9-10 am. We ate breakfast in the parking lot and then set off on the hike.

The hike was about 12.2 miles total (out and back) with 1,300 ft of elevation gain. The hike itself was mostly in the forest, and the first 2 miles are on a horse trail, so very muddy and scented (if you know what I mean). The last mile or so was in the open valley/canyon, but you don’t see the lake until you are upon it. Cracker Lake itself is well worth the hike. It is a beautiful chalky-blue color, unlike anything I’ve seen before, and the surrounding canyon creates such a peaceful atmosphere. If you are looking for a less traveled hike, this is it; we were the only people on the hike in (we did see the 3 overnight groups hiking out). Even when we got to the lake, we had it to ourselves for a while before another solo hiker joined. When we were leaving the lake, we saw four other people arriving, plus two more groups hiking up (presumably for an overnight stay). We stayed up at the lake for about two hours, eating lunch and taking a very, VERY, quick dip in the freezing glacial lake. Overall, the hike took us about 6 hours and 45 minutes total, including our two-hour break at the lake. I enjoyed doing this hike as a day hike – the three campsites did overlook the lake, which was nice, but were very close together, so not as much privacy as I imagined. We also did not see much wildlife on this hike aside from birds and ground squirrels. However, we chatted with a ranger later in our Glacier trip who said he had come across a grizzly bear recently on that same hike. Once we got back to the car, we still had an almost two-hour drive back to the campsite. Dinner was beef tacos. Bedtime was early.

After our long hike the day before, we relaxed a bit this morning. We cooked breakfast tacos and sipped our coffee. We caught up on some blog posts and read. Around noon, we walked the 100 feet from our campsite to the Avalanche canyon trail head, a hike which was too convenient to skip. The hike is about 4 miles total (out and back). This hike was also through the forest; the first portion of the hike followed a swift running river. We were moving pretty quickly and reached the lake in about 40 minutes. The lake is gorgeous – three large glacial waterfalls feed into the lake, which then continues down the river that we hiked next to. It’s a short, very rewarding hike that we would definitely recommend! We snacked at the lake and then took about 30 minutes to get back down.

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After the hike, we drove over to Lake McDonald lodge to pick up some firewood for the rest of the afternoon/evening. We walked around the lodge, which was simple, but looked like a nice place to stay. You can also rent individual lodges as well along the lake. It was a bit of a cloudy day, so we decided not to rent boats/stand up paddle boards. When we got back to the campsite, it started raining (again, glad we weren’t on the water), so we played cards in the car for a bit until it cleared up. Dinner was pasta with sausage, peppers, and onions. The next day would be a long day in the car for our drive up to Banff National Park in Canada.

One hike that we thought about doing, but ran out of time for, was the Ptarmigan Tunnel and the Highline Trail. Patrick had also been to Glacier before and did the Dawson-Pitamakan loop as a one-night backpacking trip, although people do day hike it (I could never). Unfortunately, this loop is extremely popular, so we had no shot at getting backcountry permits for this one, but Patrick (and everyone else) would highly recommend it if you are lucky.