Jan 2024 Winter sledding trip to Two Medicine

[orin]

Over the years I’ve done several winter camping trips in Glacier. In mid January I pulled a sled into Two Medicine for two nights. I had reservations for a week in Yellowstone and decided that if the weather cooperated I would add a couple of nights in Glacier either before or after. Unfortunately the start of my trip coincided with the big arctic outbreak. The frigid temperatures in Choteau reported by Ear Mountain and the predictions of Montana minimums below -25F sounded too cold for me so I drove directly to Yellowstone. Luckily, by the time I left Yellowstone temperatures had warmed up enough to give it a try.

I drove 4 miles from East Glacier to the Two Medicine road turnoff near Lower Two Medicine Lake dam. The Looking Glass highway is closed here in the winter and the road dead ends. Since a winter trip into Two Medicine is on a snow covered but fairly level road, I pulled my gear on a sled. Sledding is easier than backpacking since the weight rests on the ground letting me carry heavy winter gear without too much pain. Snowshoes kept me from post holing. Two fiberglass poles connected the sled to a harness made from an old Boy Scout pack frame.

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Lower Two Medicine Lake was frozen. The temps were mostly in the twenties. Mountain tops were often shrouded in fog. A little snow and even some light sleet/rain fell from time to time but nothing troublesome. There were snowmobile tracks for a short distance but they soon vanished.

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The park boundary is 3 miles from the road end.

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Running Eagle Falls is another couple of miles past the park boundary. In the spring and early summer water comes over the top as well as out from underneath but in the winter all of the water comes out from below.

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You know you are in Glacier when the riverbed is red and green argilite. There were also quite a few yellow rocks.

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Winter days are short and by the time I reached the campground dusk was fast approaching. I made a right turn past the campground signpost and used a snow shovel and snowshoes to pack down a platform for the tent and excavate a picnic table. By the time camp was set up and dinner made it was dark. The hardest part of winter camping is the looong night. I bring plenty of reading material and extra batteries for the headlamp.

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The next morning I snowshoed the short distance to partly frozen Pray Lake to get more water. It is a lot easier to cook and fill bottles with liquid water. Melting snow takes a lot of time and fuel.

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The bridge over the Pray Lake outlet is barely visible on the far right.

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I didn’t see much wildlife but the tracks of moose, elk, deer and coyotes were everywhere. What I did see were dippers. This fat gray dipper is bobbing up and down on the end of the branch. It would dive off and swim under water for a few yards and then pop back to the surface and fly back to the branch. I think they catch insects underwater.

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In the summer getting a picture from this bench near the camp store can require patience. No problem in the winter. The boat dock has been pulled back onto land. I spent the day snowshoeing up frozen Two Medicine Lake to the shelter at the upper end where the summer boat docks. Instead of walking straight across the lake I stayed within a few feet of the shoreline. Regardless of how solid the ice looks you have to be careful. Falling through would be pretty dangerous. I carried an extra set of clothes in a dry bag and a stove just in case something bad happened.

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Not too far from the head of the lake a treeless slope comes down from Sinopah on the left. There was quite a bit of avalanche debris on and in the ice so I took extra care here.

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A good view up to Dawson Pass near the upper end of the lake. There was no boat dock at the upper end. I’m not sure whether they pull it up on land or float it down the lake. The shelter is not visible in this picture but it is back under the trees. I ate lunch there before heading back down the lake.

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The next morning blue sky and sunlight were breaking through from time to time. We call those sucker holes in Seattle because they give you false hope that the clouds and rain will soon clear. But the trip out was fine with a little sun and clearing now and then.

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I was back in East Glacier by afternoon. Then I drove US2 to West Glacier.

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Mount Saint Nicholas shrouded in clouds.

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I made a final stop at Apgar for the iconic view up Lake McDonald. There was some floating ice but it was far from solidly frozen. By midafternoon the temperature rose into the 40s. The temperature swing on this trip from coldest to warmest was about 70 degrees. It rained for a good deal of the drive back to Seattle.

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[zozeppelin]

All I can say is WOW!!!

Thanks for sharing, so cool. What type of tent do you use?

[Selkie]

Indeed -- wow!
It's always a treat to see quiet Glacier in the winter. Thanks for posting an account of your visit, complete with calendar pictures. I especially enjoyed Running Eagle Falls. It sounds like quite the adventure.
Was Pray Lake open but Two Medicine mostly not?
I hope you'll want to post something about Yellowstone in winter, as well.

[paul]

Sounds pretty amazing. Thanks for sharing with us. Like Zepp, I would be interested in hearing more on the gear you used.

[orin]

With a few exceptions, my winter gear is similar to summer gear but heavier and bulkier. The Mountain Hardware tent has 4 poles, no netting, a single door at one end and heavier fabric. It weighs 7 or 8 lbs. I have backpacked with it but my normal backpacking tent is half that. The sleeping bag has more down, a double zipper and a full hood. I sometimes add a vapor barrier liner. I put a full length piece of blue foam under the sleeping pad. I carry extra layers of clothes. A small mountaineering snow shovel is useful around camp. My white gas stove works fine but I bring an extra day or two of food and fuel just in case. So nothing very exotic but probably 10 or 15 lbs more than a summer load and a lot harder to stuff into a pack. With a sled that doesn’t matter very much.

I use snowshoes rather than skis mostly because I don’t ski that well and because an old knee injury is happier on snowshoes.

Selkie,

Pray Lake had open water. The Two Medicine Lakes were solidly frozen. The river was also open so if I had to guess maybe Pray Lake is closer to a wide spot in the river than an actual lake and the faster flow through it is harder to freeze.

[paul]

On the downhill sections did you hop on the sled and go for a ride?

[orin]

No. I was afraid I would miss the hairpin turn at the bottom and end up wrapped around a tree.

[paul]

Probably a wise decision

[Jay w]

Love it. That's all. Carry on.

Jay