Big trip of summer: Glacier's Belly River

 

Crossing the longest suspended bridge in Glacier over the Belly 

River

On the way out we were approached by this bold fox

The crimson fireweed harkens the beginning of Autumn

Dawn Mist Falls on the South Belly is a beauty, like Katie

At our Glenn Lake campground below Pyramid Peak

It took a 600-foot rock scramble to reach Margaret Lake

Katie and Josie Maclean on the Margaret scramble

The many cascades of Mokowanis/Pyramid Falls

The thriving thimbleberry crop was shoulder high

We had smoke all the way, but it enhanced the sunsets

The intense heat brought with it fire and smoke.

I didn't get out much over the past couple of weeks, a short trip with Wayne Phillips where we found numerous varieties of wild berries on Crawford Creek in the Little Belts to celebrate his 81st birthday.

But, when we did get out we did it in a big way with a four-day backpack trip into Glacier National Park's Belly River in the park's extreme northeast corner along the Canadian border.

We had camp spots on Cosley Lake, the head of Glenn's Lake, and at Gable Creek near the scenic and historic Belly River Ranger Station.

We did side trips to Mokowanis Lake, the Mokowanis (Pyramid) Falls, a bushwhack to Margaret Lake that feeds the falls, Gros Ventre Falls, and Dawn Mist Falls up the South Fork Belly that's fed by Lake Elizabeth.

Three of us did all of this for 40-miles during the four days.

This was no group of youngsters, with four of our party of eight being over 70 (I was the oldest at 74). The youngest was 57, and the rest in their 60s.

One of the trip's highlights was Mick Taleff's humorous limericks.  I wish I had written them down or recorded them.

Unfortunately, we had a pretty heavy haze and smoke cover coming from fires in California and Oregon.  It distorted and obscured the scenery.

We were all awed by the high peaks and glaciers of this valley, even me, although I had been here more than a half-dozen times. Two of the park's 10,000 feet mountain peaks tower over it ---- Merritt and Cleveland, with Miche Waben checking in within feet of that height.

This is a valley of glacier fed lakes ---- Cosley, Glenns, Mokowanis, Stoney Indian, Elizabeth and Helen ---- accessible by trail.  And lakes like Margaret, Sue, Ipasha, Miche Waben that sit in alpine cirques perched in the high country.

You might note the numerous lakes named for women, reputed to be Joe Cosley's girlfriends.  This outlaw who poached, trapped and hunted where he built the first ranger cabin, was the valley's first ranger when Glacier became a national park in 1910.  Our group visited the ranger station which displays his photo and a section of an aspen tree with his initials carved into it.  There were believed to be many such trees in the area where he claimed to have buried an alleged  diamond ring that law enforcement agents could claim if they freed him after arrest.  It was a diamond ring he had promised Margaret, Elizabeth, Sue and Helen.

The highlight of the trip was making it to Margaret Lake above Mokowanis Falls and Lake.  It was a 600-feet bushwhack along side the Mokowanis cascades and then through a dry streambed deep in alder thickets and up through rock shelves.

Mokowanis Falls is really a series of cascades beginning with a spectacular falls in  red shale, followed by lesser, shallower falls, and climaxing in a tremendous drop of water from Margaret Lake.

Margaret Lake was like a vision of turquoise waters with a backdrop of long, thin waterfalls dropping into it from Sue and Ipasha lakes high above, which are fed by glaciers of the same name.  It was thrilling.

While we enjoyed Gros Ventre Falls coming in, and Dawn Mist Falls on the South Belly on separate hikes, Margaret Falls is incomparable for beauty, which raised the question for all of us, 'which is the park's most beautiful waterfall?' 

Depends on the eye of the beholder, I guess.

I think the only camping experience I've missed in the Belly country is Helen Lake.

Next year, maybe?