Glacier National Park Tips?

[ID Bronco]

Hiawatha Trail Bike Ride

Driving Directions to get to The Route of the Hiawatha Scenic Bike Trail.

Driving Directions to get to the start of The Route of the Hiawatha Scenic Bike Trail. Trailhead and parking area is located 2 miles up a dirt road from I-90 Exit 5 in MT.

www.ridethehiawatha.com

This has been on my wife's bucket list for a few years. It's NOT hardcore and nearly anyone can do it but against my better judgement I am endorsing it. It's fun, normally beautiful and something that's pretty unique. 15 miles along an old early 1900's train route. 10 train tunnels and 7 200ft high trestle bridges to cross, and mostly downhill.

The day we arrived it was raining. Once we started it began to rain hard. Our trip was a little bit miserable honestly but I can see how it would be awesome with good weather. It is really busy though so go early (it's on pacific time) and beat the crowds. We had fog/clouds and rain so it's tough to see the bridges in the background but they are very neat.











If you go let me know and I'll tell you about a very cool place to stay nearby on the cheap.

 

[ID Bronco]

Fishing wasn't the focus of this trip (maybe secretly for me) so I didn't get much time to go. I did catch some West slope Cutthroats and some small bull trout. I was hoping to catch a big bull trout, but without really having time to spend on them they are pretty elusive. I was not lucky enough this time.

 

[ID Bronco]

My 16 year old and I had a goal to find a Ptarmigan since we want to hunt them one of these days. We found one dead and had almost given up until the evening of our last day there, we finally spotted it!

Animals we saw: Black bear, deer, elk, ptarmigan, eagles, hawks, beaver, multiple moose and an array of other "critters"

 

[ID Bronco]

Glacier National Park takeaways:

1. It's beautiful
2. The area around the park is beautiful and there is a lot to do outside the park.
3. The vehicle passes you need to enter in addition to the National Park Pass are a total pain if you don't plan ahead. (you can only get one a day so you cannot easily access multiple entrances on the same day)
4. 90 plus percent of the park is managed as wilderness so it's pretty inaccessible to most folks.

I loved the hikes (minus the parking and crowds but you have to expect and get over that up front) The lakes are gorgeous.

 

[ID Bronco]

 

[Greg]

Looks like an absolute blast, great pics! You saw a bigger variety of animals than we saw on our recent Alaska trip. 🙄

 

[Herzog]

Photos don’t do Glacier justice, but those are great photos!

 

[ID Bronco]

Looks like an absolute blast, great pics! You saw a bigger variety of animals than we saw on our recent Alaska trip. 🙄

I'd love to see more about your trip, I've never done it by sea. The few pics I saw were great.

 

[Greg]

I'd love to see more about your trip, I've never done it by sea. The few pics I saw were great.

I can put together a vacation report and share more. 😎

 

[Tonkaman]

Wow great photos

 

[ID Bronco]

Wow great photos

Gotta love the Samsung S23

The place is really breathtaking.

 

[comingdown]

We go, and do some park stuff but it’s so annoying and crowded. Luckily tribal members aren’t required to have any vehicle passes so we go where we want whenever we want. But we always see lots more wildlife outside the park on the Rez, on the east side. We have land up there and it takes all my efforts to keep my wife from moving there. Although someday we’ll be up there.

When the deal to buy the land for glacier from the tribe was made, the tribe retained hunting rights to hunt inside the park. That lasted only a couple years before they told them yeah, we can’t allow that anymore. So there’s always some bitterness towards the park from my in-laws. But we get to hunt Montana around Yellowstone so it’s a nice consolation prize I suppose.