Many Glacier Hotel at Glacier National Park
Many glacier hotel is located right next to Swift Current lake and on the east side of Glacier National Park. Getting a room in Many Glacier hotel during holidays and long weekend is very difficult, so I booked the lake view room for two days 4 month in advance through https://www.xanterra.com/.
After enjoying the boat ride in Lake McDonald, we took a to-go order from the restaurant at Lake McDonald Lodge and started our drive towards Many Glacier hotel (There are very few restaurants in Glacier so it good to either dine/takeout's in West entrance or in Lake McDonald). Lake McDonald is on the west side of the Glacier Park, so it will take around 2hrs to reach the hotel through 'Going-to-the-sun' Road. Babb is small town near East Glacier national park and is very close to Canada border. After reaching Babb, I took a left turn from highway for East Glacier National Park, there was a road construction going on so I had to drive at 20mph. We were driving around 10pm so it was pitch dark and to add to this excitement we had thunderstorm that night and the wind was blowing quite hard so had to drive very carefully .
We reached our hotel around 11pm, I parked in front of the hotel to unload the luggage. The hardest part is the parking lot is little far from hotel. We have to park at top of hill and walk down to the hotel. And as it is a bear country, so we have to carry bear spray all the time. I was bit fearful while walking down to hotel because of thunderstorms, lightning and bears but I reached hotel safely, the lake view from hotel room was amazing. There is no cell network in this area, but as we were hotel guest we could use the hotel Wi-Fi. The next morning, I got up early to take sunrise photo, I was able to take photos over the parking lot but couldn't take any photos of the mountain or their reflection in the lake.
We wanted to take some night shots so around 9.30pm, we drove towards West side of the park and on the way we saw fox and its pups near its den, the fox had built the den next to the road. In return, the fox pup was playing on the road, so I had to stop the car for 10mins and drove very slowly to cross them. After reaching the hotel, I dropped my wife at the entrance and went to the parking lot . While walking back to hotel, I was able to see a clear and full milky way over the parking lot. I tried to take some photos but it didn't come so clear, as I was bit scared of bears in the area , but I was fortunate enough to take the milky way photos near the Lake. I have done night shots for some time now, but the milk way which I saw on this night was so clear and captivating.
On 3rd day, again I got up early morning, this time I was able to see the sunrise over the beautiful mountains and took photos of the mountain reflections in the lake. There are lot of beautiful hiking places on the east side of the park ( Iceberg lake, Grinnell glacier). East side of the park is home to grizzly bears, as it is much cooler in temperature than west side of the park.
On 3rd day we had plans for horse riding, so while we were lounging we were able to see a moose and its calf crossing the Swift Current lake. Then later, we went for 2hr horse riding to Josephine Lake trail with Swan Mountain Companies. https://www.swanmountainglacier.com/trip/many-glacier-trail-rides/ . The ride was fun and we saw beautiful lakes, our guide spoke about the forest and its different trees varieties, Glacier history and some wildfires which this area had seen some years back . And then we saw grizzly bear it was indeed near, sorry guys couldnt capture any photos, as it was so quick and we didnt expect to see a grizzly lying by the lake.
Many glacier hotel has a restaurant and gift shop, during our stay we had breakfast, lunch and dinner at the restaurant. The food was good and staff was nice. It a good place to stay and do hikes, boat rides, Kayaking and canoeing on the lake. Please check my instagram for Fox and Moose videos