When my mom was a teenager, her best friend’s family invited her to join them on a three week cross-country road trip, from the flat expanse of the midwest to the Rocky Mountains of northern Montana. It was her first time ever seeing mountains and, as she tells it, she knew then that she was going to return to the mountains one day.
Over the years I’ve heard many stories about that trip, including their hike to Dawson Pass. While her specific memories of it are a little fuzzy, some of her recollections turned out to be very accurate. For example, it’s steep. And also beautiful. Obviously, after hearing about this trail many times, I was excited to finally have the chance to hike it myself.
Dawson Pass sits at an elevation of about 7600 feet (2315 m) at the back of the Two Medicine Valley, framed by Mount Helen and Flinsch Peak. There are a few ways to reach the pass. One is via an 18 mile (29 km) loop – the Dawson-Pitamakan Loop – which combines Dawson and Pitamakan Passes, with views of various lakes along the way. I’ve heard from multiple people that it’s an absolutely stunning loop, but that’s more miles than I want to hike in one day, so I’ll have to make it to Pitamakan Pass some other time via some other route.
The second option is to begin at either the North Shore or South Shore Trailhead and hike along Two Medicine Lake to catch the Dawson Pass Trail at the opposite end, which makes for about a 14 mile (22.5 km) day.
The third option – the one we did – is to take a boat across Two Medicine Lake, bypassing either of the shore trails and thereby cutting nearly 6 miles (9.6 km) off the round trip distance, and hike to Dawson Pass from there.
Boat tours are run by Glacier Park Boat Company, and they have seven departures per day. However, if you’re going to catch the boat back across at the end of your hike, you’ll want to be on one of the morning trips. If you miss the last boat of the day, you’ll be hiking back to the boat dock instead. Roundtrip tickets cost $19 per person and should be booked in advance. We purchased our tickets about three weeks beforehand, as this was a last-minute addition to our trip. A couple people showed up that morning and got on through last-minute cancellations and no-shows, but most of the trips fill well in advance.
We boarded the 97-year-old Sinopah (pronounced SIH-nuh-paw) just before 8:00am for her first trip of the day. It takes about 20-30 minutes to cross the lake, which is about 2.5 miles (4 km) long and 250 feet (75 m) deep at its deepest point. Our journey was narrated by the boat operator, and it was interesting to learn the history of the Two Medicine region, including the geology, names of the surrounding mountains, and the origin of many of these names. Quite a few of them – including Two Medicine – are of indigenous origin, as this region of Glacier National Park is the native land of the Aamsskáápipikani (Blackfeet) people.
We were dropped off on the opposite end of the lake at around 8:30am and promptly set off toward the pass. We began our hike on a wide and popular stretch of trail along with most of the other boat passengers. However, we soon branched off at a signed junction onto the Dawson Pass Trail.
No one else followed.
It was just us on this narrow path through tall, densely-packed vegetation, including numerous berry bushes. I know a lot of people hike to find solitude – and I like to get away from the crowds as well – but I prefer to find my solitude somewhere without abundant grizzly bears. Suffice it to say, it wasn’t the most comfortable hike of our lives.
We ended up carrying on a very loud conversation the entire way, interspersed with shouts and clapping to announce our presence before blind corners or near flowing water. I actually bruised my palm from clapping so much. But we didn’t have any bear encounters, so I’m calling it a success in that regard.
Finally, with just under 1 mile (1.6 km) to go, we emerged from the trees into Bighorn Basin. We could now see Dawson Pass ahead of us and No Name Lake and the Two Medicine Valley behind us. We did not see any bighorn sheep in their namesake basin, but we did see plenty of wildflowers!
We still had a decent amount of elevation gain to go, but after about half an hour of slow but steady progress, we were cresting the pass. I always love the big reveal at the end of a hike. You know… that moment as you’re approaching a high point or a summit and suddenly you can see what’s on the other side. As far as reveals go, this was a pretty darn good one.
We spent nearly forty minutes on the pass, relaxing in the sunshine and enjoying the view. We pulled out our binoculars and spotted a moose in one of the ponds down below, and put my Peakfinder app to good use to learn the names of the surrounding mountains. I’ve read other accounts of this hike and so many people talk about the brutal winds at the pass, even on days with good weather. I guess we got lucky, because it was pretty calm.
We were back to the dock just shy of the 1:15pm pickup time, but there were quite a few people in front of us so we didn’t make it onto the boat. However, they dropped off the first load of passengers and came right back to get us, so we only had about a forty-minute wait.
I’m not complaining; there are far far worse places to wait. We simply took off our shoes and sat on the dock with our feet soaking in the chilly water of Two Medicine Lake. Some other people were doing the same and we started chatting, primarily with an older couple visiting from Florida. Topics ranged from grizzly bears in Grand Teton National Park to the fact that alligators love marshmallows, which I suppose is something you only know if you live in Florida.
Also, we ran into this same couple the next morning in a totally different area of the park. Small world!
I could talk about the scenery in Glacier all day, but the people we met on this trip were lovely as well. We ended up having so many random conversations with random people and it added a layer of enjoyment to our visit. It’s something I feel like I haven’t experienced as much in other national parks, especially recently, so it was nice to know that this type of friendliness and camaraderie can still be found in Glacier.
Up next: a stunning hike to Iceberg Lake
Hike stats: 8.5 miles (13.7 km) round trip with 2450 feet (745 m) of elevation gain.
Here is a trail map of the Two Medicine area, including the route to Dawson Pass. I also recommend downloading the NPS app and saving Glacier National Park for offline use. You will be able to use the map in the app to track your location.
For more information on visiting Glacier National Park and how to access the Two Medicine area for this hike, please see this post.
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