Meet me in Montana..........Glacier National Park

The train that runs from Chicago to Portland and back is aptly called the Empire Builder. It travels along major portions of the trail blazed by Lewis & Clark. You will leave Portland at 5.:00 p.m and head toward Spokane, cross Idaho and arrive in East Glacier Park, MT at 8:16 a.m. the next day. I have chosen the Glacier Park Lodge and Resort as our home for the next few days. The park offers several types of lodging, go tohttp://www.glacier.national-park.com/ and click on Lodging and you will see all the choices. From Grand lodges and hotels & motor inns to cabins.


The Glacier Lodge is located on the eastern gateway of the park and is a rustic western themed lodge. Plenty of rooms for families on the 2nd and 3rd floors, nice pool, restaurant on site. You can enjoy golf, bus tours, boat cruises, horseback riding, hiking, shopping, and water rafting.

The lobby has Douglas Fir pillars that are 40 ft high and 40 inches in diameter. A great social gathering place with the large stone fire place and comfortable seating. Rooms run $129 - $179 for a suite.

You can make reservations for several types of activities through the lodge. We are going to be here 3 days, counting the day we arrive, so on that afternoon we are going to saddle up and ride a horse, cowboy. They have a 3 hour ride starting at 2:00 p.m.

All the beauty of the mountain front at your fingertips. The greatest view of
"Looking Glass" without the vehicles and traffic.

The 2 hour ride begins at 3:00 p.m., a guided horseback trip along the eastern border of Glacier National Park.

The maintained trail takes you to lofty sites and into the mountainous terrain
that has to be seen to be believed.

There is also a full day ride starting at 9:00 but I don't think my body can hold up to an all day ride on horseback.

The next day we are going to ride on the red buses up to the Prince of Wales hotel for afternoon tea. The bus leaves the Glacier Park Lodge at 9:30 a.m. and is 8.5 hours long.

"If breathtaking scenery is your thing, this is your tour! Begin your morning on
the “Old North Trail”, one of the oldest ‘highways’ in the world. See vistas and
views unparalleled anywhere as you wind along Montana plains and peaks. Visit the incredible Many
Glacier Valley along the way. Continue north to Waterton and the historic Prince of Wales Hotel, overlooking the Waterton Valley back to Montana. To enhance your trip even more, experience old world charm as you are served Afternoon Tea
(optional) in the lobby of this grand hotel. Return along the base of Chief Mountain, the spiritual landmark of the Blackfeet Indians.

You do cross over into Canada, so with the new regulations, you must have your passport available. Although their brochure lists two forms of identification and a birth certificate, get a passport and make it easy. Cost is $75.00 per adult, $37.50 per child.

Relaxing and eating a good steak, taking a swim in the outdoor heated pool will finish up this day. Picture taking all along the way. But resting up for tomorrow, cause rafting the river is next on the agenda. I cannot decide if I want to do a white water or a scenic float. Both use the middle fork of the Flathead River. Cost is $45 - $65 for a half day trip and $75 - $85 for a full day. I know my son would love the white water and they offer a dinner trip that includes both, so we will probably go for that one. Hopefully we will see some wild animals like Eagles, Black Bear, Whitetail Deer and Beavers. The dinner trip isn't until afternoon but the others start around 9:30 a.m.

Now there is also hiking, boat cruises, gold, fishing, and kayaking and the good thing about this website http://www.glacierparkinc.com/Activities.htm is that you can find out all the information on tours and trips that start at the Glacier Park Lodge.



A little history on the park should make for some interesting reading. Recent archaeological surveys have determined human occupation dating back 10,000 years. These would have been the ancestors of the tribes that live in the valley today, Blackfeet, Salish and Kootenai. In the early 1800's, trappers came to capture beaver and Lewis and Clark came within 50 miles of where the park is today.

As the westward movement continued, the Indians were forced into reservations. The Blackfoot reservation adjoins the east side of the park. The Salish and Kootenai are southwest of Glacier. This entire area is of great spiritual importance to the Indians.

The railway through Marias Pass was completed in 1891, allowing more people to move into the area. Homesteaders settled in and many small towns sprung up.

In 1895, the mountains east of the Continental Divide were bought from the Blackfoot in hopes of finding copper and gold. No great deposits were ever found and the rush only lasted a couple of years.

"Glacier National Park is a land of high-mountain adventure, a land that sets the
senses soaring and the spirits winging. Here you'll find lofty mountain ranges
with sculptured glacial valleys, ice cold lakes that mirror mountains and sky,
wildflowers and wildlife flourishing in alpine meadows and prairie grasslands.
These exquisite elements make up Waterton Lakes National Park in Canada and the adjoining Glacier National Park in the United States. But there is more. To
commemorate the long history of peace and friendship between our two nations,
Waterton and Glacier have been designated the Waterton/Glacier International
Peace Park."

Although these two parks are divided by an international boundary and administered to by different countries, they are united by nature.

The park has wildlife consist of big horn sheep, mountain goats, wapitit(elk), black bear, whitetail and mule deer.

The wildflowers are distinguished by area. In the Alpine area you have heather, gentian, beargrass, and glacier lily, and in the east, where the plains meet the mountains, you have pasque flower, lupine, Indian paintbrush, gaillardia, asters, and shooting stars paint the prairie.

This website http://www.glacier.national-park.com/info.htm#his, has an abundance of information for you. Check it out.


The train leaves East Glacier Park at 9:54 a.m. and heads to Chicago. You will cross the plains of North Dakota, pass by Minneapolis/St Paul, and travel during the day through Wisconsin. It should be a scenic ride. We arrive in Chicago at 3:55 p.m., just in time to check into our hotel for the night. I think we will spend a little time in Chi Town, believe me there is plenty to see and do.

Vaya con dios