We stayed 4 nights at West Glacier RV Park and Cabins, which was super convenient for entering the park. It rained hard the night we arrived and all the next day, so we just rested in the RV.
DAY 1 in Glacier
We decided to go into the park on the second full day, even though only about 15 miles of the 50 mile long Going-to-the-Sun Road was open, due to flooding. (They had even evacuated everyone from the lodges in the Many Glacier area.) The amount of rain they got was very unusual for the area and it made the creeks/rivers/falls super exciting! It was cold, foggy and drizzly while we were out, and traffic was a pain, since so many people were crammed into the smaller area, but it was worth the effort to see the high waters. We talked to a few people who had arrived before the floods and they were amazed at how different it was in that short amount of time. A ranger said that there were water falls flowing that had not flowed since the 70’s.
We had to pass up McDonald Falls parking, since it was full, so were happy to find parking in the Sacred Dancing Cascade turnout (not an actual spot, but totally off the road and without a “no parking” sign, so we grabbed it!) We walked down the short trail to get to the bridge that crossed McDonald Creek, which was more like a roaring river than a creek! We kept our parking space here and walked about the half mile back to McDonald Falls.
From there, we were hoping to get a parking spot near the Avalanche Campground to hike to Avalanche Lake, but after waiting in line for about 30 minutes to even get to the lot, then circling a couple of times and realizing there were people out of cars trying to quickly stand in spots until their driver could circle back around, we gave up and headed back to West Glacier. Our Guide Along audio tour guy suggested we go look inside of McDonald Lodge, so we did. While we were there, we ate lunch at their Cafe. Then we stopped by the Apgar area to get a different view of Lake McDonald before going back to the RV.
We had started thinking that this trip to Glacier was going to be a bust and we’d have to come back another time to see the rest of the park. So we were pleasantly surprised to see Going-to-the-Sun Road was open when we checked before going to bed. So we got an early start on the second day of sight seeing, to try to fit everything else we wanted to see into the last day.
Day 2 in Glacier
We were planning to drive straight through the section of road we did yesterday, but when I got a glimpse of the clouds reflecting in the lake, we decided to stop for a quick photo. It was like a mirror, with the water so completely still. Stunning!
Even though we left the RV around 7am and the weather wasn’t great, most of the pullouts and parking areas were already full. So, we just got quick looks at all the gorgeous waterfalls as we drove by and I tried to snap pics from the truck. Since there were a lot of other people doing the same thing, traffic was going super slow, which made it easier. Unfortunately, there was fog and low clouds that prevented good mountain views. (Thankfully, it cleared up for the trip home, though, as you can see further below!)
When we got to the Logan Pass Visitor Center, rangers were standing at the entrance and waving people past, with barricades blocking the entrance. My guess is that it was so full, they weren’t letting anyone else in at that moment. That didn’t really bother us, though — we just kept driving. But we were disappointed when we got to the St. Mary Falls and Sunrift Gorge areas and could not find any parking, since those attractions required a hike to see instead of just pics from the truck. Then we saw a service road .3 miles further that had space to pull into without blocking the actual road, so we parked there. It was an easy walk back to Sunrift Gorge and short hike to see the gorge and waterfall.
Then it was another .7 miles to get back to the St. Mary Falls parking. From there, we did the moderate 2.8 mile out-and-back hike to see both St. Mary Falls and Virginia Falls. All of that hiking was fine, and the falls were pretty, but the mile hike from the trailhead back to the truck felt really long after having already walked about 4 miles; but we eventually made it back!
During the three hours we were hiking, the weather started getting warmer and clearing up, so we could see most of the peaks of the surrounding mountains by this time. There wasn’t much else to do or see beyond this point, since Many Glacier area was closed, but on the off chance that it had opened up, we drove about 10 more miles to the St. Mary Visitors Center to check. (We didn’t have any cell service in order to check online.) To our surprise, it had — YAY! The ranger warned us that there were only a couple of hiking trails open, but said it was still worth the drive just to see the scenery. She was right! And since most people probably thought it was still closed, there was hardly anyone up there!
On our way back out of the area, Randy decided that he’d like to hike up to Apikuni Falls. And I decided that I’d prefer taking a nap instead, ha. So he went without me while I rested in the truck.
It was after 5pm when we started driving back through the previously crowded section of the Going-to-the-Sun Road — what a difference 9 hours can make!! The views were spectacular and we were able to easily pull off into any of the parking areas to enjoy them! There were some places we just stopped in the middle of the road, because there was no one behind us to care. There was one spot where we saw a bunch of people pointing and taking pictures, so we pulled over and saw a family of Mountain Goats, including a cute little baby goat.
For the heck of it, we stopped back by the places we saw yesterday, to see how different they were. (Pretty different!) The last few hours of our day was so enjoyable that I’ll be tempted to only visit busy National Parks in the evenings from now on.
Thankfully, we ended up seeing all the stuff we wanted to, so we can check Glacier National Park off our list after all! It’s definitely worth visiting (in the late afternoon / evenings!) Also, here are a few videos from Glacier that you might find interesting.
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