WOW. Our trio to Montana was better than expected and here is my review:

Day 1) We took a 5-hour flight, with 1 hour layover in Dallas, into Kalispell, rented a car and spent the first two nights at the park motel in Apgar Village on Lake McDonald in GNP. We then went to a resort condo on Big Mountain at the Whitefish Mountain Resort for the rest of the week.

Day 2) Going to the Sun Road. While the park motel itself was as plain as you can get (no TV, AC, Wi-Fi or cell signal) it has the most important feature you could want. Location, Location and Location. To be able to walk out your door to watch sunset or sunrise or dip your toe into the cool clear lake water on Lake McDonald was worth the high cost of the room alone.

The location also meant you could jump in the car and go exploring the park anytime you felt up to it. The short morning rides at sunrise were amazing and the ability to get on the Going to the Sun Road (most of Day 2) before the traffic built up was great as well.

Day 3) Hike to Avalanche Lake in the morning. We had plans to hike Hidden Lake from Logan’s Pass but the trail was closed due to bear activity. Explored Lake McDonald area in the afternoon and evening.

Day 4) Went back to the park from the mountain for a trail ride on horseback in the morning and spent the rest of the day going to Polebridge and Bowman Lake. For those that have been to Polebridge, MT…then you know what I mean when I say you have to really want to go there to get there! Had a great meal at Jalisco Cantina in Whitefish. The food, service and atmosphere was great after being on “park food” for a few days.

Day 5) Rested up, and then went back to West Glacier and ate a fantastic quick lunch at the Wandering Gringo food truck before spending the afternoon white water rafting on the Flathead River. The rafting experience was much better than we expected. It is a beautiful river with a great guide from Great Northern Rafting Co. We then did a little shopping and had dinner at Abruzzo in downtown Whitefish that night (I say night… but it doesn’t get dark till 10PM!). Abruzzo was pretty good Italian fare, but not great.

Day 6) We were really tired by now but we took the chair lift to the summit of Big Mountain in the morning (cloudy and cold for the first and only time of the trip) and hiked the easy East Rim trail and then had a lunch picnic at the Les Mason State Park on Whitefish Lake. That afternoon we went to the Huckleberry Festival downtown and then had the best meal of the trip at Latitude 48 in Whitefish. It was really good by any standard.

Day 7) Flew out and was back home in less than 6 hours.

What a great trip and we plan to go back to Montana next summer to see the rest of the park.

Speaking of Glacier National Park, while I thought no NP would ever challenge Yosemite as my favorite park, I am now in the process of reconsidering that. GNP is simply outstanding, and we were not even able to explore the east side of the park due to CV-19. I can only imagine it would be # 1 on my list if we could have seen the whole park. It is simply that beautiful. Here are just a few pics we took.

Lake McDonald at sunrise

Going to the Sun Road (St Mary Lake on the east end)

This post was edited on 8/11/20 at 2:05 pm