Winds Howling

After two days of big hikes at Glacier National Park, we woke up early to get a parking space for Hidden Lake Overlook Trail, a 2.3-mile round trip of mostly boardwalk through a wide-open area of mountain meadows leading to a nice view of a big mountain next to a lake. It took almost exactly two hours.

Here are my photos with timestamps from beginning to end.

06:44: The parking lot at the trailhead, called Logan Pass parking lot, is notorious for filling up quickly and being super congested. The park implemented a new system this year placing a 3-hour limit on each car. I saw one get a ticket while we were there — the ranger seemed to spend ages writing it up. We woke up early and found plenty of parking, but it didn’t stay that way for long.

06:58: Walking up to the trail. The Logan Pass Visitor Center is on the left, containing a gift shop. We went in there after the hike, but by then the line for the register was too long to be worth buying anything.

07:09: Now we’re on the trail.

07:10

07:11

07:12

07:13

07:14

07:15

07:18

07:19

07:21

07:22

07:23

07:25

07:26

07:27

07:28: This snow patch was pretty slippery. I almost fell once.

07:31

07:33

07:34

07:35

07:36

07:37

07:38

07:39

07:40

07:41

07:43

07:44

07:47

07:48

07:49

07:50: A white-tailed ptarmigan and her chicks at the side of the trail.

07:52

07:54: Here’s the destination, a front-row view of Bearhat Mountain, Hidden Lake and the lightly forested meadow below.

07:55

07:56: These photos look pretty good to me in retrospect, but while we were there, I remember being pretty unfazed by this view. I think the similarly expansive views of the hike to this point had already impressed me.

08:00: “All area beyond this sign is closed because of bear danger.”

08:04: After 10 minutes of poking around the overlook area, we’re on our way back to the gift shop.

08:05

08:09

08:10: A distant mountain goat on a patch of snow.

08:11

08:12

Columbian ground squirrel:

08:14: Something’s hooked up to this tree.

08:16

08:17

08:19

08:20

08:22

08:24

08:25

08:26

08:27

08:28

08:29

08:30

08:33

08:36

08:38

08:39

08:40

08:41

08:42: The parking lot was full by the time we got back, with cars circling the lot for a space.