Montana the Marvelous

“The next passage in my journey is a love affair. I am in love with Montana. For other states I have admiration, respect, recognition, even some affection, but with Montana it is love, and its difficult to analyze love when your in it... It seems to me that Montana is a great splash of grandeur. The scale is huge but not overpowering. The land is rich with grass and color, and the mountains are the kind I would create if mountains were ever put on my agenda.” ~ John Steinbeck, Travels with Charley.

In case you couldn't tell from our previous post on Glacier National Park, Montana is probably our favourite state so far. Cowboys, Indians, mountains, crystal clear rivers and big ol' skies. It is true the sky is bigger in Montana. I don't know why this is. Perhaps there is a scientific reason for it, but the horizon seems to be 10% land and 90% blue blue skies in Montana.

On our way from Theodore Roosevelt NP to Glacier NP, we drove along Montana Highway 2, which runs about 50 miles south and parallel to the Canadian border. Most towns we passed through on Highway 2 have roadsigns with an arrow pointing right (since we were heading west) directing you to Canada. Along this road are a number of Indian Reservations – Fort Peck, Fort Belknap, Rocky Boy's (actually just south of Highway 2) and Blackfeet. Most of the reservations seem to be utilized as cattle ranches and include a couple of small towns.

After our glorious week in Glacier, we drove to Whitefish, a mid-sized town on the southwest side of the park, for a night at The Garden Wall Inn, hosted by probably the nicest guy in America – Chris Schustrom. Provider of gourmet beers and gourmet breakfasts, Chris didn't even complain about our body odour when we arrived, which was heady given that we had not showered for a week while engaging in extreme physical activities. The inn is furnished completely in the art deco style, right down to the claw foot bath and light switches. Very impressive attention to detail. This place is the full 5 stars. Probably too nice for us, given that we are meant to be roughing it a bit. But after that Swiftcurrent Lookout hike, we both felt we needed a bit of TLC. 

The next day we drove through the Swan River Valley on our way to Yellowstone. This drive, designated scenic by our road atlas, was particularly lovely. It passes through a number of notable scenic monuments, probably each worth a week camping without a shower - the Flathead National Forest, Mission Mountain Range, Garnet Mountain Range, Swan Mountain Range, Flint Creek Mountain Range, Lolo National Forest, Helena National Forest, Beaverhead Deerlodge National Forest, and, obviously, the Swan Lake and Swan River. Once we hit the Interstate Highway 90 to Bozeman, we continued to pass through similarly beautiful scenery noted by unique names - the Tobacco Root Mountains, Gallatin National Forest (not that I want to freak anyone out, but this is the scene of that nasty bear attack earlier this year: http://billingsgazette.com/news/state-and-regional/montana/article_21d02556-9a58-11df-b1f3-001cc4c03286.html), Absaroka Mountains (where the documentary “Sweetgrass” was film – this is a great little doco. Check it out: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XbF_8e151ds), Gallatin Mountain Range. By the time we got to Gardiner, the Gateway to Yellowstone National Park, we were on full sensory overload with beauty bursting out of our ears.