June 1st (tomorrow) and the prices would almost double. The amount of tourists in the park was already wall to wall on our visit with all of the tour groups. I can’t imagine what it would be like on a full capacity day.
We followed Lucy’s recommendations for seeing the park most of the day starting at Station 1 where we walked to the Big Waterfall.
The raised wooden paths were filled with people and if you got behind a tour group, you just had to hope they would pull off to the side at some point.
The lower lakes were filled with one waterfall after another.
We followed the path until we finally saw the big waterfall from the ground. It was one of the waterfalls we saw from the overlook last night.
After seeing the lower lakes and waterfalls, we took the train/tram from Station 1 to Station 3 at the top of the Upper Lakes. This was going against the tourist traffic according to Lucy and would allow us to encounter the least amount of crowds.
We started from Station 3 and walked to our first viewpoint. It was a bit of an elevation gain, so not traveled by quite as many tourists.
We followed the path to P2 and got in the huge line for the ferry to P3. This is where we should have followed Lucy’s advice and walk to P3 around the lake from P2. As luck would have it, we waited in line for the ferry to P3, eating our packed lunch along the way, and then walked back to P2.
When we got back to P2, the line was at least half a mile long.
We texted Lucy and asked her best advice. She suggested we go to Station 2 and get the train there instead of taking the ferry. We didn’t realize that would be an extra mile and half!
It was a 12 mile day of walking. But so beautiful. Well worth our time to visit.