Yellowstone in September

Sounds like a good plan.

your route sounds good. if the road is still open, you might want to take a day to drive the Beartooth Pass road from Cooke City, MT to Red Lodge, then down 308 and 72 to 296 (Chief Joseph Scenic byway) which will take you back to Cooke City.
This is an outstanding drive, but the Beartooth road may be closed by mid Sept.
If it is, you can do the Chief Joseph road down to Cody and either reverse or make a loop through Cody and over back into Yellowstone and back to wherever you are camped.

Never Entered via the West Entrance, nor have been there in September. A Little of What I have on Yellowstone & Tetons.

If close to Great Falls, MT: C.M. Russell Museum -Really neat if you like Western Art - HIstory. It was why I wanted to go. http://cmrussell.org/

Just across the border from Montana in North Dakota: Theodore Roosevelt Nat'l Park -Great Place to see Bison and Western Landscapes. But a somewhat out of the way detour. http://www.nps.gov/thro/index.htm

If you use US 89 in Montana to get to Glacier, they have a city park with camping at Choteau which is about 105 miles from the east entrance at St Mary's and 140 miles to West Glarier. We stayed at it, I believe, in '97, but do not remember a creek. We stayed in a city park, in the town, not sure if it is the same town. Looks about right on the map. http://www.freecampgrounds.com/detail.aspx?id=257

Glacier & Waterton Parks are really neat. Going-to-the-Sun Road a neat drive.

Near the US Border in the Waterton Nat'l Park (Glacier Nat'l PK in US) area:
Fort Macleod, Alberta, the first RCMP made an appearence.

It was in the general area of a neat site, :C Head-Smashed-In Buffalo Jump. Really neat place to see. http://history.alberta.ca/headsmashedin/

Ft. Macleod was interesting http://www.fortmacleod.com/visiting/

Check the Other Government of Alberta History and Heritage Links in the above site^.

Banff & Lake Louise has a lot of neat sites & sights to see.

North of Banff: There is a hot spring resort in the Jasper area, very nice. Hot Springs

:C The ride onto the icefields between Jasper & Baniff is really neat. Icefield

We did a day trip to the Icefields from Banff in '86.

We drove the Trans-Canada Hwy 1 W from Banff to Kamloops, where we took Route 5 down to Hope; where joined the Trans-Canada Hwy 1 W again. But that was in 1986. It was called the Kamloops Toll-road then, or something like that. It had just opened. We got a pumper sticker. Ha!

We drove up from Hope on it in 1997 & it wasn't a toll road anymore. But we went to Jasper before going to Banff.

Route from Banff to Kamloops was very scenic I remember. Many places to stop & view the Trains & Tunnels.

The two times we have visited there, we used two of the campgrounds in The Banff National Park can't recall the names (not walking to Banff close). One was on a lake, we had a canoe with us at the time. And one in Jasper (only been there once). Also one in Waterton (the Town Site CG).

Artum Snowbird wrote:
we are planning to come to Yellowstone from the north near the middle of September. We will likely come through Clark Fork Idaho, and make our way to the Western Entrance, then go down to the Tetons and reverse and then go out the North Entrance then up into Alberta to Calgary and home through Southern BC.

We enjoy scenic byways, looking for roads and routes or scenic campgrounds to stay at along the way from Clark Fork south east, and then during our visit, and then north towards Calgary.

Looking forward to your input!

Mike and Carole

Sept. is our favorite time to visit Yellowstone. Anytime after Labor Day the kids are back in school and the crowds thin out. Keep in mind that Fishing Bridge starts closing down after the first week of Sept. and that is the only campground in the park with full hookups. Several of the visitor centers also close down around the middle of the month. You MAY start having some wet/cold/snowy(?) weather towards the end of Sept. The snow probably won't stick during the day however.

The advantages - NO crowds! Elk will be out and in rut into Sept. The bison may still be butting heads as well.

I would recommend getting there as close to after Labor Day as you can and be willing to spend the time and drive long distances.

I second the suggestion of the Bear Tooth Mt. drive. One of if not the most spectacular mountain drives in the lower 48.

You may want to check the campground with hookups in the Tetons. Can't remember the name of it, right at the lake, but the 2 years ago when we went through there at the end of Sept. they had already closed it for the season. The same for the private one up outside the north entrance to the Tetons. Gras V(?) down at the south end, just north of Jackson Hole is where we stayed. No hookups, but had moose in the campground!

Click on my Picasa website to see pictures from that area. Have a great trip and have lots of memory card space in your cameras!

We, too, are heading that way right after Labor Day, via SD and the Black Hills. I can't wait and will be following this thread closely.
Ron S

I will be watching this thread as well, we're heading up thru ID into MT for a look around and are looking forward to trying out a few CG we found near river's edge. Like what we're reading about the crowds thinning after Labor day which is exactly when we'll be in MT. Thanks to the OP for starting, looking forward to reading more!