Epic Road Trip From Denver to Glacier National Park

Our week long car camping road trip from Denver to Glacier National Park was one of our favorite trips we have done! We drove and car camped in our Hyundai Tucson for 7 days straight, no hotels or accommodations! For some, that is probably no big deal, but we are used to 2-3 days. Check out our guide on how we camp in our Tucson here.

This all began in February of 2023 when we randomly saw the reservations for “Going-to-the-Sun Road” were opening the next day. We took it as a sign and decided to try to get a 3 day reservation (now it is only 1 day), even though we had no idea where we would be starting in May. Fast forward a couple months, we are on contract and planning this road >2000 mile road trip from Denver to Glacier National Park.

This will hopefully give you some inspiration to plan out a similarly epic road trip! It will walk you through our itinerary, where we stopped and slept, where we hiked, and what we saw.

Timing

When we got the reservation, it was just about getting the latest weekend possible. As one could imagine, the snow really piles up and takes a long time to clear the road. We got lucky and were able to snag one for June 30-July 2. Then we realized that we would have July 4th off for the holiday. So it worked out nicely to only have to take 2 days off (Thursday was our off day, 4 10’s schedule). Usually the road is cleared in late May or early June, but can be later depending on the year.

Itinerary

Denver to Lander, Wyoming (~5.5 hours)

Our plan was to leave after work on that Wednesday, and drive about 5.5 hours to Lander, Wyoming. This was a nice place for us to stop and sleep, in part because we found a great car camping spot on ioverlander.com at Lander City Park. Nice, quiet spot right by a river, with good restrooms and plenty of space for a good amount of other campers.

This was really only a place for us to get some sleep. It put us just about 2.5 hours from Grand Teton National Park, so we could get there with a nice, early start. Highly recommend Lincoln Street Bakery for some coffee and tasty breakfast before hitting the road.

Lander to Grand Tetons NP (~2.5 hours) to Bozeman, Montana (~4.5-5 hours)

This was planned to be a busy day of driving and hiking/exploring Grand Tetons NP. We only had a few hours in Grand Tetons, so we narrowed down what we really wanted to do. It is so pretty there, and there is so much more to explore. But, this is what we went with (in this order). For reference, we drove in from the East.

• Schwabacher Landing to get a good view of the range and some good photo ops.
• T.A. Moulton Barn and Mormon Row because you have to see the barn. It is just a barn, but a very cool barn in front of some very cool mountains.
• Hike up to Delta Lake, with a nice quick dip in the lake to cool off. Our Garmin shows 8.1 miles with ~2650 feet of elevation gain. We added in a little extra distance missing a turn, and took a more adventurous route up the scramble at the end (on accident).
• Jackson Point Overlook on Signal Mountain. Stopped here on the drive out to the north side of the park.

Our final destination for the day was in Bozeman, Montana. It was pretty much just another place to sleep for the night. So, we ended up in a Walmart parking lot with a bunch of other RVs and travel trailers sleeping for the night.

• Always double check that you are allowed to stay in the parking lot overnight.

Bozeman, Montana to East Entrance of Glacier NP (St. Mary, Montana, ~5 hours) to Apgar Campground (~1-1.5 hours)

Today was finally the day that we would get to Glacier NP! We still had a good solid drive ahead of us, but we were excited. You can start to see how beautiful this mountain range is from hours away. The drive is somewhat parallel to the mountain range, so you get a good idea of what you are in for. We made sure to fill up the gas tank in St. Mary before entering the park.

Check out our full Glacier National Park itinerary here.

This is what you see just a couple minutes in to the drive (literally jaw dropping). Glacier NP is what I (Adam) consider to be the most beautiful area that I have been to in the United States, and at least in the top 3 internationally as well (disclaimer: there are lots of beautiful places that we have not made it to yet). Even with how amazing the pictures are, they never do it justice. You have to see this place with your own eyes. it is absolutely INCREDIBLE!!!

What We Did In Glacier National Park

• Camp site at Apgar Campground on west side of park.
• Drive the full “Going-to-the-Sun Road.”
• Hike to Avalanche Lake, ~5.8 miles with 1110 feet elevation gain. Cold plunge on the far end of the lake with less people.

• Hike the Highline Trail with Grinnell Glacier Overlook addition, 17 miles, ~3900 feet elevation gain. One of our favorite hikes we have ever done!!! There are options to make it shorter and less elevation gain.

• Many Glacier. Grinnell Glacier Trail was not fully open, otherwise we likely would have tried to squeeze this one in to. Instead we just enjoyed the views and had a beer at Many Glacier Hotel.

• Lake McDonald stand up paddle board

Glacier National Park West Entrance (West Glacier, Montana) to Flathead Lake to Butte, Montana (~4.5 hours)

Before we left our campground, we did some stand up paddle boarding on Lake McDonald (highly recommend). On our way out of Glacier NP, we wanted to check out Flathead Lake a little bit. Naturally, we looked for a brewery to check out, and found Tamarack Brewing Company. We grabbed a late lunch and a beer, and headed south. Our goal was to make it a few hours south before finding a place to car camp. ioverlander.com came in clutch again, and we found a great spot in the mountains to sleep for the night.

Butte, Montana to Yellowstone National Park (Madison Campground, ~3 hours)

Yellowstone NP was our last stop on the trip. Technically, we had already been in the park as we drove to Glacier NP, but now we could actually explore. We had a reservation at Madison Campground near the town of West Yellowstone. For only having about 24 hours, we were able to see a good amount.

• Tower Falls
• Upper Falls, Grand Canyon Of The Yellowstone, and Artist Point
• Thumb Geyser and Yellowstone Lake with a nice picnic near the shore
• Old Faithful and Grand Prismatic

Yellowstone Beer Company in West Yellowstone was another great brewery that we found. Yellowstone has a lot of cool wildlife in the park. The coolest and most impressive were the bison. We drove right past one on the road, and it felt like it was as big as the SUV.

Yellowstone National Park to Denver (~10 hours)

With such a long drive, there was not much time for exploring. With an early start, the only thing we did was the grand prismatic before getting on the road. At this point, we were ready to be back home after being in the car so much for the past week or so. It was not ideal to leave such a long leg for the last day of the trip, which happened to be the 4th of July. But, it worked best for what we wanted to accomplish.

Wrap it up…

To sum it all up, this was one of our favorite adventures that we have done. It was so much fun, and we were able to see so many amazing places. The car camping and packing food and drink helped keep the cost down. We would 100% recommend a road trip like this for anyone interested in it. There were some long days, but everything was broken up pretty decently to make it more manageable.

Please feel free to reach out if you have any questions about our itinerary or what we did.

Also, check us out on Instagram and give us a follow if you are interested! @acoupleoftravelingpts