Glacier National Park & Beyond

Making good use of our National Park pass we leave Whitefish early to ride the short distance to Glacier National Park & 'The Road To The Sun'.

We stop in the park for breakfast close to Lake Macdonald with it's crystal clear water, the still early morning provides us some reflections of the mountains in the distance.

Stopping at Macdonald Falls you can see the scenic beauty of this park as the road starts to rise.

The road is more like a European mountain pass & you can enjoy the curves on the parts that are not too busy with traffic.

As we approach Logan Pass we reach the highest point of the road at just over 2000m, not that high really with the surrounding peaks reaching just over 3000m, it's nice however to be back in the mountains & time for a selfie.

The mountain goats like it here & seem to ignore the tourist, this family group just go about their own business next to the visitors centre.

From the Logan Pass it's all down hill to the park exit at Saint Mary which takes you straight into the Blackfeet Indian Reservation, the difference in the wealth between the two sides of the park is very stark.

Passing through Browning we ride to Choteau, it's easy to see where Montana gets it's wealth, the golden fields of wheat are regular sights & the iconic shape of the grain elevator is very common.

We pass several convoys of combine harvesters being moved from farm to farm & the dust clouds created during harvesting can be seen in all directions.

Choteau turns out to be a very attractive small town & the adjacent restaurant does great fruit pies, the Hotel is also one of the best we have stayed in. 
A shorter journey the following day to Billings sets us up nicely for the visit to the Little Bighorn Battlefield, since 2003 this historic monument has begun to embrace both sides with this mural being part of the Indian Memorial that opened that year.

They now mark where some of the native warriors fell with red tombstones as well as remembering the horses that perished during the battle in 1876, more information on the National Memorial & the battle itself can be found here: http://www.nps.gov/libi/index.htm

General Ciuster is of course the name that everybody associates with this site, this is the location of his 'Last Stand' with the headstone marked in black marking where he fell.

Leaving Montana we now enter Wyoming to visit the iconic Devils Tower featured in the 1977 film 'Close Encounters of The Third Kind', I have to say I found this laccolith more impressive than I was expecting!

This was the first US National Monument established in 1906, of the 400,000 annual visitors about 1% climb the tower, you can see one here with a couple of colleagues further up.

'Dog Town' is situated at the foot of the tower with one of it's resident Prairie Dogs looking at what's going on.

We are also close to Sturgis, South Dakota with the famous 'Bike Week' starting tomorrow so motorbikes are everywhere, this Victory has a matching trailer, very stylish!
Tonight we have a Hotel booked in Rapid City very close to Sturgis but due to the inflated costs we won't be hanging around.

Montana, Big Sky Country

Following the re-visit to Yellowstone it's time to head into Montana, once again it's very hot & due to our physical state we take a short route to Bozemon along route 191 through Gallatin National Forest & the appropriately named 'Big Sky' ski resort, the fly fishermen are also out in force.

After a deserved night sleep we plan another short day to Virginia City & Nevada City, once again these were gold strike towns that fell into disrepair only to be rescued by tourism.
Nevada City has a living Museum & while we were there a re-enactment of a 1863 hanging took place by vigilantes, it was fairly realistic & upset a couple of kids in the audience.

 John & I have a drink in the Saloon, it's a Sarsparilla for me & a 'Pig Iron' Cola for John, I remember the old Cowboy shows on TV!

There is also a great collection of mechanical musical instruments from the time, this Violano-Virtuoso was voted one of the 'Eight Greatest Inventions' of the decade in 1912 when it was made, it works as well!

This is Boot Hill (one of many) with the graves of 5 men hanged on Jan 14th 1964 by the vigilantes of Montana prior to the introduction of formal law enforcement.

Our bed for the night is also one of the original buildings & it's supposed to be haunted, we sleep well & see nothing unusual.

The town has many re-created shops from the 1860's & opposite the Inn is a Gypsy Arcade with more mechanical musical instruments & old gambling machines.
The star attraction however is a fortune telling machine for which $1m dollars was offered by the magician David Copperfield, it belongs to the State of Nevada however & can't be sold.

The local bar is full of atmosphere, as a change from sawdust the peanut shells are thrown on the floor & only cleaned up at the end of the season in September, the local craft beers are pretty good too.

I guess with the name of 'Big Sky' State you would expect the sunsets to be pretty good.

After Virginia City we head towards Glacier National Park & stop at Deer Lodge to visit the car museum & old Montana State Prison, they have a great collection of 1950 Chevrolet Bel-Air's, I'd love one of these.

Highway 83 follows the Swan River & we stop at Seeley Lake for the night before heading onto Whitefish, it's a scenic ride through more national forests passing Summit Lake as well as several others, Lindy Peak can be seen in the background.

The road continues through Flathead National Forest & reaching Whitefish we find a small clean Ski town, we will be here for 2 nights.

Another Montana sunset sets in with some great cloud formations.

Today it's a day ride to Eureka only a few miles from the Canadian Border returning via the Lake Koocanusa Scenic Byway, we are now not far from where we started?

The ride is good but I've never seen road repairs like this, a soft tar filling with paper!! it doesn't work & is very slippery.

Back in Whitefish a storm is brewing, it passes the town but rain falls over the mountains creating a double rainbow, you can also see the end as the bogies on the train wagons are lit up, is there a pot of Gold?

Yellowstone

It's an early start as we enter Yellowstone at Madison around 8am.

Our aim is to cover the whole park today with the first stop being the Norris Geyser Basin.

This place is amazing & difficult to portray with a few pictures.

Next we travel North to Mammoth Hot Springs a very extensive area with some great formations.

The colours are fantastic caused by living organisms that can tolerate the hot water, when they die they add to the mineral deposits.

The barren landscape is easily accessible here & although the car parks are close we are doing a lot of walking in very hot conditions, this is a good way to get fit.

Apart from the geological features the park is full of wildlife, we see Bison, Grey Wolf, Deer, Elk as well as a number of smaller Gophers & Chipmunks.

At Yellowstone Grand Canyon there are 2 fantastic waterfalls, here is the view from the Lower Falls overlook.

John also contemplates diving in just to cool down!

We reach the West Thumb Geyser Basin just as the sun is going down, it's proved too much to complete the park in one day so we will have to return tomorrow, we get back to the tent around 10.30pm completly knackered after a 15 hour day in 90 degree heat.

After packing up we re-enter the park to complete our tour, 1st stop is the Upper Geyser Basin, this place just gets better & better!

Next it's Midway Geyser Basin our penultimate stop.

This area includes Grand Prismatic Spring, the name says it all.

Via Firehose Lake Drive we see the Grand Fountain Geyser erupt, unfortunately we had just moved on so only caught it from a distance, this is much better than Old Faithful & lasts a lot longer.

Fountain Paint Pot at the Lower Geyser Basin is the final stop, now it's off to Glacier National Park.

The picture of the sign waves us goodbye, anyone who has not visited Yellowstone needs to add it to their bucket list immediately, it may be a bit crowded but you have to come here!!!

Grand Tetton National Park & Old Faithful

Today we head into Wyoming and the scenery is turning green with mountains in the distance, this is getting back to the landscape we prefer.

It's still very hot but a few degrees less than Salt Lake, the route through Grand Teton National Park takes us through Jackson, this place is full of tourists which will be the norm for the next few days, the ski runs look good here so a place to return in the winter.

Riding through the park the views get better and better although it's difficult to capture some of the vistas due to all the trees. 

It's amazing how after a fer days you miss the open road.

Along the road we follow the Yellowstone River with a number of falls along the route, it's been a long day today but some excellent roads.

Grand Teton National Park merges into Yellowstone National Park & we enter from the South entrance, our accommodation is at West Yellowstone so there is only time today to stop at Old Faithful, fortunately we don't wait to long for the show.

As you would expect this area is full at this and most times of the year, we have booked a fixed tent for 2 days at 'Yellowstone Under Canvas' although at $125 a night it's not cheap.