And now on to the fun! Our First Hike in the Mountains of Montana.

Memorial Falls

 *Click on the pictures to enlarge them.  Click on them again to zoom*

 Beautiful Drive up

 The stream followed us on the highway

 Once we got to the trail head, we saw piles and piles of these 'glittering' rocks that just sparkled in the sun. 

 I was pretty disappointed that you can't see the 'glitter' in the pic.

 The stream at the beginning of the hike

 Let's follow Daddy

Rusty jumps right into the water..surprised? 

 Stream on left, massive glittery rock on right

 Taking a break

  

This is Memorials Falls.  A smaller waterfall, but still very pretty!

According to the Forestry map, the trail ends here.  But since it's only 1/3 a mile in, people have created trails past this waterfall that goes deeper into the mountains.  We are barely getting started so we find the trail that goes on.

 To go deeper you have to go above the waterfall. To do this, you have to climb around it.  Before I know it, Charlie is climbing to the right. 

 Can you see her way up there?

 Mommy and Zak climbing

 I like the trees and sun here.

 Here comes Charles..see the falls?

 At the top looking down.. dizzy!

 And on we go.  See the guy right above Charles' head?  He was standing on the very EDGE of the waterfall getting a pic.  Crazy people!

 In the water at EVERY chance. How he is just standing here in this cold water..I'll never know.  It is SO cold that our feet went numb in less than a minute.

 One of many times the trail crossed the stream.

 Stopping to play

 He's a mountain goat.  Any chance he had to scurry up rock formation, he took.

 It took several tries to get this shot without Rusty in the way, and by that time, we couldnt feel our feet!

 Rusty had the best time.

 We went off the trail just a little bit to reach this really high rock formation. 

Up we go!

 Looking down.

 So happy to be in the clean, cool air in the mountains!

 The 5 of us ;)

 Throwing rocks...over and over

 What is this?  A rare, sweet moment.

 Charlie decided to go slightly off the trail and follow us on the other side of the stream.

 The lone flower on the trail.

 She runs into a dead end and has to find a way to cross the stream to get back to us.

 Zak wants me to get a pic of him hanging out on this log, but he soooo doesn't want to put his feet in lol!

 I found muh-self a hiking stick.  I'm going to put a notch in it everytime I use it to hike trails while we're here.

 Back down at the beginning :)

 A cool looking formation at the trailhead.

 A fun surprise, Rusty meets another Springer Spaniel!

c, m, c & z!