The Road Goes Ever on and On: MS to MT and back

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The long awaited day finally arrived. I awakened early, while the sun was still nestled behind the trees, and drove to the hospital to make rounds, discharge a patient, and tidy up things for my return nearly two weeks later.

Heading back home, all the munchkins were up and excited, and we piled into the two trip vehicles, my 2020 Tacoma and my wife's 2019 GX460. Big brother LX stayed home to keep the home fires burning.

First stop, St. Louis Missouri! 5 hours of mostly back roads with a brief hour or two on the highway brought us to the classic gateway to the West, the gateway arch. Sitting next to the Missouri River, one of the cheapest and easiest ways to get far into the west, and also the starting point for Lewis's and Clark's expedition, it was a fitting place to mark the beginning of our own journey, which would roughly follow their path up the Missouri and all the way to Three Forks, Montana...but I'm getting ahead of myself.

This trip makes the first time I've used KOA campgrounds, and I must say I was pleasantly surprised. They are generally clean, well organized, and with playgrounds for my couped up kids, they were worth their weight in gold.

The tents worked great (Smittybilt and iKamper 3.0). Really thankful for the iKamper's new and easy features that made set up and take down a breeze.

The next day was a hard, long push to the badlands, South Dakota. We were up early and despite 25mph headwinds keeping speeds lower and killing our gas mileage (8-9mpg), we got to our destination and made camp in time to observe the locals and enjoy the tapestry God only puts in desert locations.

The next morning, we took a little time to hike around the badlands, giving thanks we had brought food, water, and a way to get out. Some 60-70mph winds in one valley with sand stingining our faces convinced us that the "Badlands" were aptly named.

 

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Our expected third night was in the mountains of southern Montana. We drove out of the Badlands...

And wound our way through sparsely populated western South Dakota and Eastern and middle Montana.

Our planned camp site in the mountains had a 25mph wind, sub freezing temps, and wintrymix predicted, so we made good use of a quiet farmhouse in Helena, MT, to cozy up for a chilly night, wash some clothes, and take a shower after three days of hard travel.

The diversion did allow us to visit a historic spot, "three forks", where Lewis, Clark, and company spent a few weeks trying to figure out which of the three branches (Jefferson, Madison, or Gallatin) was the most navigable River that led them the farthest West. Their men had contracted a bad series of venereal diseases at their last major stop, and so they kept away from the local pleasures as the scouted, repaired, and actually buried caches of supplies, to be reclaimed upon their return.

One more 3 hour drive to Kalispell, and we arrived at our destination lake house, a hair under 2000 miles traveled in three days...all with kids 6, 5, and 3. They all did exceptionally well, and mommy having spent a few weeks reading and schooling lots about Lewis and Clark, they were tracking with the adventure...mostly.

 

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After a Lord's Day rest at the lake house, my brother and his family and we headed off into Glacier National over the next few days for exploration, hiking, and general shenanigans.

We brought both an inflatable kayak (advanced element's tandem) and a MyCanoe Duo, and enjoyed both immensely.

Wildlife was just starting to come out in late May, and while bears were sparse, we saw newborn mountain goats up on the hills.

 

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Later in the week, we hiked in the North Fork region. The girls took a brief couple hour kayak trip while we dads hiked a couple miles with the kids, all under beautiful weather, and of course with Polebridge Merc's delicacies filling our bellies.

Then the girls piled the little ones into the Gx, and my brother and I ran off to Kintla Lake for some first class kayaking, an overnight stay at the best campsite in America, and a return trip with refuel and rest at Polebridge the next day.

 

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Our trek back home was unfortunately marred by some pretty miserable weather, with planned stops in Yellowstone and the Grand Tetons pushed back for both that and my surgery partner catching a minor case of COVID that required a quick return. We still managed to enjoy lots of fun sights, some journaling, and some chilly, damp camping that the kids were all quite used to at this point in the trip.

It was a great two weeks, and we are so grateful for good rigs that worked flawlessly throughout the trip.

 

[DavidLReid]

Great photos and narrative.....thanks for sharing. A few years back we did a motorcycle trip to Glacier.

 

[TCOTUE]

Looks like a most excellent trip! Hope to do some road tripping in my future!