Falling Water

Last time I visited Glacier National Park it was September and someone mentioned that the waterfalls weren’t as pretty as they would be earlier in the summer. So, this time we arrived in the early summer, and I was ready for some beautiful waterfalls.

We drove into the park on a cloudy day. Humm. Last time we were here we could see the a lot more of the mountains. Maybe it will be nicer tomorrow, I thought. We set up camp and headed for Going to the Sun Road. Sure enough, water was trickling down the rocks onto the road. We continued, heading for Logan Pass. What? The road was blocked off--closed well before Logan Pass. Upset at the closure, we returned to St. Mary’s where we comforted ourselves with coffee and a nice piece of berry pie at The Park Café.

After studying some maps, we returned to Saint Mary’s Lake the following day. Although it was raining, we decided to take the trail to St. Mary Falls and Virginia Falls. Both were gorgeous. St. Mary’s was rushing with water, pouring both from the top and the side. Virginia Falls was tall and powerful. What we didn’t expect to find was two other waterfalls. Again, they were very strong and beautiful. They flowed over red and green rocks. Along the sides grew fuzzy green moss.

It cleared up a bit on our third day, but the wind was fierce. Realizing we were not going to get perfect weather, we headed back into Going to the Sun Road. Along the way we saw stairs climbing up a steep mountainside. We decided to follow them. A good decision. The stairs led to Sunrift Gorge where water surged through rock. A small trail wound around the side of the gorge and up the mountain, so we followed it to see what was on the other side of the gorge. The wind was fierce, so we had to watch ourselves. Adolfo nearly lost his camera and tripod in the wind. I had difficulty staying on my feet, so I decided to sit down on the trail at several points to keep the wind from sweeping me off my feet. Still, we forged on.

Behind the gorge was a heavily flowing creek that had sculpted the red rock into smooth curves. The hillsides in front of us were amazing, too. Water wept, tumbled, and blew off mountains everywhere we looked. The wind created a unique sight that appeared to be steam rising from the cliffs. The trail itself had become a stream as the water took every available route to fall off the mountains. Luckily Adolfo and I both have new waterproof hiking boots. We followed the trail/stream until the water pressure became too dangerous to continue.