Glacier National Park in 1 day
This post is part of series where we visit many of our beautiful national parks and monuments.
Great Falls, Montana to Polson, Montana through Glacier National Park
This would be a big day for us. Not only were there a lot of miles to cover, but we were going to go through one of the most beautiful National Parks in America. What we did not plan on was all the construction we would encounter as well.
What should have taken around 5 1/2 hours to ride without stops ended up taking nearly 12 hours with construction delays. There are a few things that are not a lot of fun on motorcycles, fresh oil, gravel and muddy construction sites are among them. We hit all of these on this day, some of them more than once. It seems that the Montana DOT thought it would be a good idea to do routine maintenance on both the east entrance and the west entrance to Glacier National Park during the peak of high season in early August. We got to wait for extended periods on both sides of the park to take our turn riding on oil and gravel. Thanks Montana. The national park service also had a great deal of construction going on too. Nearly eight miles of the going to the sun road was under construction and quite muddy.
Sign at East entrance
We have been to Glacier a few times on motorcycles. It is a really beautiful park. The going to the sun road is a great drive or ride. It is the only road that goes all the way through the park east to west.
Majestic mountains and lush green valleys are a good way to describe the scenery heading up to the Logan Pass Visitor Center.
There are several places to pull over to take pictures and take in the sights.
You know you are getting close to the visitors center when you see this tunnel.
Glacier park was packed during this visit. Every parking lot was full and every pull out was full as well. The good news is that there are designated motorcycle parking spots and we did find places to park the bikes at the visitors center on top of the pass. We also had great weather so even with the construction delays at least we were not sitting there in a thunderstorm.
Parking lot at Logan Pass Visitor Center. this was early August and it was packed.
Waterfall just below the visitor’s center
This is the alpine meadow at the visitors center. Lots of trails for hiking start here.
Mountain Goat in the meadow by the visitors center
There was no food available at the Logan Pass Visitors Center. We were quite hungry after our long morning of riding up from Great Falls and the construction delays. If you are planning a visit to Glacier keep this in mind.