 Our
first stop was at Two Medicine Lake. That's Sinopah Mountain I believe
on the far side of the lake. There is a campground and store here.
We ate at the store and I think mom and Jen bought gifts. |
 We
visited Running Eagle Falls while we were in the Two Medicine Area.
It's named for a Blackfoot holy woman. The Park
Service sign explains more about that. The older name for the
falls is Trick Falls. Look closely. There is the taller main
fall, and there is a shorter fall behind it coming from a cave. Quite
a trick. I suppose changing the name was the least they could do,
considering this part of the park was taken from the Blackfeet. |
 We
left Two Medicine and went up the Going to the Sun Road. At one of
the scenic overlook pullouts was this rock. Aside from the fracturing,
the surface is flat and has a bunch of parallel groves. I imagine
this is from those glaciers grinding along it's surface years ago. |
 We
drove a bit farther and then took a short hike to a couple of waterfalls.
Along the way were many wildflowers, including this shooting star. |
 The
first fall was St. Mary Falls. |
 Although
the east side of the park is drier than the west side, there still was
enough moisture for things like this little cup fungus growing along the
side of the trail. |
 A
bit farther up the trail was Virginia Falls. Actually, there were
two or three falls right close together, and who knows how many more farther
up the trail. Glacier sure has a lot of waterfalls. |
 Not
being content with the usual waterfall picture I had to climb dangerously
close to the brink of the falls for this shot. |
 While
we were hiking back to the car I came upon this deer at the edge of a meadow.
She was quite unafraid of me, just kept eating. I had gotten ahead
of mom and sis, so I went back to them, and told my sister, and when
we got to the meadow the deer was still there. So my sister took
a bunch of pictures of it while I explored the meadow further. |
 You
could see lots of mountains from the meadow. This one I thought looked
kind of dramatic. I think it might be the Going-to-the-Sun Mountain.
At least it looks likely that is what it is from looking at maps nearly
a year later. |
 I
also found more cool looking flat rocks in the meadow. These looked
like they maybe had ripple marks from some long gone lake or ocean in them. |
We got back to the car after navigating around yet more deer, a doe and
fawn. We drove maybe a mile or so back down the mountain to Sunrift
Gorge, which is right by the road. |
 It
was starting to get late, but we felt we needed one more waterfall, so we
drove maybe another mile, maybe a little more, to the Sun Point Nature
Trail. This is an interesting trail that goes along the shore of
Saint Mary Lake, with a guidebook that explains about the plants and rocks
and old lodgings and stuff. At the end of the trail is Baring Falls.
My mother was a bit ill when she found out that Barring Falls is immediately
across the street from our previous stop at Sunrift Gorge. She would
have rather just walked to it from there. I can't remember now if
we sent my sister back for the car or not. We discussed it. |
|
After Baring Falls we drove back to Apgar, had dinner, did a little packing as out time at Glacier was unfortunately nearing it's end, and slept. I must have been adjusting to the altitude because I had no more of those super vivid dreams for the rest of the trip, just the usual ones that fade away minutes after I wake up. |