Scheduled Departure Dates
Casual Inns: $3,799
eBike Available When you join an Escape Adventures tour in 2024, you will receive a FREE custom sublimated Limited Edition Jersey!
$3,799
Per Person
MONTANA | Multi-Sport Road Bike Tour
MONTANA MULTI-SPORT ROAD
GLACIER NATIONAL PARK
Road Biking
Hiking
Rafting
- Private Tours and Custom ToursSolos, Couples & Friends
- Departure: Whitefish, MT
- Tour Offered:
Jul, Aug, Sep
- Departs On: Sunday
- Duration: 6 Days
- Lodging: Casual Inns
- Fitness Level: 2-3
- Elevation Range: 3,000 - 6,000 ft.
Overview
Basing from Montana’s 1583-sq. mile Glacier National Park, with its 375 historic properties plus six historic landmarks, we cycle into some of North America’s most breathtaking landscapes. At each stop, each slow pass, we understand a little more about “The Crown of the Continent” ecosystem.
Amazingly, nearly all of the plants and animals that existed during the era of European exploration are still present in the park, the adjoining wilderness and tribal homelands. The flora and fauna will hopefully remain undisturbed, thanks to the lank of dense population centers nearby.
We have to note that the time to enjoy this glacier-based park is running out. Of the park’s 150 recorded glaciers, only 25 remain. Park Service divulges that by 2030, accelerated by Climate Change, the park’s namesake glaciers will likely completely vanish.
*ebike available for this tour. Some restrictions apply.
Day 1-2: Our six day epic kicks off with an hour-long shuttle, from the resort town of Whitefish. The day’s first stage commences from 6651-ft Apgar Mountain, on Glacier’s western edge. We route past 6593-ft Huckleberry Mountain, in the Apgar range: thickly forested home to elk, mule and whitetail deer, mountain lion, Grizzly and Black bear. Beneath soaring peaks, sculpted by glacial retreat, we arrive at the humble visitor center. On the next ten-mile stage we sweep up valley, paralleling the shores of Lake McDonald: an alpine stunner, fed by fading glaciers and snowfields. At the Park Inn, a rustic Swiss style resort built in 1913 we close out a fulsome first day. Day 2, a turn of the century engineering feat, Going to The Sun Road consistently places amongst America’s top-ten most scenic roads. No wonder some stretches of this roughhewn, east-west stretching thoroughfare took ten years to complete, given the distinct if not powerful landscapes Going to The Sun traverses: no less than 48-miles of waterfalls, broad alpine valleys, magnificent forests and sharply serrated mountain peaks. Climbing to Logan Pass, we gain 3000-feet on a roadbed so accommodating to our Kevlar skins it seems manicured. At the eastern terminus of The Going to The Sun Road, we roll into a humble village of 50 full-time residents, truly a wide spot on US-89. Nonetheless, at the park’s edge we marvel at the striking presentation that is the Saint Mary’s visitor center. All smart, sharp, modernist lines that conform to the vividly vertical landscape, the Saint Mary’s structure is arguably the most architecturally imaginative welcome mat in the US Park Service.
Day 3-4: Take a 20-mile shuttle from Saint Mary to Many Glacier Inn, which edges Swiftcurrent Lake. No less than the jewels of Glacier National Park, these alpine lakes—at 4878-ft altitude—represent wilderness paradise. Where water, big-charismatic wildlife and even bigger backcountry mountains merge, we indulge in hikes along Cataract Creek. Later, the day’s ride options include the spectacular Chief Mountain Highway, ascending to the Chiefton Overlook. Day 4, view bears rising above close-in meadows, more reclusive Bighorn sheep on hillsides, Golden and Bald eagles riding a thermal—or admiring our kit—on high. Our ride shoots south, plying the eastern border of Glacier. Set against spectacular meadows, we sojourn briefly at Two Medicine Valley, at the park’s southeast: a Matterhorn evoking mountain called Rising Wolf, 9518-ft. lording over Two Medicine Lake. A stunning descent to East Glacier is palpable for its spirit, the quintessence or essence that fills the space between terra firma and the universe above. Not only rich Grizzly habitat, but wolf, coyote, Black bear, moose, elk are routinely seen from the road’s lookouts. Overnight at Glacier Park Lodge: magnificently framed by 40-foot tall Douglas firs.
Day 5-6: Our first stage sweeps from East Glacier to West Glacier, with a shuttle to Whitefish. Our ride parallels the southern border of Glacier, threaded through a stunning canyon carved by the Flathead Wild and Scenic River. Broken by multiple picnic stops, our route courses through the rolling ancestral lands of the Blackfeet tribe. We close just as we opened: with a shuttle back to equally welcoming, if well-adorned Whitefish. Overnight: Grouse Mountain Lodge, downtown Whitefish. Think elegant meals meets come-as-you-are high country pub amidst a modern ski chalet setting. Loosening the legs we indulge in a short, vigorous spin along Whitefish Lake. Next, swapping pedals for paddles, we throttle back to a full immersion in the Flathead River, emerald waters churning beneath dense, riverside forests. Our Crown of the Continent tour wraps in fluid fashion, rafting the Middle Fork of the Flathead River.
