Sometimes despite the best planning and such the plans don’t work out. I had researched a ton of hikes and everything for Glacier but unfortunately the famed Going to the Sun Road was still closed because of snow and avalanche dangers and the hikes I had planned for our Monday in Glacier involved going on that road. So we had to figure out a different hike and so we chose Snyder Lake and we were not disappointed. It was very strep at times but gorgeous all along the way. There were very few people as well because access to even the open parts of Going to the Sun Road were still limited by having pre-time passes that we had snagged a few months before. The hike did take us through an old burn section from 2003 I think and we could see where the forest was re-growing and coming back. The lake at the top was beautiful and the kids didn’t hesitate to put their feet in. A little butterfly really seemed to like Edric’s hat and kept landing on it which was super fun. And there was a big area of snow on the hillside which everyone had fun making snowballs in (we even ambushed Clint when he wasn’t aware with a bunch of snow balls). On the way down we ended up encountering rather closely two grizzlies. They were up on the hill to our right and then intially went up and over the ridge, we were stopped a fair distance away with another couple hikers and the kids did great about staying close and taking all the precautions. However we realized with the other two hikers that the ridge they just went over lead right down to where the trail was also going. So we preceded cautiously and turns out they just wanted to drink and play in the stream the crossed the trail. The two bears didn’t really care about us about 20 yards away but we were all quite nervous crossing the stream so near to them. It was a great hike and even though it wasn’t the initial plan it still worked out great and we had a good time.
Hiking Mommy 