| As we left the east side of Glacier National Park we stopped in
at Two Medicine Lake. This proved harder than we expected since the road we
wanted again was limited to a maximum length of 21ft. So a twenty mile
detour added to the 50 mile detour we already had to make since we could not
go across "Going to the Sun" Road to West Glacier, our next target. |  |
 | We wanted to do
the walk up to Twin Falls and Upper Two Medicine Lake. To do this we
took the scenic boat tour halfway (to save the three mile walk around the
lake) and then
walked the 2.5 miles up to the upper lake. The real constraint was doing the
five mile round trip in 1.5 hours. We moved!!. |
| The view on either side of the upper lake is spectacular with
colour strewn cliffs rising jaggedly another couple of thousand feet above
us. We also just missed a bear which was seen by the people behind us.
Maybe we'll get one eventually. Just not too close. We watched very
carefully on the way back and talked loudly to each other. |  |
 | Twin Falls was
spectacular with two parallel waterfalls into a common pool. Not easily
visible from this shot, but it shows the general arrangement better than two
separate shots. |
| The path was good and we passed through more areas with the
bear grass clumps. This one was particularly striking.. |  |
 | We had to go
south before going north to West Glacier, and travelled over Marias Pass. This is
a well known major
climb for trains. We must have passed eight or nine all climbing up the west
side heading east. They were virtually nose to tail. They must do westbound
in the morning and eastbound in the afternoon. I have this pass on my Train
Simulator and I've never yet got up it in winter! |
| Passing down the other side heading into West Glacier, the canyon
was full of rafters. This is obviously more than a level one experience
because they were all working like billyo.. |  |
 | West Glacier
is a more commercial centre than East Glacier partly because of the rafting
possibilities, but there are also helicopter rides. We just took a scooter
ride about 15 miles and then walked up to Avalanche Lake. This was a
pleasant and manageable climb. The cliffs and waterfalls are quite steep.
Over 600 inches of snow fall here each year so the lake is aptly named.
|
| The lake empties via a very fast flowing creek with many small
waterfalls. These eventually merge with McDonald Creek which empties into
the main lake. The waters here are very clear. |  |
 | In contrast to
the force in the creeks, Lake McDonald seems very peaceful. The weather was
becoming quite threatening (it did rain later) but the lake was serene.
There was a large fire here in 2003 and a lot of trees on the other side of
the lake were lost. |
 |
Whatever the weather, life goes on for this family which went about its
business only feet from us while we were at Avalanche Lake. |
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