Jim and Lyndi ZR-1 Road Trip 2019 - Back to Alaska

[QB93Z]

We spent our night in East Glacier at the Glacier Park Lodge. This lodge was built by the Great Northern Railroad in 1912, just after Glacier National Park was dedicated. The three-story main building of the lodge required 60 Douglas Fir trunks. Each timber is 40 feet long and 36 to 42 inches in diameter. This lodge is one of the nicest historic lodges in the National Park System and is our favorite. The lodge is privately owned and is not run by the NP lodging contractor. Reservations are made directly with the lodge.






We did not go into the Glacier NP on this trip, but the snow on the mountains provided a nice view:




Day 31: We drove east on US-2 then south on US-89/ US-287, to Livingston, MT. Western Montana has a lot of acres in agriculture and a lot of mountains. It is a beautiful area:






The unique landscape of the Missouri River Canyon caught our attention. We added the area to our Bucket List:







Jim

[QB93Z]

Day 32: Drive from Livingston, MT to Pinedale, Wyoming

On Tuesday we continued our journey south. Our destination for the day was central Wyoming. From Livingston we drove south to Gardner, MT, the gateway to Yellowstone Park.

We weren't going to do any sightseeing in Yellowstone, but since it was the shortest route to central Wyoming we went this way. In Gardner we found the original stone arch that was the entrance to Yellowstone National Park:






As we approached the actual park entrance gate we spotted some Prong Horn Sheep:




This is a nice trestle bridge for the road to the east gate to the Park and to the Canyon Lodge area of the Park:




We stopped briefly at the Mammoth area of the Park to see the hot spring pools:




The central plain of Yellowstone NP is at 6,700 to 7,200 feet elevation. There are many places throughout the Park that steam rises from the ground and ponds:




We stopped briefly at the Old Faithful Inn, one of the historic lodges in the National Park System:




We left Yellowstone at the Southern Gate and drove on to Grand Teton National Park:




The Grand Teton Mountains:




South of Grand Teton NP, in Jackson, WY, we turned on to US-189/US-191 South and headed for the small town of Pinedale, WY. The scenery for this leg of the trip was fantastic. We followed the Hobeck River and passed through mountains and then beef cattle country:




Jim