Montana/Glacier National Park

Driving through Montana is unforgettable; endless mountains, green rolling fields, an abundance of trees, lakes, rivers, streams, ranches with cows, horses, sheep, and small western towns with miles of scenery in between. We spent our first 2 nights in Anaconda, a town northwest of Butte. Anaconda is (was) one of the oldest iron smelting towns in the country, getting the ore from Butte. We walked on the Old Works Mining Trail that provides a history of the smelting industry where remnants of the smelting process are located. Afterwards we went into town to a local pub. To visit Glacier National Park we stayed in Coram, MT that was a 15 minute drive to the west entrance of Glacier. On July 4th we drove to the east side of the park, leaving at 5:30 a.m. to beat the crowds and arrived at the trailhead at 6:40. We took the Two Medicine South Shore trail to the Rockwell Falls trail with a slight detour on the Twin Falls trail. The trail was moderately easy and fortunately not crowded at that time of day. We crossed a swinging bridge and walked through the forest. The falls are beautiful with multiple levels of cascading falls. After the hike we drove on the Going to the Sun road through the park, which had opened for the season a week or 2 prior to our arrival. We stopped at Logan’s Pass, one of the highest points on the road and very popular. We managed to find parking and went to the visitor center. There was still a lot of ice up there. The drive back to the west side was filled with waterfalls on the cliffs next to the road and beautiful scenery of the glaciers and valleys, and we saw a young grizzly bear on the side of the road! On July 5th we went whitewater rafting on the Flathead River. We were in a 6 person sport raft and got very wet with icy cold water!
The next day we got an early start at 6:30 am for a 7.7 mile hike to Avalanche Lake. The trail followed a rushing stream to an emerald green glacier filled lake surrounded by waterfalls coming down from the Glaciers. After that we did a 2.5 mile hike on John’s Lake Loop that started along another rushing river and led into the trees, at which point there were almost no people which was peaceful. To end the day we stopped at Glacier Distillery and sampled spirits which were surprisingly good.
Upon leaving Glacier, We followed the Yellowstone River from Coram to Deer Lodge, MT on the 8th of July then to Billings on the 9th.Read more