travel dates: June, 2022
Like with so many drives during our summer of mountains, I was a little worried about the one that would take us from Brigham City, Utah to Bozeman, Montana. And as with all of the drives, I needn’t have worried. With the help of the Mountain Driving Directory and a good towing setup, we were fine. It was, in fact, a really lovely drive. It took us through Yellowstone for a few miles, right along the Gallatin River (this was just a few weeks after the terrible flooding in Yellowstone, but we were lucky and nowhere we were visiting was severely affected). We even found a very cool rest area on I-15 (past Blackfoot in Idaho, I believe) that had a small network of trails through lava flow. Lava flow!
Bozeman was our first of several stops in Montana; it’s a fun and pretty touristy little city about an hour north of Yellowstone’s Gardiner entrance (we had considered doing a day trip to Yellowstone, but the flooding made that impossible. We saw Yellowstone, including the part near Gardiner, a few years ago, though). We stayed at the Inn on the Gallatin, about half an hour south of Bozeman on Highway 191.
I’ve been considering exactly how to write a review of the Inn on the Gallatin for months now. It has the best reviews of any campground I’ve ever seen, and we were very excited about staying there. But then, maybe mostly because we had such high expectations (and it had such a high price tag), we were a little underwhelmed. It had a beautiful setting, right on the Gallatin River. There were lots of thoughtful touches: lovely landscaping, homemade cookies at check-in, a nice communal fire pit, a deck overlooking the river. But it was also one of the most expensive campgrounds we’d ever stayed at, and for that we got a very tight site, no bathhouse, laundry room, camp store, etc. Absolutely no cell phone service; there was spotty wifi but we weren’t given the password and there was no one around to ask; we finally found another camper and asked for it. And we were super disappointed that the cafe that all those reviews raved about stayed closed with no explanation the whole time we were there, even though the website said it would be open the days we were staying. And it was a long drive into Bozeman, but, of course, we knew that part when we booked. Basically, we’re used to campground pricing being higher these days than in the past, but that generally comes with a lot of amenities, instead of…almost none. But it turns out the owners have decided to retire and not open this year (but also not sell the campground and cabins but continue to live there), so it doesn’t matter what we thought anyway! You can’t stay there! So I don’t have a personal recommendation for a Bozeman campground, but I can say that the other one we considered was Bozeman Hot Springs (which had far less glowing reviews, but seemed decent).
For some reason, I kept forgetting my camera in Bozeman, so you get a lot of iPhone pictures that don’t do a great job of capturing how pretty it is there. But, anyway, things we did!
Museum of the Rockies
While the Museum of the Rockies has a lot going on, what they do best, IMHO, is dinosaurs. Look–they even have a dinosaur out front:
The dinosaur galleries are extensive and impressive and worth lingering in.
They also have a cool “history hall” about the…history of the area, with some interactive stuff. And some old cars:
The kids’ area is Yellowstone-themed, and looked like a lot of fun for younger kids (maybe up to 7 or 8?) Abe was a bit old for it and also tired of museum-ing by the time we got there:
I was excited that they also have a living history farm on the museum grounds, but I was a bit disappointed by how little was going on out there. But it was still cool:
M Hike
This hike, to the giant letter M placed on the side of the hill by Montana State University students in 1915, is perhaps the most popular in Bozeman, both because of its proximity to the city and because it’s a really nice hike.
There are two ways to get to that M way up there: you can go to the right and go pretty much straight uphill, or you can go left to take a more meandering, switchback-filled route. But either way you’re going to ascend around 800 feet over a fairly short distance.
We opted for the easier route and did not have any regrets about our choice. The harder route looks STEEP. As it was, our youngest wasn’t feeling the hike that day, so our route was more challenging than it might have been. But we made it! It was crowded at the top, with several groups hanging out up there including a day camp group.
And he was in much better spirits on the way back down. Look how pretty it is even with just my old iPhone camera!
So we definitely understood why this hike is so popular; highly recommend!
The American Computer and Robotics Museum is a fun little stop, particularly if you have people with a big interest in computers or robotics. And particularly if you have a rainy day to fill. It won’t take long, but they have a fascinating collection of all things computer and robotic. The first room is a history of computing, and then things get more esoteric from there:
Don’t worry: I did an excellent job following the directions here!
We attempted to hike the South Cottonwood Trail, which is about 25 minutes south of Bozeman, but was near our campground. Unfortunately we got kind of a late start so that it was getting close to dusk, which made me extra nervous about bears, and we realized as soon as we got there that’d we’d forgotten water (for us and the dogs, all of whom we’d brought along). So we only made it about 3/4 of a mile before turning around. It was all uphill at first but then leveled out quite a bit. Word is if we’d made it a mile we’d have gotten to the first creek crossing and a nice area to hang out (and the dogs at least could have had a drink!) Oh well.
Downtown Bozeman is a great place to walk around and do some shopping and eating. We bought bear spray there! We should have bought it before, because I think it’s cheaper on Amazon than in actual bear country. We did not need to use our bear spray. But we did eat at a couple of good restaurants. We enjoyed Montana Ale Works and Smoke, Fire, and Coal, the latter of which featured an appetizer called “chicken crack” which was spicy fried chicken skin. Yes, we ordered it. 
Next up: Butte! Where things don’t go as planned.
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