planning a trip to glacier park in montana from missouri

thinking of using I90, is there a better route or is there any ongoing construction to look out for? is I 94 a better road? Any favorite spots to check out? looking to travel about 8 to 10 hrs a day from central mo best places to stay overnight? thanks for any input

I 90 to 25 north in Montana would be a good way to go.

Depending on your timing there are lots of spots to check out between Missouri and Glacier.
I70 or I80 out to Denver, I25 North to US26 West to Jackson Hole.
US 191 North from Jackson to Yellowstone.
US 287 North through Yellowstone to Glacier National Park.
We have actually done this rather long road trip.

When you leaving? We have a show near Billings Mt (Junction of I-90 and 94) in August.
Several other shows around the state all summer.
Stop in Butte to see the Berkley Pit and World Mining Museum.
Nice museum at Mont State Uni at Bozeman.
Custer's Battlefield near Hardin Mt.
Couple rifle makers in Big Timber.
Of course, there's always Yellowstone, but I hear there is lots of construction there.

Depending on when you come thru Billings/Laurel, stop and McD's
and have coffee with us.

I know some parks are lim6ting the number of people in the park. You might check ahead!

Lived there and visited the park many times. Your I-90 idea is sound and both more direct and more scenic then I-94.
Scenic and not difficult route. I-90 to 3 Forks (beautiful historic place with the headwaters of the Missouri river. ~25 miles past the first # Forks exit is US 287 (an interesting and early US highway (long going in the southerly direction to South Texas Not your goal) it travels through fine country and mountain vistas. At Helena, an interesting City, take I-15 north. At Wolf Creek, again take 287 North (to the left) to Augusta. There take US 89 to/through Browning. the entrance to Glacier is on that highway.

Beautiful and better options for food and lodging along this above path.

Slightly shorter is to go to Butte (also historic and fun in a western saturation way Mercury Street, East Park Street, and Granite Street are core places to Eyeball.) Then I-15 north to Wolf Creek, turning on US 287 to go the same as above. I have traveled these roads and believe you are in for a treat. (Going to the Sun Road is about as serious as one can get. Not for RVs or trailering at all) Highway US 2 is south from the 89 way and also beautiful. Mountain goats anyone! Jim

When were you thinking of going

Better get your pass for the park ahead of time. There is a limit on cars there I hear. Ron MN

I am at Belgrade which is about nine miles west of Bozeman, Montana. I90 is about half a mile north of the house, about one and a half miles from the interstate exit. Lewis and Clark caverns is very little out of your way.

I would like to know about the show you are talking about. That would only be about 150 miles from home.

If you get to Helena MT there is a good tour of Helena. The tour of Butte is not as good to us when we were there and took them. Cody WY has the Cody museum there and Cheyenne has Frontier days there. At OR near Fort Bridger or Lyman WY there is a rendezvous or something there during the summer not sure of the month. If you go I-90 there is the bike week at Sturgis right off 90 While there slip up to Belle Fourche SD and cut across to Crow Agency for the Custer Battlefield on 212 Shorter than running across to I-25 and up. 212 Has been redone with slow truck lanes on some of the hills for better traffic flow. Not that much traffic out there compared to farther east anyway. Good scenery though I would not travel it after dark if I didn't have to. Not much across there for services and 2 reservations there. I used to take the truck across there rather than going down around Buffalo WY to SD. pawn shops in Billings with no sales tax makes them worth looking at for tools and such if you have the time. Sugar Beets from Crow Agency to Hardin will be growing. Wheat harvest will be about end of July to Mid August out in MT. If you can get to Grangeville ID See if Ted is Still around. Ask at the JD dealer. Ted had a pretty extensive collection of everything in tractors 2 sheds full. It's been about 10 years since I was there and he was in his late 70's or early 80's then. They also have a fall celebration there and he gets some of the pieces out and runs them he said when I was there.

X2,
Heard on news everyone wants to visit parks and they are overcrowded.
I'm delaying my travels until next year.

We're heading to Rapid city in a couple of weeks for our sil's graduation from OCS. He'll be commissioned a 2nd lieutenant. We're in western Iowa and gonna go thru ND. Wife wants to go to the peace garden on the Canadian border and I want to see Roosevelt national park. We'll be heading up I-29 to either Fargo or Grand Forks, eventually we'll be on 94 for a while, then south on highway 85 to Rapid and home on 90.

Ive visited several Natl Parks and tell people if they had to choose only one, make it Glacier. I loved the Big Red Bus Tour BUT MY FAVORITE is Many Glacier Lodge on the East side of park. Dont miss Logan Pass and the Going to the Sun Road

John T

I went through Glacier many years ago. Traffic on the Going to the Sun highway was bumper to bumper most of the way. At the top of the pass, there was a parking lot bigger than Walmart full of cars. Hundreds of people were walking the short trail to view a glacier. It looked like the crowds when the Super Bowl lets out. A big disappointment for me, although the country was spectacular. They should limit the number of people getting in. If I go again, it will be in September when the crowds are thinner.

(quoted from post at 23:51:01 07/12/21) thinking of using I90, is there a better route or is there any ongoing construction to look out for? is I 94 a better road? Any favorite spots to check out? looking to travel about 8 to 10 hrs a day from central mo best places to stay overnight? thanks for any input

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Agree Glacier is the best of the National Parks but anything good is crowded nowadays. Avoid weekends but it will be crowded no matter what. If you want to test your grip on the steering wheel jump off the interstate around Sheridan WY and head toward ALT 14 (closed in winter) to Cody. We usually stay in Libby when we visit Montana, there is a really nice little roadside park about 10 miles west of town on the Kootenai River. Normally we leave Montana with at least one new chip in the windshield. Montana HWY Dept seems to like to tear out long stretches of two lane highways for repairs. Last trip we hit a 20+ mile stretch on a weekend they seemed to take the weekend off and it had rained a fair amount. We nearly got stuck in the mud on the highway. There's a lot to see in Montana and the people are great.

This post was edited by atlarge54 on 07/13/2021 at 06:17 pm.