July 9, 2024

We got up at 6 and packed up. We left at 7 to drive to Glacier and had breakfast at Nell’s. I had an egg and cheese bagel.

We started our hike at the Grinnell Glacier trailhead which was at the edge of the parking lot. We walked by Swiftcurrent Lake.

Next came Josephine Lake. 

We hiked on the Grinnell Glacier overlook trail by accident, but we were glad we got to see the beautiful view.

We were trying to get to Grinnell Lake. People told us that there was a Grizzly mom and two cubs on the trail and they were heading down the mountain. We realized that we were heading to the overlook area (that was closed 0.75 miles ahead. We decided to turn around and head for Grinnell Lake. The trail had been very steep and hot.

As we were hiking to Grinnell Lake, people told us they had seen the mom and cubs. We saw pictures of them crossing the stream. We got to Grinnell Lake and it was beautiful. Some people waded out to a little island/sandbar made of rocks. 

As we were eating, someone on the island said, “Bear!” We couldn’t see it so we walked farther down and then the mom and cubs came out and headed to the island. We snapped some pictures and then they headed straight toward where Tammy and I were. I didn’t know which way to go. I ended up cutting through the weeds to get out of their path. It was amazing! Mom seemed focused on keeping her cubs with her. She let out one little growl when she was trying to figure out how to get through the people (as we were trying to figure out how to get out of their path!). She and her cubs lumbered through the woods up the mountain. It was a little scary at the time but so cool!

We hiked back. There was a cool suspension bridge that only could hold one hiker at a time.

As we passed Josephine Lake, we saw a bull moose cooling off in the water. Look to the left of the trees on the peninsula.

We made it back in a total of 9.5 miles. We decided to go to Nell’s for a snack. Tammy had grilled cheese, Dana and Mike got lemonade and water, and I had a big bowl of soft serve ice cream that was mountain berry and alpine vanilla twisted together.

We took Dana to the lodge to read while the rest of us hiked to Apukani Falls (1.8 miles round trip). It was short but steep. We climbed 700 feet in elevation. When we got close to the falls, there were some huge boulders to climb on. We saw a guy climbing in slides. He hiked super quickly and he passed us. We also saw a woman hiking in flip flops, but she turned back. 

We were hoping to see some bighorn sheep, but we didn’t. We went and picked up Dana and headed out of the park. We drove to the St. Mary entrance and stopped at the visitor center for restroom. Then we headed east to west on Going-to-the-Sun Road. We enjoyed the sights and talked about our favorite parts of the trip. We all agreed that the Grizzly mom and cubs were our favorite animal sighting followed by the bull moose in Fishercap Lake. We all picked Iceberg Lake as our favorite lake. I worked on my blog as we drove.

We stopped for pizza at Apgar Village. We placed our order and were given a buzzer. We sat down and talked. After a really long time, Mike went to check on our pizza. The lady acted annoyed and said she was calling for number 16. We weren’t listening since we had the buzzer and we were sitting at the far end of the eating area. Besides, our buzzer was number 26. She said they must have put the wrong number in. We got our pizza (which was sitting on the side waiting to be claimed). We ate and headed back to the campground. We ate Chips Ahoy and Golden Oreos. We showered and packed before going to bed.