MANY GLACIER REGION
For many Swiftcurrent Lake is the hub of points of interest, to be surpassed by no other spot in the park. From it branch many deep and interesting glacial valleys. Fishing, boating, swimming, hiking, photographing, mountain climbing, horseback riding, and nature study are to be enjoyed at their best here. It is reached by an excellent spur road from the Blackfeet Highway at Babb, or by trail from Sun Camp, Granite Park, and Waterton Lakes.
Many Glacier Hotel, the largest hotel in the park, is located on Swiftcurrent Lake. Just beyond the hotel is an excellent auto camp and a group of auto housekeeping cabins. The hotel has telegraph and telephone services, an information desk, curio shop, a grill room and soda fountain, swimming pool, barber and shoe-shining shop, photograph shop, a first-aid medical establishment, and other services. A garage is situated near the hotel. A store with an ample line of campers' needs, including fresh meat, bread, butter, and eggs, is located in the auto campground.
Ranger-naturalist service is available at Many Glacier. This includes daily field walks; a nightly lecture augmented by motion pictures and slides in the Convention Hall in the basement of the hotel; an evening campfire entertainment in the auto camp; a cut-flower and geological exhibit in the hotel lobby and in the auto camp; a small museum on the opposite shore of the lake from the hotel, on the road leading to the campground; a self-guiding trail around Swiftcurrent Lake; information service in the museum; a naturalist-accompanied launch trip on Swiftcurrent and Josephine Lakes in the afternoon. In addition to this last-named, several other launch trips are taken daily on these lakes. This service may be used to shorten hikers' distance to Grinnell Lake and Glacier.
Many Glacier is a center for fishermen, as there are a dozen good fishing lakes in the vicinity. Rainbow, brook, and cutthroat trout abound in Swiftcurrent, Josephine, and Grinnell Lakes, and the lakes of the Upper Swiftcurrent Valley. Wall-eyed pike are plentiful in Lake Sherburne, the only body of water in the park in which these fish are found.
There are many excellent trails in the Swiftcurrent region. Cracker Lake, Morning Eagle Falls, Cataract Falls, Grinnell Lake, Grinnell Glacier, Iceberg Lake, and Ptarmigan Lake are all reached by oiled horseback trails. Good footpaths lead around Swiftcurrent and Josephine Lakes to the summit of Mount Altyn and to Appekunny Falls and Cirque.
The possibility of seeing and studying wildlife is best in the Many Glacier region. Except during midsummer, mountain sheep are commonly seen at close range around the chalets or in the flats above Lake Sherburne. Throughout summer they are high on the slopes of Mount Altyn or Henkel. Mountain goats are often seen clinging to the precipitous Pinnacle Wall on the way to Iceberg Lake, or on Grinnell Mountain while en route to Grinnell Glacier, or on the trail to Cracker Lake. Black bears and grizzlies occasionally visit the grounds near the hotel. Conies are to be heard bleating among the rock slides back of the ranger station along the trail to Iceberg Lake, or near the footpath across the lake from the hotel. Early in the morning, or at twilight, beavers are frequently seen swimming in the lake. Marmots are common in many valleys near the hotel and auto camp. Deer infrequently visit the region. Hikers, horseback riders, and rangers have reported seeing such rare animals as foxes, wolves, and lynxes. Without moving from one's comfortable chair on the veranda of the hotel one may watch the ospreys soaring back and forth over the lake in quest of fish. These graceful and interesting birds have their huge nest on top of a dead tree across the lake from the hotel. The pair of birds return annually to the same nest. Beside Swiftcurrent Falls, two families of nesting water ouzels may be studied at close range.