Glacier National Park - The Cracker Lake Hike

Since the dawn of Christianity people have wondered where Hell is. I can tell you it’s only 10 miles away. You’ll find it toward the end of this 12 mile hike. It doesn’t seem like a long way, it only has a 1400 foot vertical, and Cracker Lake is striking, but we just ran out of gas on the way back.

The first four miles (and hence the last 4 miles too) are kind of dull. There are a lot of trees and no views. But hold out, the hiking guides say, keep going, Cracker Lake is spectacular. For those who want to keep track, but can’t do the math, that’s 75% dull so far and 25% awesome. Still, that’s better than life by the time you count sleeping, brushing teeth, mowing grass, taking the dog to the vet, and cutting yourself skinning a cantaloupe with a potato peeler because it might go faster that way.

We got up at 5 a.m. to make the 3 hour drive from Kalispell to the Many Glaciers Lodge parking lot. Then we reset our alarms to go off at 6 a.m., arriving at 9. But, you say, aren’t photographers (the great ones at least) supposed to get up at the crack of dawn to get the best light? My reply is, has anything good ever come of something named in full or in part with the word crack? Any noun that comes before or after crack is usually up to no good. This being in the mountains, the sun takes a while to crest over the peaks, so sometimes it makes sense to wait for the light in order to get a well lit shot.

Many Glaciers lodge is an amazing circa 1910 lodge sitting at the edge of Swiftcurrent lake. The name of the lake doesn’t make any sense because it really is quite calm, reflecting the high peaks that surround this area. I presume the guy that discovered it had the cool last name of Swiftcurrent. “Hi, I’m Jack Swiftcurrent,” he announced lakeside one morning two hundred years ago to the surprised Native Americans. “Get the hell off my lake.” Since Disney long ago stole my last name for its own ends, I have longed for that one day if I ever become someone famous, or perhaps a starship captain, I might have a cool last name. Of course, Swiftcurrent is taken, so is Disney, but still, I hope.

Desperation, fear, hunger, profuse sweating, extreme thirst, and exhaustion are all words I would use to describe this hike, as well as my teen years. Still I would also use the words amazing, colorful, wild, scenic, and “bear.” More on the last word in a minute. I will let the pictures speak for themselves beyond the few words I have mentioned. Toward the destination of the hike to Cracker Lake, we reach what looks like a dam. Aha, I think, the lake must be behind this dam. Prepare yourself for the payoff I say to myself. Just beyond this dam is the azure blue of Cracker Lake nestled in the high cliffs of the surrounding mountains. As fast as we can, we scale the rubble pile of rock, grown over with grasses and pines stunted from being near the tree line. This dam was probably about 100 feet tall. At the top…nothing. There is more trail ahead and a Coyote. But more about the stunted pines. I have read that these are quite old, somewhere around 400 years old. I tell my hiking friend this factoid and we both scratch our heads. Although we are tired and a little delirious from our exertions, we still grasped the magnitude of the accomplishment of these twisted, gnarled plants. I am only 50 and find this hike quite strenuous, how did these amazing 400 year old plants get up here? One suspects Native American involvement, but no one was here to record it so we’ll never know for sure. We stop to drink some of our water and push on. As it turns out, we were still about a mile or so from the actual lake.

Cracker Lake is blue because the water is a suspension of glacial powder. The small Siyeh Glacier, which clings for dear life to the cliff-side on some of these photos, is still active, grinding away at the rocks underneath it, producing a fine powder. This powder flows into the streams running from the glacier into the lake, turning the water a vivid blue. If you take a close look at the glacier, you can tell by the nearby moraine, which also clings to the mountainside, that it used to be about 5 times larger. And then it hits you. What you thought was a dam a mile down the trail, is actually an ancient moraine deposited perhaps thousands of years ago when the glacier filled the valley.

The trail back was very similar to the trail going in, except for the fact that we ran into two bear. One was a rather sizeable grizzly about 50 yards away (a grizzly can cover this in about 2 to 3 seconds). At times like this you are either seconds from death, seconds from severe injury, long lingering pain, and death, or years away from forced retirement on public assistance, and slow death. None of these is pleasant to ponder, yet this is exactly what we faced on the trail at that moment. As fate would have it, forced retirement prevailed. The bear wanted nothing to do with us and quickly left the trail. The next bear was a little scarier for a different reason. It was a black bear, about 20 yards away, and some horseback riders ahead of us on a series of switchbacks scared the bear into our area of the switchback. As this was happening, a couple of 12 year olds were running on the trail unaware that they were running toward the bear. We stopped them and in doing so, in our minds, we saved their lives. Gratitude? No. Offer to wash my car or at least buy some car wash tokens since my car is out of state? No. Offer to pose with the bear while we take photos? No. Offer to make some sort of contribution to relieve the poverty of my forced retirement? No.

When we returned to Many Glacier Lodge, it was about 7 hours after the start of the hike. We were both very tired but decided to have lunch there. It would be a few more hours before we would get back to Kalispell and a late lunch after a long hike with no food is always fantastic!

The wildflowers were more abundant than I have seen in many visits to the park. This was taken on the road to the Many Glacier Lodge about 2 miles from the lodge.

Taken in a location similar to the previous one, this shows wildflowers and a weather system near the top of the mountain. This mountain is near the Many Glacier Lodge, and is one of the peaks that reflects in Swiftcurrent lake.

This photo shows Cracker Lake. On the mountain-side you can see Siyah Glacier and the morraine. Once the glacier is gone, the water will lose its supply of powder and its blue color.

Glacier National Park - Going to the Sun Road

The last week in July, I visited one of the great parks in the National Park System. Glacier National Park is located in the northwest corner of Montana, along the Canadian border. Drive, fly or walk, it is a place you should see somehow before you get too old to enjoy it.

I read somewhere a quote from the turn of the 20th century (i.e. early 1900s) that one should have a month to enjoy the park. Not sure who the target market was in the early 1900s but who has the time and money for that? Fortunately, we have faster means of transportation available to us, and we can pretty much get there, move around, and enjoy the park in a fashion that is far different versus the early 1900s.

Most folks will initially experience the park via the Going to the Sun Road. The GTS Road is a long (40-50-60 mile, one loses track) road with a speed limit 25 to 45 miles per hour. It starts at one end of the park, goes way up into the mountainside of a glacier carved valley, over Logan Pass, through more glacier carved valley and then down into the other side of the park.

Often, at the Logan Pass visitor center, there are mountain goats, big horn sheep, bear and tourists. Lots and lots of tourists. Usually, they are surrounding and doing a papparazzi on some hapless creature that wandered too close to the humans. I didn't do the hike this time, but at the visitor center begins a hike to Hidden Lake. Don't miss it. It has to be one of the most beautiful spots in North America.

The GTS Road is a requirement if you want to have a nice overview of what the park has to offer. In my next blog, I will discuss the hike to Cracker Lake. But here are a few photos showing what can be seen on or around the Going to the Sun Road.

The first photo is of Haystack Falls. This was take with a Nikon D3x, 24-70mm lens.



Taken near the Logan Pass visitor's center, Big Horn Sheep, Nikon D3x, 24-70mm lens:


Taken from the GTS Road, this water falls is across the valley, and is about 500 feet high. Taken with a Nikon D3x, with a 200-400mm lens:

Hike to Black Lake

Because I try not to overdo it on self-inflicted suffering, when no sleep came by 11 pm, I moved the 3 a.m. wake-up time to 5 a.m. The pressure of trying to get to sleep on a schedule was just too much and I stayed awake from 9 until 11 fretting about it. Once I moved the wake-up time to 5 am, I slept like a baby. I woke up like a baby too, kicking and screaming - I can only imagine what 3 am would have been like.

Everything, gear, food, water and sunblock was ready to go so all I had to do was place it into the trunk. The coffee maker had been prepared the night before with coffee grounds and water pre-dispensed, and the timer set. Clothes had been laid out. Mornings, especially early ones, are best left to rote activities because higher brain functions don't necessarily wake up with the lower ones.

Doug showed up on time at the mall at 6 a.m., we put everything into his SUV and headed to Rocky Mountain National Park. We discussed our excitement over the pending hike, and how this hike, with its 1500 foot vertical over nearly 10 miles would be a nice prep for a later hike we hope to take which has a 3200 foot vertical and is nearly as long. He was in charge of breakfast and the breakfast burrito made with egg-beaters was really good as I was quite hungry. We noted the bikers along the route, senselessly exerting themselves in their ridiculous spandex biker clothes. Some of them were in packs, like it was the tour de France. For crying out loud, get off the road! We gave them suitably Italian sounding names such Panini, and Spandexi. We thought we were funny, which is a sure indicator that we weren't quite awake.

We entered the park in the express line (an advantage of buying the annual pass) and made our way to the trail head. We opted to take our chances on not using the shuttle parking and drove further to the trail head parking. It was full, but just as we pulled in, someone was pulling out. Perfect. This was very lucky, and would be more so at the end of the hike.

Doug popped the gate and we applied sunscreen. I reached into the bag where I had stored the food (various peanut butter crackers) and water and gave Doug his share of the food. I put my food and water in my bag. Loaded down with camera gear, food and water we were off. At this time of year, the mountain wildflowers are out in full force and they are beautiful. As you go higher, there are different flowers to look at. As the summer matures, flowers in the lower elevations migrate up the slopes. The first stop is Alberta Falls, only we didn't stop. Being about a mile from the trail head and having seen it many times, we continued past it to an area we hadn't been to before. The next stop was Mills Lake. At about 2.8 miles or so in, it was a good stop to take photos. The lake itself is beautiful, but there were a few people laying around its banks, almost as if they were placed there strategically because I could not take a shot without getting some people in it, so, I opted not to shoot. However, just before you get to the lake itself, there is another spectacular view which I was able to get a shot of.



We continued ever upward to the next lake which is Jewel Lake. The shoreline of this lake has a marshy quality, which is reflected in the trail. The National Park Service has very considerately provided an elevated wooden "trail" made probably on site from split lodge pole pine. Good balance is key in some areas as the trunks get to a food or so in diameter; not a lot of margin for error, but no worries as the only penalty is a wet foot.



At Jewel Lake, one is only about half way to Black Lake. Plus there is still a lot of vertical to go. I was going to have some water at this point but since I only brought one bottle I thought it would be a good idea to save it for Black Lake, then I would not be thirsty on the hike back.

After Jewel Lake, the traffic of other hikers dies down a lot. This is a sure sign that the hike ahead is for the dedicated few. Of course the views range from trail bound where the trees surround on all sides, to the sweeping vistas for which the Rockies are so renowned. Just before Black Lake, there is Ribbon Falls. About here is where we saw a small herd of elk.




Just beyond Ribbon Falls is Black Lake. There were only a couple of people lounging around the lake like beached seals, but just enough to get a proper shot of the lake itself, which is surrounded on nearly every side by cliffs from which snow-melt water cascades. Here is a shot of Black Lake. When Doug and I sat down to have our food and water is when I found out Doug did not bring the water. "Why didn't you make sure I put it into my bag?" he asked. Am I my brother's keeper? Apparently so, because I split my already thin water rations with him. The lack for drinkable water made the hike back extremely long. Plus, you notice all the rushing, gushing water around you as well as the occasional leisure hiker with the ubiquitous plastic water bottle all the more. I'm sure the water in the stream is just fine to drink but those were elk we saw near the stream and they don't care where they pee, do they? But you should. Plus at Black Lake, there was a guy there with his wild child girlfriend and she was sort of washing her hair in it. There was a small glimmer of hope when I spotted a small child with a water bottle and no apparent adult supervision nearby. But civilization hasn't broken down that much has it? Not really, at least not in my own mind.

Late in the day, the trail between Alberta Falls and the parking lot is very busy. The slowest determines the speed of the rest. When we finally made it back to the SUV, we had some nice water waiting for us. It was truly a miracle that we had gotten the parking space after all!




Post Script: I hadn't realized that one reason I had become so dehydrated to begin with was that I was coming down with some sort of food poisoning. We'll never know if it was the breakfast burrito or some other food that caused it (such as the artificially flavored peanut butter and jelly snack crackers which I had brought). Within 24 hours of the hike's completion I would be in sorry shape indeed.

July 1, 2010.

Preparation for the coming week-end and weeks-away vacation is nearly complete. As planned, during the work week I ate only half of the peanut butter crackers I purchased for the long hike this week-end. That leaves half for the hike itself. Light and packed with calories, they are perfect for the approximately 9 miles round trip.

Rocky Mountain National Park is a wonderful area and I am lucky to live so close to it. Plenty of mountains (rocky, of course) make for a lot of photo opportunities and that is what this hike is about. There will be a lot of people in the park this week-end for the Fourth of July which means I probably won't need to bring the bear spray. RMNP has about 30 bear across its many square miles, says the park service. There are probably mountain lion too but I have never seen one. The area I will be hiking is pretty high in elevation, around 9 thousand feet, so UV is a factor. There will be sunblock on hand.

The last thing to be done before getting "on the road" is sleep. Getting up at 3 a.m. to meet a friend at a mall parking lot at 4 a.m. so we can travel to the park in time for some morning shots may sound great to some (right?), but if sunrise was at 9 am, that would be fine with me. A photographer is a slave to the light, when it beckons, you go, or you miss the shot. It's about 2 hours to the park, so leaving at 4, we will be 30 minutes past sunrise upon arrival. By the time we get onto the trail the sun should be just clearing the mountains to the east, casting a nice light in the valleys. And let's not forget the 30% chance of thunderstorms! The original hike planned would have taken us to elevations above the timber line. That makes me and my friend the lightning rod of choice. After reading about one of the original settlers in the park who was killed by a lightning strike, I decided not to tempt fate.

The second last thing to be done, which will be done the night before, is to clean lenses and camera, vacuum the back-pack and perform a check of the camera settings to ensure ISO, focus selection, metering, and various other modes are ready to go. Who wants to do this at 3 am? Hard to believe anyone could look forward to all this, but I am!

Thanks of the Day: while walking my dog around 6 pm, I looked to the east and the sun illuminated a cloudburst about 10 to 20 miles away. I can only guess, but although it was subtle and faint, the rainbow thus created must have been a mile wide. Probably the biggest rainbow I have or ever will see.