A Quick Tour of Waterton Lake

Two thirds of Waterton Lake is Canadian but the far end, removed from Waterton Townsite by either a lengthy shoreline hike, long kayak paddle, or more luxurious motorboat trip onboard the tour ship "International", is American soil which when you've been away for a couple of weeks is close enough to home for me. Having reached the American end of the lake via all three methods in the past I thought a nice late afternoon kayak would fit the bill for a repeat performance this trip.

I picked a calm day with not much wind which any paddler knows can be the bane of a happy trip. Waterton Lake runs more than six miles in length and while that's not that far to paddle doing it in wind, whitecaps, and waves is a challenge I was hoping to avoid. Fortunately the weather gods blessed me and I reached American waters in good order.

The shoreline hike is not overly strenuous but does take you through some premier grizzly habitat so if you partake of this excursion keep your eyes and ears open and have the bear spray can within easy reach. Paddling left me free of such worries and the trip to Goat Haunt, the name of the American end, was delightfully uneventful.

The good ship "International" passed me by on the other side of the lake filled stem to stern with folks listening to the Parks Canada naturalist narrate and point out things of interest. Said boat does dock in Goat Haunt allowing tourists to step ashore and stretch their legs on red, white, and blue soil before the return voyage. If you venture anywhere beyond Goat Haunt bring your passport as you'll actually go through customs even at this remote bastion of Uncle Sam. When my wife and I did the hike we went past Goat Haunt to spend a couple of days at Kootenai Lakes watching moose gorge themseloves on local flora and the folks at customs had stamped our passports and given the official look-see at our backpacks before allowing our tired feet to carry us on down the trail. For those familiar with Logan Pass and the High line Trail to Granite Park Chalet in Glacier National Park, you could continue on north and end up in a day or so at Goat Haunt and we met some weary hikers in the Waterton campground who had done just that. That's one of those bucket list hikes I'd love to do but for this trip I had to content myself with a slow paddle past the Stars and Stripes before continuing my paddle in earnest. All in all a 3+ hour excursion putting some energy into the paddles before hearing the welcome scrape of hull to beach gravel back in Waterton. A happy kayaker was I.