Iceberg Lake
John, the proprietor of this establishment (yes, I use that term loosely because he's an arrogant ass) recommended Breakfast at Two Medicine Grill. Since this is a one horse town, we chose Two Medicine Grill for breakfast, because well, we're just that smart! It was within walking distance and we were desperate. Sounded like good motivation at the time. It wasn't horrible. It was ok. And as desperate as I was for decent coffee, I was thrilled when the coffee wasn't just passable, it was really good - not as good as mine mind you, but good since I couldn't get mine. Just sayin'.
We were on the road to Many Glacier a little after 7:30 and the sky was a gorgeous blue. No smoke in sight. And a few billowy white clouds drifting by. The only drawback was the wind. Good God the wind can whip around out here. We'd have advisories out at home. In all honesty they do here too but it's just not the same. It took a little over an hour to reach the starting point over Iceberg Lake hike. A 10-mile roundtrip hike. It was supposed to be around 70 today, and we dressed accordingly. But with the hellacious winds, we figured it would be prudent to bundle up a little more. So we changed clothes in the car. Getting a visual? Never mind. I'll just leave it with the fact that we bundled up. I'm talking hats, gloves and the works.
We started the hike about 9:15am. It started off with a bang. Uphill. The total elevation climb is nearly 1300 feet. A good portion of that is in the beginning. Back tracking a bit - we ran into a older couple at the Lake MacDonald Lodge who told us about this hike. We really hadn't considered it since it was a 10 mile hike. But when people are are at least 10 years older than us did it and said it was great, well we rethunk it. That's kind of a challenge isn't it? If they can do it, certainly we can do it. They also said there were icebergs in the lake. Okay. Done deal. We have to do this. Fast forward to this morning ...
We hiked for a while with an older couple from San Diego, who hiked the ruins to Machi Picchu. They covered 26 miles in 4 days in groups of about 30 and said it was amazing. Sounds awesome and that will definitely go on our bucket list. Bob discovered that he played golf at the same course in Camp Penddleton as the husband. Small world. Again.
The views around every corner were amazing along the way.
Take a look at the two glaciers on the mountain in the background (photo above). Iceberg Lake is right under those glaciers. That's where we were headed. The trail was pretty easy for the most part. Towards the end, though, it just went on and on and on and on. Finally we made it to the lake. It was beautiful.
But there no icebergs in the lake which is why we did the hike in the first place. Kind of too late to make that an issue at this point, huh?
We made a friend while resting. A little Ground squirrel was very friendly. He came right up to us looking for food. We had packed nuts for a snack so pulled the bag out and that little guy was in heaven! He loved our nuts! He ate some of them (didn't like walnuts thought, left them on the ground, but his friend later snatched it up) and stored the rest in his pouches. Reminded me of Bob eating cereal. He does the same thing!! It was reminiscent of the squirrels at Yosemite on one our hikes back in 2008. We had peanut butter and jelly bagels then and they thought they had struck gold. It was the highlight of our day then and this little guy was a highlight of my day today. How cute is he?
Both of us we dragging butt on the way back. We had motivation though. The views to the east that were shadowed on the way were now lit up with the afternoon light.
Trust me when I say it was a blessing to have to stop so often to take pictures. We made it back around 3:30 and everything was screaming - my hips,my knees, my lower back, my feet (I could feel at least one blister), my calves ... Everything. I was even over the scenery. The only scenery I wanted to see was our car.
Since it was such a pretty day we wanted to drive the Going to the Sun Road again, hoping to get better views with a pretty blue sky. We did.
Took a few shots but honestly our hearts weren't in it. We were just done. So about 5:30 we headed back. It was quarter after 6 by the time we hit 89, which is the cow road. Thankfully we didn't see too many and we're back at the hotel by 7:00. We freshened up and hopped back in the car to go to dinner at the lodge, where we will hopefully stay if we ever come back to stay in this area again. We both ordered a wonderful tortellini dinner with adult beverages. Glacier mojito for me. Pretty good. Not as good as my mojitos but not bad.
Tomorrow is another day! Hoping for more good weather because we have at least one, if not two hikes planned.
Night!
No comments:
Post a Comment