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Hidden Lake, Glacier National Park

At the top of Glacier National Park is Logan Pass and a fairly short hike to Hidden Lake. After a glorious motorcycle ride on the Going-to-the-Sun Road, I stripped down in the parking lot to change from biking clothes (jeans) to hiking clothes (running skirt). What, don’t judge! The only other option was taking my chances in one of the scary, smelly, cramped port-a-potty’s.  Not. Happening. (Also, there is no photographic evidence of said scandalousness, so as far as anyone else is concerned, it probably didn’t happen and I’m just making stuff up for a better story.)

I’ve never experienced the kind of winter where it lasts for 9 months, so when we arrived at the visitor’s center and there were still patches of snow on the peaks I just thought “Cool, high elevation!” Um, no. Not really. Well, yes, it’s a high elevation, but not so long prior to my arrival the entire building was still covered in snow. May I remind you, the photo above was taken towards the end of August.

Yeah, this was the end of June. Hello, winter, nice you’ve made it past the equinox. The summer equinox, not the spring one.

At any rate, J-Mo and I shed our biking gear, strapped on hiking stuff and headed up the trail. It was beautiful, the weather was perfectly cool and breezy to counteract the up-hill hiking and sunshine.

I think roundtrip the Hidden Lake hike is only about 3 miles, but I was surprised and delighted at how much snow was still on the trail. I mean, I would have been had I not packed only watershoes. My Teva’s are sturdy and perfect for tramping through rivers, like the Hidden Canyon of Secrets in Southern Utah. But snow? Well, my toesies got a bit cold a time or two. Nothing frostbitten or anything, just slushy.

J-Mo and I happened across a small family of mountain goats.

The first glimpse of Hidden Lake. This sizable body of water is all glacier melt and the clear, blue color is amazing. I think I audibly gasped when the lake appeared through the trees.

Sitting on the rocks rehydrating and having a little mid-hike snack and laughing with J-Mo was probably the highlight of this trip. I couldn’t have been more content. My stresses (which I promise I’ll fill you in on soon) receded and the high mountain air really began to work it’s magic.

J-Mo and I.

As we made our way back to the visitors center I was more and more fascinated with how much snow was still on the ground. Let it be known that I threw a snowball on August 20, 2011. And then I threw another one. And then J-Mo and I got in an epic snow/slush ball fight.

See? There’s still a LOT of snow to throw at people, er, I mean, to hike through.

Gorgeous, just gorgeous. Even though they aren’t splashed around the Interwebs in these last few posts, J-Mo’s parents came with us on their Harley’s and as charming and hilarious as ever. It was awesome to spend the weekend with them on another Harley adventure.

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