from yellow stone to glacier

[elle8]

would anyone know if rte.89 is the best way to go from yellowstone to glacier . is it too mountainous . is there a secondary rte . that is scenic and more enjoyable to ride .

thank you ,,rickybobby

[CloudDriver]

Jim Shoe wrote:
Another suggestion. If you intend to drive the Going to the Sun Road, drive it from west to east. Its a two lane road carved out of the mountain and you want to be up against the mountain, not the edge. Its a long way down. Google "Going to the Sun Road" and look at the pictures.

Actually you are on the drop off edge side of the road going west to east (from McDonald lake to St. Mary Lake). Unless you also plan to drive all the way around the bottom of Glacier on route 2 to get back to the other side, you are going to drive the Going to the Sun road in both directions anyway.

Just in case you don't already know, large vehicles like RVs aren't allowed on the Going to the Sun road. When you drive it, you will understand why.

[Jim_Shoe]

Another suggestion. If you intend to drive the Going to the Sun Road, drive it from west to east. Its a two lane road carved out of the mountain and you want to be up against the mountain, not the edge. Its a long way down. Google "Going to the Sun Road" and look at the pictures.

[Lauren]

Trust me on this - do not come to St. Mary on 89 from the south! Take the 464!

[mfinnerty]

See Winged One's comments about US89. We made the same mistake going to St. Mary's. Did not make it again leaving.

[Dick_B]

If you are driving/pulling an RV I suggest staying off any road that states Scenic on the map. Some of them are 25 mph with switchbacks and tunnels. I like interstates. There is plenty of scenery at the destination.

[Winged_One]

I made the mistake of coming into St. Mary on 89 from the South. Do NOT do that.

Course it didn't help that I was pulling the swivel wheel and there were bicyclists on the switchbacks. What a nightmare.

464 is nice and easy.

As far as out of Yellowstone, 191 is a beautiful road, but busy and tricky for big rigs. 287 is much more flat and straight. Different type of beautiful, but would be much easier with a big rig. Rode both on the Goldwing while out there.

A cool/disturbing thing to see is on 287. Earthquake lake. You can still see where the mountain fell into the river. Earthquake lake

[n7bsn]

There is really only one "mountain" between Yellowstone and Glacier on US 89 (Little Belt Mt and Kings Hill grade)
In fact most of the road, after the Little Belts, is flat driving. Actually that's because from Great Falls on you follow I-15 for much of the drive.

As noted, traveling up the west side of the divide (I-90 to Missoula, then north) is much more scenic.

In order to get to roads that would not be "fun" (ie tough) you would have to drive up the back-roads. Even then they are not bad

Ya, I've probably drive most of every road going from one to the other.

[CloudDriver]

FYI, here is an earlier thread about route 89 from Yellowstone to the east side of Glacier.

[kknowlton]

Mfinnerty, any of these routes you wouldn't do again while towing? Anything we should watch out for?

[mfinnerty]

Last summer we took US191 and MT85 north out of West Yellowstone to I90 west. Then took US287 north to I15 in Helena. Took I15 north to US2 in Shelby. From Browning it depends on which side of Glacier your going to. For the west side stay on US2. For the east side I recommend MT464 north out of Browning to US89. Then south on US89 to St. Mary's.

For the West side we've also stayed on I90 to US93 west of Missoula. Then US93 north to Kalispell and US2. Then east to the park.

[lasttruck]

Personally, I find the west side of the Continental Divide in Montana to be more scenic, but that may well be just me. 🙂

Of course, you would then have to double back on US2 to get to East Glacier.