Hike up to the Harding Ice Fields

     We wanted to hike up to the Harding Ice Fields. It is a 4.3 mile trail that climbs to over 3500'. It is mostly flat for the first mile before you start climbing. Our friend Toni had told us this trail was a must do with unsurpassed beauty. So Monday morning we got up early and were on the trail shortly after daybreak. The sign at the beginning of the trail said to expect it to take a minimum of 6 to 8 hours to hike it round trip. We had another beautiful sunny day to enjoy some of the most outstanding scenery God ever created. We saw a lot of wildlife on our hike this day: Marmots, Dahl sheep, Mountain Goats, Brown bear, Black bear, etc.

 Joyce looking over the side of Exit Glacier

 Lupines with the ice fields in the background

We saw this mom and kid Mountain Goat above us

At about 3 1/2 miles the trail started to go through snow fields

You can see where we are headed towards the saddle at the left

Emergency shed

     After hiking off and on thru the snow fields we came to an emergency shed. A man standing on the porch asked if we had seen the Grizzly bear near the trail. He said it must have just crossed right behind us. We remembered stopping at a ravine and thought we had heard a grunt but looking around never saw anything. We looked back and down the trail and saw the bear he was talking about. Upon our return trip we saw his tracks in the snow right near the ravine that we had heard the grunt noise. Pretty cool!

Looking back from the Emergency shed to see the Brown bear...man he could move fast.

 A family of Dahl sheep below us

Joyce enjoying the views of the ice fields

Rewarding views all around us

 Black bear near the trail

     After reaching the end of the trail we enjoyed the views and ate our lunch that we packed. After and hour or so started back down. The trip down went well until the last 2 miles when my knee started to hurt. I think the long day and steep declines had caused the pain. After we leveled out the pain decreased a great deal. We had been gone about 8 and half hours when we returned to the parking lot. It was a beautiful hike that we would love to do again someday.