Hike to Grinnell Glacier - Many Glacier - Glacier National Park

Wow.  What a hike for our final day at Waterton-Glacier National Parks!  We had driven into Many Glacier earlier in the week to make reservations on the boats that would ferry us up Swiftcurrent Lake and then Josephine Lake to our trailhead to hike to Grinnell Glacier.  We were looking forward to the hike.  But we got much more than we expected.

The rising sun lit Grinnell Point and the Many Glacier Lodge as we walked down to the lodge from where we parked the truck:

We got to lakeside and were treated to beauteous views of glacial mountains across Swiftcurrent Lake:

Our boat plied the waters of Swiftcurrent Lake, ferrying hikers from the lodge up to the head of the lake:

Once our first boat delivered us to the head of Swiftcurrent Lake, we hiked 0.25 mile over a ledge to the shore of Josephine Lake, where another boat picked us up and carried us to the top of that lake. Here is a photo of the second boat, docked at the head of Josephine Lake:

Our hike was ranger-led, and it turned our that our ranger was very knowledgeable and a great speaker.  She would have attributed that to the fact that she is an elementary school teacher by training.  In any event, she gave us a great introduction to the flora, fauna and geology of this beautiful park.  As she talked to us at the bridge over Grinnell Creek where it fed into Josephine Lake, we had this gorgeous view down the creek and lake:

Our hike was strenuous:  9 miles, with 1600 feet of elevation gain in the 4.5 miles of hike up to the glacier.  We came upon a waterfall on the hike up, and Kathy had no trouble deciding to rinse her hot brow in the glacial freeze of a waterfall spilling down the vertical cliff wall:

Our hiking group comprised 32 intrepid hiker-tourists.  Below, you can see the first part of the group strung out along the cliff as we climbed above Grinnell Lake toward our lunch spot on a terrace near the glacier:

At lunch, we had an unobstructed view of the entire cirque carved in ancient times by Grinnell Glacier and its glacier buddies.  The rock, clouds, snow and sky composed a harmonious whole:

After lunch, we continued our hike up to the glacier.  As soon as Kathy spotted this cute little iceberg that calved off of Grinnell Glacier a year ago, she fell in love and had to have a photo of it:

As our ranger related, recent measurements indicate that the glacier is retreating 32 feet a year!  At this rate, the glacier will be gone by the year 2020, even though other measurements indicate that the glacier ice is over 180 feet thick.  Likewise, Upper Grinnell Lake, the glacial tarn it has created , also over 180 feet deep.  We had trouble wrapping our minds around those figures.

The retreat of the glacier is so fast that much of the bedrock and glacial till around us has only been exposed to view for a few years:

David found this particular glacial erratic quite fetching:

This photo shows what was perhaps the most unique feature we saw on our hike.  According to our ranger, the circular shapes in the limestone in the photo below are fossilized stromatolites. Stromatolites are layered bio-chemical accretionary structures formed in shallow water by the trapping, binding and cementation of sedimentary grains by biofilms (microbial mats) of microorganisms, especially cyanobacteria. Fossilized stromatolites provide ancient records of life on Earth by these remains, some of which may date from 3.7 billion years ago.  More importantly, scientists believe that stromatolites were responsible for transforming our ancient carbon dioxide rich atmosphere into an oxygen rich atmosphere (by "breathing" the carbon dioxide much as all plants do today) and thus setting the stage for animal life such as ourselves.  With this, everyone grew hushed and reverently moved off the stromatolite fossils in the limestone, as if feeling that it would be sacrilegious to step on our mothers:

Kathy wasn't shy about searching out a baby iceberg to adopt.  She named it "bunny" because it had the shape of a bunny floating around in the glacial tarn.  Bunny couldn't come home with us - for lots of reasons such as weight, cold, melting, and so on, but that didn't stop Kathy and bunny posing for a memorial photo.  We left bunny in her original habitat, hoping she would last the season.

The bedrock limestone, the glacial till, the ice and snow, and the sculpted rock, formed patterns we've never seen before, but which were so compelling to our eyes that we couldn't stop searching our more beautiful shapes and structures:

For instance, glaciers sculpted this entire scene in one way or another --

-- and Kathy couldn't resist running down and joining the glacial party!

We thought this an appropriate point to take a selfie with one of our favorite glaciers and tarns:

According to our ranger, some pools left by the glacier have been stained red - not by iron as you might guess - but by bacteria that stain the water - and hence, the surrounding rocks - a deep scarlet:

As we left Grinnell glacier, we turned around for one last look at its sister, Salamander Glacier, the snowfield remnants of its old reach, and Kathy's favorite iceberg floating in the glacial blue of Upper Grinnell Lake:

Our organized hike was over, and so we started down to make our return to the boat.  Along the way, we met a woman who wanted us to take her photo with the scenery, and she obliged us in return by taking our photo with beautiful Grinnell Lake in the background:

Hiking on, we got one final view of Grinnell Lake looking slightly westward, in its setting among glacially carved peaks and valleys:

Proceeding down the trail, we spotted a group of perhaps 20 hikers, all jammed up together on the trail.  We couldn't imagine why so many hikers would be stopped in one place - until we arrived, and realized that we had joined a RAM JAM in progress.  The subject of the meeting - one very curly-horned mountain sheep, stood in the meadow just below the trail, placidly munching his lunch, and eyeing all of us very critically.  We deduced that, either he was very curious about these human animals who walk in lines past him, or he was on the payroll of the National Park Service and enjoying his role as the star of many a tourist's photo essay about Glacier National Park:

Having met the ram eye-to-eye and lived to tell about it, we proceeded down the trail and back to our dock, where we spied our boat plying its way up Josephine Lake in our direction:

Soon we would be safe on board the boat, headed down toward Swiftcurrent Lake and then Many Glacier Lodge, with visions of glaciers dancing in our heads, our bodies pleasantly exhausted from our journey up and back through some of the most spectacular scenery we have ever enjoyed.

We need to leave Glacier National Park now, heading south toward Albuquerque, but we intend to return, full of ideas for the hikes, kayak trips and other adventures we can find in this rocky wonderland.