Montana Day 3 Gunsight Pass

 Day 3

Thursday September 17, 2020

    One of the groups I follow on Facebook is for folks like me to share photos, stories and advice for visiting Glacier National Park.  A few weeks ago, someone posted of their hike out to Jackson Glacier.  They had walked right up to the wall of ice and posed in front of it.  

    Sunrise through the smoky haze at Logan Pass...

    The trailhead is on the eastern side of the park, a few miles beyond Logan Pass.  There’s a glacier overlook by the parking area.  But, do to the smoke, you can't see the glacier from here.  

     To get to Jackson Glacier, you have to follow the Gunsight Pass Trail six and a quarter miles to Gunsight Lake, another two miles to Jackson Meadow. That’s where the official trail ends.  If you follow the rock cairns further, you’ll get to the glacier. Scramble down the gravel and you can walk right up to it. For someone like me, that would involve starting out a few hours before dawn and most likely getting back to the car after dark.  Yes, I did think about it.

    Instead, I simply chose to hike out and back to the lake for a twelve and a half mile day.  Not too shabby.  The first mile and a quarter is all downhill...

     Just after the one mile point, the trail brings you to Deadwood Falls.  The colors just don't get old.

     At the first trail juncture you encounter the first swinging bridge.  

    Three miles up the trail is the turnoff for Florence Falls.  That’s what I did the last time and didn’t feel the need to do it again.  The trail itself wasn’t bad at all. It was mostly rolling hills and overgrowth crowding the already thin trail. 

     The first actual glimpse of Jackson Glacier...

    About a half mile from the lake it all suddenly changes…

    Eventually, you hit another juncture.  Straight ahead is the lake.  To the right is the campground.  To the left, Gunsight Pass continues.  It’s five minutes to another, longer swing bridge and the trail up to Jackson Meadow.

     Back at the lake, it just felt good to sit on a rock for a while and let my feet cool in the water.

    While I could have continued chilling lakeside, I still did have that six and a quarter mile hike back, complete with the incline at the end.  It was time to go.  

    

    On the hike back, I met two groups claiming to have seen multiple moose in the clearing just beyond the Florence Falls turnoff.  Sadly, they were long gone by the time I arrived.  

      I took a break on the other side of the small swing bridge for some water.  There was a family of six captivated by it.  They ran across, jumped up and down and tried swinging it left to right.  It was all quite entertaining.

     When I did this trail to Florence Falls seven years ago, I also paused here and heard an all too familiar rumble in the distance.  It's amazing how quickly you can cover ground when you hear thunder approaching.  Today, nothing but sunshine and smoke.