Running Eagle Falls
| Trail Features: | Waterfalls |  |
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| Trail Location: | Two Medicine (Running Eagle Falls TH) | ||||
| Roundtrip Length: | 0.6 Miles | ||||
| Total Elevation Gain: | 15 Feet | ||||
| Avg. Elev Gain / Mile: | 50 Feet | ||||
| Highest Elevation: | 4952 Feet | ||||
| Trail Difficulty Rating: | 0.63 (easy) | ||||
| Parking Lot Latitude | 48.49601 | ||||
| Parking Lot Longitude | -113.34823 | ||||
Trail Description:
The trailhead for Running Eagle Falls in Glacier National Park is located 1.1 miles west of the Two Medicine entrance station.
Running Eagle Falls, also known as "Trick Falls," flows off the outlet stream between Two Medicine Lake and Lower Two Medicine Lake.
The trail to the falls is a wide, well maintained path suitable for everyone in the family. It's also one of two trails in the park that's handicap accessible. The Trail of the Cedars on the west side of Glacier National Park is the other.
Just prior to arriving at the falls, hikers will cross over a footbridge. The platform overlooking the falls is roughly three-tenths of a mile from this point. There are, however, several places in this vicinity that offer alternative vantage points for viewing this very impressive waterfall.
The waterfall receives its nickname, "Trick Falls", because there are actually two separate waterfalls at this location. During the spring run-off, water rushes over the top ledge, creating a 40-foot drop, while completely or partially obscuring the lower falls. However, as the volume of water decreases by late summer, and the upper falls "dries up," water continues to rush through a sink hole at the top of the cliff before flowing out of an opening in the cliff face below (as seen in the two nearby photos), thus creating the lower 20-foot falls.
Towering prominently above the falls is 9513-foot Rising Wolf Mountain, which is named after the first white man to live with the Blackfeet Indians. Hugh Monroe, who was married to Sinopah, received his Indian name as a result of his habit of getting out of bed in the morning on his hands and knees, thus resembling a wolf. Rising Wolf Mountain also has the distinction of being the highest mountain in the Two Medicine area.
The waterfall is named for Pitamakan, or Running Eagle, a female warrior leader of the Blackfeet Nation in the early 1700s, who experienced a four-day vision quest in the mountains high above the falls. Running Eagle led war parties on many highly successful raids, and was the only woman in the Blackfeet tribe ever to do so, or to be given a man's name.
