Problem solved. The blankets boosted our sleeping setup into the comfort zone. At prior cold mornings, I would just get up and start moving before losing too much body temperature. Today I didn’t feel like leaving my blanket-wrapped sleeping bag, knowing the cold that would await me. Marius was already working towards breakfast tea, but he usually falls asleep before me, while I still sort the day’s pictures and write a bit. I eventually got up as well – porridge duty.

Just as we finished breakfast, it started to rain. We knew the forecast, so we were not surprised but maybe a little disappointed that it was accurate, though. We did the dishes and started driving towards the Many Glaciers inside the National Park.

Even before entering the park, we saw our first bear this trip. We hardly managed to take footage before he disappeared into the forest.

The weather still didn’t look too promising for hiking.

When we reached the many glaciers area, the rain had partially turned into hail, and thunder sounded through the mountains. We tried to find a WiFi to use the time for some planning. There was one, but we didn’t get the code as we were no overnight guests at the place.

The cabins and campground were one day before closing for the season. An employee pointed us towards the Many Glaciers Hotel one mile back down the road. The place had impressive woodwork, a moose, and a great view on the nearby lake and mountains. The hotel was about to close on Tuesday for the season, but seemed pretty booked.

They wouldn’t grant us access to their WiFi either, but they had information material on the trails, so we could plan our hike.

We decided to pay Grinnell Lake a visit. It was still raining – sometimes more sometimes less. We decided to gear up and start anyway.

Marius had the brilliant idea to bring an umbrella, while I could shine with having thought of gloves.

The first part of trail took us along the Southern coast of Swiftcurrent Lake.

After crossing a bridge over a creek connecting the two lakes we continued North of Lake Josephine. This part was marked as backcountry and the trail was a bit more challenging, but still rather easy to walk. Backcountry means bear awareness.

Autumn is definitely a good time to witness nature’s colourful beauty in the mountains.

Leaving Lake Josephine behind us, we crossed another creek and the trail lead us through thick forests.

We took a detour and an ascent to Hidden Falls, a name we already encountered in Yellowstone. Slight lack of creativity there, but the name was apt in both cases.

A short forest passage later, we arrived at Grinnell Lake. The lake and its surrounding mountains provided a stunning view.

We didn’t want to take the same trail back, so we looked on the map for alternatives, and found one – the Piegan Pass Trail. It wasn’t on the list of recommendations, but that doesn’t mean it’s bad. So we made our way up a few height metres and followed its way. There were no other hikers and some potential bear excrements made us remember where we were.

Making noise is one recommendation to avoid bear encounters. Being a bit tired of talking all day, we put some music on the Smartphone speaker. I felt a bit like one of those teenagers in Berlin’s public transport systems, but since nobody was around I figured it was OK. We started with Eye of the Tiger, but then switched to The Autumn of Vivaldi’s Four Seasons. The latter went much better with the context.

At some point, our path merged with a horse trail, i.e. a muddy experience given the weather.

The views compensated for the trail quality though.

After roughly 5:20 hours, and 15.7 km, we arrived back at our starting point. Here’s the GPS track of our hike:

We got out of our wet shoes, and satisfied our craving for sugar with lemonade and Reese’s Pieces.

While warming up in the car, we did some rough planning for the rest of the trip. We will spend 3 more days in this area, then take a two day drive to Seattle and spend two more days in Olympic National Park before heading to Portland.

On our drive back, we saw two more bears, one of which I got on camera.

At Babb, where the road to Many Glaciers starts, we tried to find a place with WiFi. We didn’t succeed but got 3G mobile data at some point being able to upload the last post, check messages, and download some park information. A friend of us sent us a warning that the Going-to-the-Sun Road, which we were planning to use, was closed due to a wildfire. This will require some changes. Tomorrow we will go back to Many Glaciers for a full-day hike. For tonight, we are staying at the Leaning Tree Campground again.

Dinner was quick: canned soups, one vegetarian, one not, scrambled eggs, and peanut butter sandwiches for desert.

We finished the day with a hot shower and left our shoes to dry next to the heater in the washroom.

Weather forecast for tomorrow is sunny. Let’s hope it’ll be as accurate as for the rain today.