SPRING IS IN THE AIR! My 2019 Glacier National Park Trip Part 1

On the first day of my Glacier National Park trip

On this journey, the first major one of 2019, I drove away from Country Manor Boulevard at about 5:30 AM on the morning of June 12. During the summer, in Montana, the sun rises early so there was plenty of light to begin my expedition. I stopped at my favorite ‘watering hole,’ a Hardee’s restaurant, for a Country Fried Steak Biscuit and a cup of coffee to go. That was my favorite way of starting a long journey, not anymore. For some dumb reason they stopped making the steak biscuit. For this trip, and the trip to the Yellowstone and Grand Teton National Parks two weeks later, my favorite item, though, was still available. Hardee’s has been around a long time; they were, in fact, the first of the larger hamburger chains that started serving breakfast. I still remember, in the late 70s, stopping at the drive-through, in Lebanon, Tennessee while working as a courier for Pony Express. Five days a week, I would buy my breakfast along with a cup of coffee before continuing my journey. By the end of last summer, however, they were no longer being served. During our Rocky Mountain Front tour in September, a manager at the local restaurant in Great Falls, Montana, told me what happened. Nobody knew in any of the restaurants in Billings nor even in Laurel, a small town a short distance to the west of my home. I had to drive almost 300 miles before getting an answer. It seems some people complained because the extra time they had to wait for their meal to be made was causing them to be late for work. Frankly, I liked the idea of getting a fresh hot steak biscuit, and a couple of extra minutes is well worth the wait. Rather than do the intelligent thing, however, and wake up five minutes earlier, all these people could do was bellyache. The folks who run the Franklin Tennessee-based restaurant overreacted and, rather than think about all the rest of us, they stopped making them. So, Hardee’s won’t be seeing my cheerful face anymore. But this trip got off to a good start because I was still able to get my beloved Country Fried Steak Biscuit.

I entered I-90 at Exit 443 in the southwestern corner of Billings and proceeded west. About thirty miles later, near mile marker 412, there is a sign, pointing left or south of the highway, for the Beartooth Mountains. This is my first favorite pull-off, so I pulled to the shoulder of the road for some quick photos of those magnificent twelve thousand-footers. This mountain range has over 25 peaks that top out over 12,000 feet. In fact, Granite Peak, at 12,807 feet, is the tallest mountain in Montana. There are many places to view these magnificent peaks while driving down I-90 heading west toward Bozeman, Montana. This happens to be one of my favorite stopping points. There is a rest area about ten miles shy of Big Timber. Montana has very nice pit stops on the interstate highways. There are two places to take a call of nature between Billings and Big Timber, which is almost 80 miles from my home. The first is just shy of Columbus, Montana near mile marker 419. The other is the above-mentioned, Greycliff, rest stop close to mile marker 381. Ten miles farther on is the first exit to the town of Big Timber. About halfway between these two places is one of my preferred vantage points to get snapshots of the Crazy Mountains. I-90 takes a turn so the highway is headed directly toward those landmarks, and there is a sign saying, “Crazy Mountains” just short of the 377-mile marker. On this day, I pulled to the shoulder of the road and took numerous pictures from the outstanding vista. My portfolio has many good photos from this spot on the interstate. Several times, since arriving in Montana, I would wake up early just to take snapshots from that spot.

Our good friends Randy, Debbie and their son Hunter live in this quintessential town at the base of the Crazy Mountains. There is a great little place called The Fort in Big Timber. I don’t think truck stop is the proper term for it; this place is more like a convenience store on steroids. There is a small market with a hot food area, i.e. sausage biscuits for breakfast, sandwiches and such for lunch, pizza to go. They also have a nice souvenir section at one corner of the building and a rather large gun store on the other end. Plus, there are two sections of gasoline pumps: one on each side of the establishment. It’s a great place to stop for a cup of coffee about an hour into the journey towards God’s wonderland.

There aren’t any more rest areas on I-90 before you reach Bozeman, a small city of close to 50,000 citizens. I wouldn’t be going that far, however, as my destination turned north at Exit 340, about twenty miles before you reach the outskirts of the fourth largest metropolis in Montana. From this point, U.S. Highway 89, will take a traveler all the way to Glacier National Park.

It’s about twenty-seven miles from Big Timber to US-89N or 103 miles from Billings. I left the interstate and headed northward, on this picturesque route, towards Great Falls. In S. A. Snyder’s Scenic Driving MONTANA, this is Scenic Drive #23 The Crazy and Little Belt Mountains: U.S. Highway 89. This 125-mile drive should have taken no more than two hours, but road construction left me side-tracked, headed east on U.S. Highway 12. I didn’t get all the way to Harlowton before discovering my mistake, but it cost me the better part of an hour. Oops!

Rather than dwell on that mistake, though, let me tell you about some of the sights along the way. Clyde Park is a little over fifteen miles from I-90. The small municipality is named for the Clydesdale horses that were bred on a ranch near here. This borough is not large. From a former Tennessean standpoint, it would probably be noted as a “wide spot in the road.” Our friends Randy and Hunter once took Doug and I on a trip into the Bridger Mountains by taking a left onto one of the side roads, 3^rd Avenue, I think, from this tiny place. There is a ski area, known as Bridger Bowl, on the east side of the Bridger Mountains. Some of the taller lifts will take you to altitudes of well over 8,000 feet.

The town of Wilsall, which got its name from Will and Sally, son and daughter-in-law of the founder, is about ten miles north of Clyde Park.  A few miles beyond Wilsall stands the sculpture “Welcome to the Shields” created by local artist Gary Derby. The statue nicknamed “Thunder Jack” was dedicated in 2006. It is a highly detailed bronze statue of a mountain man and was built and placed there as a tribute to the mountain men of bygone eras such as Jim Bridger, John Colter, Hugh Glass and for those of you who saw the movie, Jeremiah Johnson starring Robert Redford; John “Liver-Eating” Johnson who was the basis for the Redford character.

Ringling, which got its name from John Ringling, the best known of the Ringling Brothers of the famed Ringling Brothers and Barnum & Bailey Circus was a little over twenty miles north. Along the way, however, is one of my favorite spots on this route, mile marker 31; remember that number. At this point, if you stop, there is a great vantage point of three spectacular mountain ranges. Looking to the south, the Absaroka range provides much of the eastern boundary for Yellowstone National Park. This group of mountains stretch for 150 miles across the Montana-Wyoming border and has over 47 peaks that top 12,000 feet, with Francs Peak hitting 13,153 feet. To the east, one sees what the Crow Indians called Awaxaawapia Pia otherwise known as  the Crazy Mountains, with Crazy Peak scraping the clouds at 11,214 feet, and to the west are the mountains named after Jim Bridger. Four of those large mounds of rock top out at over 9,000 feet.

Another twenty-something miles puts you in the larger town of White Sulphur Springs. It is the largest hamlet, with about 1,000 citizens, between Big Timber and Great Falls and is the only one with full services. For those who remember the original Battlestar Galactica television series of the late 1970s, Dirk Benedict, who played the character known as Starbuck, came from this way point along the road to Great Falls.

A few miles north of White Sulphur Springs, U.S. Highway 12, coming from the east, merges with US-89. From this point north, the 71-mile section of the road is known as the Kings Hill Scenic Byway. The route travels ever northward through the Lewis and Clark National Forest with the Big Belt Mountains to the left, or west, and the Little Belt Mountains on the eastward, or right side of this thoroughfare. Kings Hill Pass, at 7,393 feet, is the highest point along this stretch of road. It is just north of the Showdown Ski Area.

As you come down from the pass, US-89 passes over Belt Creek, a nice little, fast-running stream of water. There is a parking lot, with outhouse/toilet on the right side of US-89. From there, you may take a short, half-mile jaunt to Memorial Falls. If the water is high, you probably won’t be able to reach the falls. The towns of Neihart and Monarch are very small and have only limited services. The area between these two western towns makes for a nice easy drive. Traveling near the Belt Creek through forests teaming with wildlife was very relaxing.

At Monarch, you are leaving the national forest. There is a nice little scenic turnout at Sluice Boxes State Park about twelve miles north of Monarch. It’s definitely worth getting out of your vehicle and stretching your legs. You’ll want to bring your camera with you.

This portion of US-89 comes to an end at the junction with U.S. 87/Montana 200/Montana 3 highway. It gets confusing when you look at it on a map, or even the road signs. However, at this confluence of two highways, commonly known as Armington Junction, the highway which becomes US-87/US-89 will take you to Great Falls. Just turn left, and half an hour later you will be entering the third largest city in Montana.

It was about 3 or 4 PM, late in the afternoon, but that doesn’t mean anything this far north. During the summer, it isn’t fully dark until about 11 PM. Still, I didn’t want to dally, so after a quick drive thru at the Burger King, I was on my way further west then north. Back on US-89, which will take you all the way from the southern border between Arizona and Mexico to the northern boundary of Montana and Canada, my next point of destination was the town of Choteau. Town is probably a misnomer; Choteau is more like a small city. With a population of about 1,700 (1,691 as of 2017), this county seat of Teton County, is a nice, sprawling community that is approximately midway on the highway that S.A. Snyder calls Scenic Highway #22 The Rocky Mountain Front: U.S. Highway 89, U.S. Highway 287 in his book entitled Scenic Driving MONTANA.

From Choteau, it took a little over half an hour to drive the thirty-three miles to Dupuyer, the next and last stop before reaching Browning, Montana. With a population of less than 100, Dupuyer truly is just a wide spot in the road. There is a nice (seasonal-only) rest area just north of this waypoint on the journey to Glacier. There was a very small market, however, where I could grab a cup of coffee to go. The same lady was there when my brother and I went through this way in October of 2018. My brother had asked her what was the coldest temperature that she had seen. Her answer was -53 °F. That is fifty-three degrees below zero. Or as Alister MacLean, in his novel Night Without End put it, 85 degrees of frost, which is 85 degrees below the freezing point of water (32 °F). Now that’s cold.

Thirty-eight miles later, in about as many minutes, found me on the outskirts of Browning, Montana. You know you’re getting near Glacier National Park when you reach this small town on the Blackfeet Reservation. It’s the nearest full-service stop on the eastern side of Glacier.  From there it’s about thirteen miles to Kiowa, which is only a name on a map, as I continued west on US-89 for the last forty-five minutes of my day’s travel. This is the junction of Montana State Route 49 and US-89. While the main road turns north at this point, MT-49 heads west before ultimately turning south and ending at the town of East Glacier Park Village. It took about thirty minutes to travel the nineteen miles from Kiowa to St. Mary, Montana, the eastern gateway to Glacier National Park. Along the way are many nice vantage points, but these are just the appetizer. So much more awaits, the weary traveler, inside the park. The St. Mary/East Glacier KOA was just a few minutes up the road from St. Mary. That would be where I spent the next two nights.