Mt. Siyeh is one of six summits in Glacier National Park that is over 10,000 ft. It is the easiest of the 10,000 ft peaks to reach and has fantastic views all the way around!
A big shout out to Blake Passmore and his Climb Glacier National Park books which are incredibly helpful in finding routes to summits. If you are planning on climbing anything in Glacier National Park, check out his books at his Climb Glacier site.
It was another beautiful, bluebird Sunday when we took off from a very windy Siyeh Bend. We hiked up the trail toward Siyeh Pass through the trees, creeks and mountain flowers. Once we popped out into the meadows at the junction and heading into Preston Park, we were overwhelmed by the flowers. Thankfully the wind, while still blowing, had died down a little.
The more popular climbing route on the south face has you going up the creek bed with the biggest scree runout. We decided to go up a slightly different route which I had done before, and prefer, which is up a creek bed further west where the green grows higher. It tends to have less loose rock in the creek bed.
We ascended up the grassy scree slope to the creek bed, then climbed up the terraced creek bed to the cliff wall. From there, we worked our way east along the base of the wall to a nice chute up to the long, broad scree slope. If you climb this, at first, you feel like you are almost there, however, you have a long scree climb ahead. It’s better to get your mind in the right mode, otherwise it can feel like forever.
As we worked our way up the scree slope, I noticed a round dark spot on the hillside and wondered if it was a bear. Sure enough, a grizzly bear was up there turning over rocks, looking for moths. After watching it for a little bit, we saw that it had a cub with it and we waited to see what it would do. At the same time, some people who we had seen earlier on the summit were coming down. They were aware of the bears and told us another one had been spotted below the red cliffs near the summit.
After figuring out the bears were going to hang out below the snowfield, we worked our way along the climbers trail to the ridge, around them. Once on the ridgeline, we kept our eyes open for the other bear and eventually saw it. It too was overturning rocks, looking for moths and being pestered by hungry ravens looking for some bugs as well. A look back down to the sow and cub found them taking a nap.
All through the cliff bands, the scree field, past the bears and onto the shoulder, the views continued to delight and get better. Glaciers were visible all around. Mt. Siyeh is located at such a great spot to look deep into Glacier National Park in all directions.
Once at the top, 360 degree views take your breath away. This summit also boasts the steepest cliff face at over 4,000 ft to the mint green Cracker Lake. You can even see up into the Grinnell Glacier basin where Upper Grinnell Lake sits perched high above the valley floor.
We ate, relaxed, took photos, then headed back down. The sow and cub were still sleeping until we got below them, then they started moving around again. We decided to take the popular creek bed down as it had a better trail and more markers. Once we hit the trail below, we cruised on down past the flower meadows, the trees, the creeks, and to our cars.
Mt. Siyeh in Glacier National Park is a sublime hike with a nice variety of climbing, a great approach, and wonderful views. We got the extra treat of some beautiful bruins along the way.
For our GPS Tracks, click here.
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