Glacier National Park with Kids and Teens: Western Half Edition

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travel dates: July 2022

Several years ago we went to Lassen Volcanic National Park in early July and found massive mounds of snow still blocking park roads and cutting us off from many of the park’s biggest attractions. Some research confirmed that we were exceptionally unlucky; the park websites has records listing the date the road opened going back to 1980: it nearly always opens by late June, and the opening date our year was the latest ever (well, at least since 1980, which was pretty much forever ago)…it would not open until July 26 that year, by which point we were long gone.

So I approached Glacier planning with great care. I again checked the historic dates when Going-to-the-Sun road opened and chose dates well into July. The only times the road had ever opened later than our dates was during World War II, during the first year of Covid, and then once in 2011 because of snowfall. No way a historically late road opening would thwart another National Park trip, right? Right?!

I suspect you see where this is going. It was a cold spring with a lot of late snow, and the road did not fully open until the day before we left Glacier, when we were on the east side of the park. So the good news was that we did get to make it up to Logan Pass. But the bad news was that we had to shift a lot of things around and sort of twiddle our thumbs waiting for the road to open.

But the other good news is that there’s a lot to do in Glacier even when you can’t see the Going-to-the-Sun road and we had a chance to do some things we might not otherwise have made time for.

Trail of the Cedars/Avalanche Lake Hikes

Much of the Going to the Sun Road (the main road through Glacier, full of dramatic drop offs and amazing views) was closed while we were on the west side of the park, but it was open as far as the Trail of the Cedars, which was good because the Trail of the Cedars and connected Avalanche Lake hikes are amazing and we wouldn’t have wanted to miss them.

A word on park reservations: you have to have them now for Glacier. Maybe. I just looked it up, and they don’t have a plan yet for 2024 as I’m writing this in September, 2023. The way things worked while we were there in summer 2022 was that you had to have a reservation to get to the visitor center and park shuttle on the west side, whereas you could park at the visitor center on the east side at St. Mary’s and take the shuttle even if you didn’t have a reservation to drive the whole road. This worked out well for us because we had reservations when we were on the west side but not the east (since we’d planned to do the whole road while we were on the west side, back when we foolishly thought it would be open in July). I’m not going to talk too much about our reservation experience, because it’s a pretty new system that’s still being tinkered with and likely won’t be exactly the same when anyone reading this goes there. But what’s not likely to change is that you need to plan well in advance for your Glacier trip and secure any necessary reservations as soon as you can, at least if you’ll be there during peak season.

We had a three day reservation that covered our stay on the west side, so we were able to park at the Apgar Visitor Center, and we opted to take the shuttle to the trailhead from there, having heard that parking is very limited. The Visitor Centers at Glacier aren’t as elaborate and expansive as they are at Yellowstone; this one is largely a gift shop and a place to get some information from the rangers. And to pick up your adorable Junior Ranger book:

On the day we were there, the shuttle was not crowded at all, and it was a great, easy way to get to the trail:

The Trail of the Cedars is a short, wheelchair and stroller accessible boardwalk trail that takes you through a lovely forested area (I would guess there are a lot of cedars there). It’s perfect for young kids or anyone not up for a more intense hike.

Here is Abe looking like he’s not up for a more intense hike. But–spoiler!–his mean parents are about to force him to go on one anyway:

Avalanche Lake is not really a particularly intense hike, and it’s most definitely worth the effort. It’s about 5 miles round trip (I think that includes the half mile or so you’ll spend on the Trail of the Cedars), and there’s some elevation change but nothing too daunting–it seems to be one of the better hikes at Glacier for casual hikers/families.

The trail meanders through the forest, along streams and past waterfalls, for a long time. Sometimes a deer decides to join you; this guy kept criss-crossing in front of us for a very long time. Hey buddy!

He’s blurry here, but he was leaping over a creek, so I had to put it in:

So it’s nice in that it’s one of those hikes that has both cool stuff to see along the way and a big payoff at the end:

The water is cold:

The problem with out and back hikes is you have to see the same stuff on the way back, so I recommend you save sliding down the giant rock for the way back out, to give yourself something to look forward to:

Paddle Boarding and Kayaking on Lake McDonald

We’d always planned to paddle board and kayak on Lake McDonald, in Apgar Village, but we’d been thinking we’d fit it in one evening, after a day of hiking and sightseeing. But then the road was closed, so we made it a full day activity…or at least a full morning/part of the afternoon activity. And it was amazing. This was actually the first time we used the paddle board I’d bought at Costco for Christmas, and it was a pretty impressive maiden voyage.

They have rentals available, but we had our inflatable kayak along with the (also inflatable) paddle board along with us, so we made do with those. If you bring your own boat of any kind, you have to have it inspected before you can put it in the water. We tried to get there early before a line built up for this or parking got scarce, and it worked! We were the only people there when we did the inspection, and we parked right by the dock area.

I had no idea how paddle boarding would go, but the kids loved it! No one fell off! At least Gus and Milo (and Dave) loved it; Abe was a little wary and mostly stuck with the kayak.

Also I was a little nervous. This was how far I got in my paddle boarding journey:

We set up by the dock on the shore and had a nice little area to hang out in, take turns going out from, eat lunch, etc. We just took turns taking the paddle board and kayak out all morning and into the afternoon.

Ranger Programs

We still had another day to fill up without doing the Going to the Sun Road, so we dedicated it to shopping in Apgar Village and doing a couple of different rangers programs, both in the Apgar Village area. First we did a more kid-oriented one that I think was about animals in the park and adaptations or…something? Anyway, it was fun, and afterwards Abe was able to turn in his Junior Ranger book and get his badge: