Glacier National Park (GNP) is known as “The Crown of the Continent”. Its northern boundary is the border between the United States and Canada, where it adjoins Canada’s Waterton Lakes National Park forming the Waterton-Glacier International Peace Park. Created in 1910, GNP is over 1 million acres (1583 square miles) and contained a recorded 126 glaciers. Today, that number has dropped by 100 and the remaining 26 may be gone in 5-10 years. While few active glaciers remain to be seen, the landscape reflects the evidence of their prior existence with many U-shaped valleys, hanging valleys, and glacial moraine.
Going-to-the-Sun Road (GTSR) which crosses the park was completed in 1932. Over 3 million people visit GNP each year making it one of the most-visited national parks. During the peak of the season, vehicle reservations are needed to travel from the west to the east on GTSR. You can either get a reservation to access it or do like we did and get a tour which provides access.
For our first day in the park, we booked the 1-hour boat tour of Lake McDonald with the Glacier Park Boat Company (GPBC). On our way into the park, this time from the west, we stopped at the Apgar Visitor Center to check it out (and note our meeting location for our GTSR tour), then continued toward Lake McDonald.
There is a checkpoint station a couple of miles down the road and if you don’t have a reservation for an activity in the park that day or a GTSR vehicle reservation for that date AND time window, you get turned around by the park rangers. We showed our pass for our Lake McDonald tour and the ranger quickly passed us on through.
Apgar is at one end of nearly 10-mile-long Lake McDonald and the Lake McDonald Lodge and GPBC are near the other end. The drive is beautiful along the shores of the lake on the Going-to-the-Sun Road.
When we arrived at the Lake McDonald Lodge area, we had about an hour to kill before time to board our boat. So, we walked around the lodge and along the shore a bit, then around the nearby cabins. I’d hoped there was a trail along more of the shore there that didn’t appear on the NPS map, but there wasn’t. So, believe the map!
GNP – Lake McDonald Lodge 
GNP – Lake McDonald Lodge 
GNP – Lake McDonald Lodge Lobby 
GNP – Lake McDonald Lodge Lobby 
GNP – Lake McDonald 
GNP – Lake McDonald – Dave, Keith, Paula 
GNP – Snyder Creek by Lake McDonald Lodge 
GNP – 1936 White Motor Bus at Lake McDonald Lodge 
Bear-proof trash can at Lake McDonald Lodge 
Map showing Great Northern Railway routes through Glacier-Waterton International Peace Park
GPBC operates two boats on Lake McDonald, the 1930 DeSmet and the recently “reclaimed” 1986 Glacier Lily (the owner of GPBC originally built her for another lake, then bought her back last year). We opted for the recently refurbished Glacier Lily, but the pictures below are of the DeSmet as she sailed near us.
Our guide provided us with the history and geology of the area as we took in the views of the forests and mountains towering around us. The devastation from the 2018 Howe Ridge Fire which consumed over 14,000 acres and many private homes and historic structures was evident from our lake viewpoint. I also found this fascinating time-lapse video of the fire developing. Amazingly, there were no deaths or major injuries from this fire, although a father-son duo barely escaped (their video and story is here).
After our boat ride, we planned to eat a late lunch at the lodge only to find out that lunch hours were over and it wouldn’t open again until dinner time at 5pm. We took a picture of Keith in front of his namesake dining room and left.
So, we headed on out of the park and back towards Columbia Falls and ate “lupper” (lunch/supper) around 3pm at a local diner, The Nite Owl. Then we rewarded ourselves with ice cream at Sweet Retreat Creamery. We were further rewarded later in the evening with a beautiful sunset and view from the porch of our rental in Columbia Falls.
Notes By Nancy 
Leave a comment