Day 16 (Jun 19) West Yellowstone, MT to Kalispell, MT - 370 miles

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Where we stayed: Best Western Plus Kalispell/Glacier Park West Hotel & Suites

 

Another one of our longest days traveling between cities.  We left West Yellowstone around 10 am and arrived in Kalispell just after 5 pm.  Our only stop was about the halfway mark for a bathroom break. It tried to rain on us at least 3 times but only enough to activate the wipers once each time. We checked in and went to dinner at a place called Nickel Charlies, then Dot did laundry and we got ready to see the Conrad Mansion in the morning.

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Day 17 (Jun 20) The man who built Kalispell, MT

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Today we visited the mansion of Charles E. Conrad who founded the town of Kalispell. We took the guided tour because knew very little about the man and our guide, Mary, was very informative and quite entertaining. The grounds were beautiful and you could tell that this historical site was important to the city and it's people. We ended the day getting the roadster washed and spent a couple more hours cleaning the parts the car wash missed. We had a pretty thick layer of insects that managed to hit our window and grill and also a fine layer of dust that we picked up driving through Yellowstone.

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Day 18 (Jun 21) We take a hike along a river

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As a Boy Scout I really liked to hike.  So when my wife said she would like go hiking I was looking forward to it.  Well, the hike we took today wasn't actually in the National Park but it was close. We decided to walk along the Swan River Nature Trail that looked well defined on the website. Well, let's just say this website labeled the trail as "easy".  It took about 45 min. to get to the site.  It began at a small dam that had water flowing over it along about 2/3rds of the dam and the remaining third went under a building and came out in a separate channel made of concrete and re-bar.  The river once over the dam is labeled a Class 5 river which should be only run by an expert raftsman.

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We began our walk on a dirt road that was gated at both ends. When we reached the second gate we walked down a different road and crossed channel and were now between the channel and the river.  At this point we discovered a trail that looked like it hadn't been used frequently.  I was a bit overgrown and as we followed it there were trees that had fallen which made for interesting obstacles along the way.  After about a mile in, the trail dropped into a ravine that had part of a bridge across it but it was no longer stable so we opted to climb down into the ravine.  After that. these two old people decided to create a trail of their own, crashing through the thick underbrush.  We tripped, we fell, we climbed over really big logs, all the time keeping the sound of the river to our right and slowly climbing up the hill to the road where we could hear cars driving by. By this time we had bent an aluminum walking stick, got scratches in several places (we have photos!) and managed to sprain an ankle.  Anyway we finally got to the top and followed another dirt road which lead down to the canal and we walked along to the picnic stop we had come across at the beginning. 

 

There was only one problem.  Somehow we ended up on the wrong side of a chain link fence with no way to get to the other side. So, we followed the fence around the small parking lot hoping it would end and we could get back to the car. Every turn of the fence was followed by another 100 ft of fence. We finally realized that this fence ran over 1000 ft a long a road so that there was no way out.  Dot wanted to climb over the fence but that seemed impossible since the last time either one of us did that was in our teens! We finally found a length of fence with space under it where with help from each other, we were able to crawl on our backs under the fence and get ourselves free.

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It was a short walk back to the car. Both of us were glad we had survived what we thought would be an easy hike of 5 miles that turned out to be more of a challenge then either of us wanted. We ended our day exhausted, wounded, & tired which called for pizza and some homemade ice cream. Tomorrow we will be traveling through the Montana forest on UTV's . . .

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Day 19 (Jun 22) In search of the Moose, the Bear, and the Wolf

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We drove south to a small town called Elmo, MT.  Stopped at a Subway along the way to get a couple of sandwiches for lunch and met our tour host about 3 miles west of Elmo. After signing or lives away and receiving the keys to our UTV, we crossed the highway and headed up fire road in to the mountains.  The road was well used and had ruts, rocks, and bumps along the way.  Our first stop was at the top of the first mountain and wow, what a view.  Before us was a vast valley with few trees but many shades of green stretching for miles in both east and west.

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After getting to the top of the second hill, we traversed a road stretching across the side of the third hill and spotted a brown bear lumbering along the road ahead of us.  We stopped wanting to get a picture but the bear heard us and began running away from us.  They run pretty fast so we were unable to catch a photo. When we got to the point where we first spotted it, it had already left the road and we were unable to figure out which direction it had gone.

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We drove another 10 miles but never reached the river we were looking for, so turned around, found a grove of trees for shade, and ate our lunch. We didn't see any animals save for a longhorn with a bell and we were back at our car by late afternoon. It was a fun ride which we even went off-road a couple of time just for fun!

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Day 20 (Jun 23) A Red Bus and the "Going to the Sun" road.

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Going-to-the-Sun Road is one of the top scenic drives in the United States. As the main road through Glacier National Park, it’s one of the best ways to see the park with little effort! Typically open from late June to early October, this scenic drive is a must-see. The 50-mile long drive has scenic viewpoints, pull-offs, and hikes along the way. It has become so popular that the National Park Service had to implement a ticketed system to limit the number of people driving on it. 

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By the time we found this out, tickets were already sold out for the days we planned on being in Glacier.  The only options we had were attempting to get one of very few remaining tickets (cancellations) 3 days prior to our drive by calling at 6am, or getting tickets for a guided tour on the Big Red Bus. At the time we inquired about the tour, we discovered that the decision to even have tours this year due to Covid, had not been deciderd, so we left our email hoping to hear from them. We called it a blessing that the Tour contacted us via email and during our first week on the trip, and we were able to secure a ticket for this adventure.

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(Click here for a History of the Red Buses at Glacier)

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We began our trip at 2pm at the parks Visitor Center. Before loading the tour guide told us that the Going-To-The-Sun road was still closed due to rock slides (a regular occurrence each year) and that we could as for a full refund or choose a different date. Since this was our last full day here, we opted to take the tour.  While we weren't able to see the glaciers and other specific stops, our tour guide did take an alternate route and we visited a new growth forest (after the recent forest fire of 2018) where all the original trees were just sticks pointing at the sky surrounded by thousands of new trees repopulating the forest.

We saw some beautiful waterfalls and the water here in the park is a beautiful turquoise blue created by a process of two different rocks rubbing together as a glacier moves and the resultant powder giving the water that color. The power is so fine that it never settles to the bottom of the creeks, streams or lakes.  We ended the day seeing a white-tailed deer along the side of the road.  Tomorrow we leave this spectacular and beautiful creation of God and head to Coeur d'Alene, Idaho for a very special weekend.