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Mountain West No. 5: Hiking Glacier

By Michael Barnes | Friday, July 25, 2008, 05:16 PM

Two days. Two long hikes. Lots of national parks adventure.

Wednesday we scuttled up gravel roads on Glacier National Park’s northwest boundaries to the Logging Lake trail. Nine miles round trip through dense, moist forest undergrowth. Heard elk. Saw reddish deer. Warnings, as always, of bear country, but also recent posts on mountain lions. I was concerned about the lack of visual warning among the chest-high undergrowth that clogged the trail, but nothing came of it. Rob swam in narrow, almond-shaped Logging Lake.

No humans until the end of the hike, more than five hours later, when we heard a “hallooo” over the coming rise. There appeared a roundish couple, older than I, who looked like characters out of Trollope, perhaps a Methodist deacon and his wife, who said: “Just out on a short walk.” Short walk? They have more stamina than I do. “Any bears?” they asked. “Not yet.” we replied.

Bears came the next day in the form of a grizzly family — a cinnamon sow and two darker cubs, watched from across a road, a swampy area and a rise. They frolicked not 150 yards away, but we felt no danger. That makes two big “gets” for wildlife on this trip — grizzlies and mountain goats. (Joe saw another mountain goat that day, scampering from precipice to precipice.)

Later Thursday, we hiked eight miles along Two Medicine Lake not far from East Glacier. Higher, drier and infinitely more scenic than the day before, with glaciers mantling the crown of peaks around us. I’m still having problems with ascents. My heart pounds in my throat. I’m convincing it’s my medication, or a nonpathalogical arrythmia. I have no problems with distances, just ascents. Lots of ground squirrels and marmots at higher elevations.

Charismatic birds identified so far: Bald eagle, osprey, violet and green swallow, rufous hummingbird, dark-eyed junko, sharp-tailed grouse (and chick), red-naped sapsucker, loons (heard, not seen), pine siskin, lots of ravens and a grey falcon that soars over the wetlands adjacent to our cabin. These wetlands out of a jungle movie extend down to the Middle Fork of the Flathead River, which we explored today, Friday.

Later, a helpful wrangler identified a bird’s song we could not: Two or three long whistle-like pitches, held out until they diminished. It’s a varied thrush. Sounds like a soft referee’s whistle.