Two Medicine

Wednesday, we left the house a little later. We were only driving to Two Medicine and our boat ride wasn’t until 1030. Unfortunately, there was construction on US-2 just before East Glacier that slowed things down, but we made it to Two Medicine in time.

After getting our tickets for the boat ride, we enjoyed the view of Two Medicine Lake and the beautiful Sinopah Mountain across the lake.

At 1030, we boarded the boat and set off across the lake. The mountains surrounding the lake were beautiful and a ranger accompanied the tour to give us some information about the natural history of the area. The lake isn't real big so we crossed in about 15 minutes. At the other side of the lake, we set off on our hike.

We took a short spur trail to Two Medicine South Shore Trail and went straight to the end of this trail at Upper Two Medicine Lake Trail. Turning left here, it was just a short ways to Twin Falls. As the name implies, there are two distinct waterfalls.

An unnamed tributary of Two Medicine Creek splits above the waterfall into two distinct streams that come back together after the waterfall. It was hard to get a good shot showing both waterfalls, but each one individually was quite nice.

The left side has more water flow, while the right side was higher. We had to rock hop across to get to the base of the one on the right, where we played in the water and climbed around next to the falls.

The rocks next to the falls formed stairs that made it easy to climb up the right side of the waterfall. As we were getting ready to leave, a Satyr Comma butterfly landed on Dan. After it flew off, we hiked the rest of the trail up to Upper Two Medicine Lake and had lunch here.

At first, it was breezy and a nice place to eat. Then, the breeze died down and a huge number of flies came out so we finished lunch quickly and started backtracking. When we got near the boat dock, we turned right to get on South Shore Trail and hike around the lake.

At the next intersection, we turned right to get on Two Medicine Pass Trail towards Cobalt Lake and hiked about a mile to Rockwell Falls. Approaching the falls, we could see the bottom portion, a 15-foot drop.

It was scenic, but looking up, I could see there was more waterfall, so I crossed the creek and climbed up to the next section. At this point there are two distinct falls, just before the creek does an abrupt 90° turn. Climbing out onto the rocks on the corner, I could kind of see the two waterfalls, but not a great view.

So I took off my boots and waded into the cold water for a much better view. I could also see that there was more waterfall further up.

So after drying my feet, I continued up for a better view of the different falls and some smaller cascades up at the top.

Rockwell Falls is a really cool waterfall and worth the time to explore – there’s a lot to see!

There were more cascades and cool rocks around the falls as we kept going up.

Eventually, there was no more waterfall further up, so we headed down and started backtracking to South Shore Trail. We turned right and continued following the south shore of the lake.

A few people on the trail indicated they had seen a moose, but we didn’t have any luck finding him. There was a rickety suspension bridge to cross the creek, and then the rest of the trail was mostly flat.

About a mile and a half or so from the bridge, we made a quick detour to see Aster Falls. It’s a thin cascading waterfall.

After some pictures at the base, I climbed up the right side to get some pictures of the upper cascades as well as the view looking back from here.

When we got back to the intersection with South Shore Trail, some people told us that they had seen the moose again. We were determined to see him, so we backtracked about a mile and eventually saw some people just off the trail.

The enormous bull moose was foraging in the shallow waters of a small pond along Paradise Creek. He would stick his head underwater for a few seconds, then come up for air and chew his food before going back down.

A few times, he vigorously shook the water off after coming up for air. His rack was huge. One time when he came up, he was right next to a tree and his antlers ripped and shredded the branches off the trail without seeming to even faze him.

We enjoyed watching him for a while then made our way back to the boat dock parking area. Everyone was tired, but Justine, Sandy, Betsy and I wanted to get one more waterfall, so on the way out, we stopped at Running Eagle Falls. It’s only a short, handicapped-accessible trail to this interesting waterfall. The water level was low, so only the lower 20-foot cascades part of the falls was flowing.

In higher water level, a second 40-foot waterfall crashes down in front of the lower one. Hence, this waterfall is also called Trick Falls. But even with just the lower part, it’s a really interesting waterfall. The water comes down from inside the rock and appears to be flowing out of nowhere.

We got some pictures and enjoyed looking around at all the pretty rocks in the creek bed, then started making our way home. We stopped at Firebrands along US-2 on the way home. While we were waiting for our food, we talked to a fairly intoxicated local who was a veteran and had been stationed at Fort Bragg, so he was familiar with North Carolina. After dinner, we made our last long drive home along US-2.