Yellowstone and Glacier National Park

Day 1

Day 1: Monday, August 7, 2023
Join us this morning from the available departure location of your choice, meet your friendly onboard Trailways host and driver, then settle in and enjoy the views as we make our way West! Enjoy rest and refresh breaks along the way, as needed, as well as a stop for lunch, on your own, before arriving in Kearney, Nebraska for our first stop. Here, you’ll visit the Great Platte River Road Archway. Built over the top of I-80, this is best described as a splashy, brassy history museum that uses film, computer graphics light and sound, life-sized dioramas, reenactors and classic cars to document over 150 years of transportation and communication across America. The Archway brings the westward migration to life. You’ll also enjoy a buffet dinner while visiting the Archway this evening before checking in to our hotel for an overnight stay in Kearney.

Day 2

Day 2: Tuesday, August 8, 2023
After enjoying breakfast this morning, we depart and head for Wyoming! This evening we’ll check in to the Ramkota Casper. This hotel offers complimentary Wifi, an indoor pool with a water park, a Managers Reception, Remington’s Restaurant and Spirits Lounge. Dinner tonight will be on your own at the hotel, or the hotel offers a free local shuttle to nearby restaurants.

Day 3

Day 3: Wednesday, August 9, 2023:
Today we’ll travel through Casper, where, after lunch on your own, you will visit the National Historical Trails Interpretive Center. Not only does it have historical information relevant to Wyoming, but a fantastic view of Casper. During your visit, you’ll be able to explore exhibits related to names that are truly legendary in Western history, and on the Oregon, California, Mormon and Pony Express Trails. Through these exhibits, capture the real-life drama that the half-million pioneers experienced as they followed these trails between 1841 and 1868.
This afternoon, travel continues to Billings, Montana, where we’ll check in to the Fairfield Inn and Suites for an overnight stay. Enjoy dinner, on your own, at a nearby restaurant.

Day 4

Day 4: Thursday, August 10, 2023:
After having breakfast at the hotel we depart Billings and travel toward Missoula with a visit to historic Butte. Nestled in the grandeur of the Rocky Mountains of Southwest Montana, between Yellowstone and Glacier National Parks, Butte is Montana’s most unique city offering small-town charm with a big city feel. There are numerous eating establishments on Main Street where you’ll have time to enjoy lunch, on your own.
This afternoon, travel continues to Missoula, the cultural hub of Montana. On arrival, enjoy a visit to the Smokejumper Aerial Fire Depot, home to the largest smokejumper base in the country. The Smokejumper Visitors Center provides a unique and interactive opportunity to learn about this demanding and important occupation.
A tour of the facility includes a visit to the Smokejumper loft, the ready room, and the National Smokejumper
Memorial. There is also a gift shop and museum which includes a fire lookout tower originally built in 1930. During the summer, Smokejumper aircraft are also present, and visitors may even see Smokejumpers dispatched to a fire.
After our tour, we arrive to the C’mon Inn where we’ll overnight for the next two nights. You will love the huge timber beams, the indoor waterfall and fish pond and the beautiful indoor courtyard. This hotel offers complimentary WiFi, an indoor pool with five hot tubs, a game room and a fitness center. Dinner will be included this evening at a local restaurant.

Day 5

Day 5: Friday, August 11, 2023
Today, you’ll enjoy a full day tour of the film sites from the hit show “Yellowstone.” Your tour offers a glimpse of the country where John Dutton and his – shall we say, complicated – family live here in Western Montana’s Glacier Country.
After enjoying breakfast at the hotel, you’ll travel to and start the day in Darby, where you see Chief Joseph Ranch. This is the site of the Yellowstone Ranch, home of the Dutton family. The ranch is not accessible for tours and the driveway has a gated entrance, often with a guard in place during filming. But, we’ll stop for a photo of the Yellowstone Ranch sign and the white barns are visible from the highway. Then, stop at the Double H Custom Hat Company and get a custom cowboy hat by Jimmy “the hat man.” What could be more fitting on your Yellowstone quest?
Our next stop is Downtown Hamilton. Scenes from season four include protests outside the Montana Livestock Association where Kayce Dutton is the commissioner. Downtown Hamilton is also a great place to enjoy some free time, and have lunch, on your own.
After lunch, our next stop is at Hidden Legend Winery for a tour and tasting. Taste the sweetness of mead, a wine made from fermented honey. On a tour of the winery, you’ll be able to see mead made from start to finish with 100 percent local Montana honey and berries.
We’ll also make a stop in nearby Florence at Glen’s Café, known for its delicious pies! Here, John Dutton bought a steak for dinner for his arch nemesis Garrett (Jamie’s real dad.) Returning to Missoula, you’ll see the Community Medical Center where John Dutton recovers at the beginning of season four after being shot in the cliffhanger!
Then, see Ruby’s Café, site of the unforgettable shoot-out scene where Rip pulls the bad guy through the window! Followed by a visit to downtown Missoula where the anti-farming protest took place outside of the Livestock Association’s “Livingston” Field Office!
End the day with dinner at The Montana Club Restaurant – Missoula’s best local restaurant! Enjoy steakhouse steaks, prime rib (all Montana raised), salads, regional microbrews and cocktails in a lodge-style atmosphere.

Day 6

Day 6: Saturday, August 12, 2023
After breakfast at the hotel this morning, and check out, our first stop is the Ninepipes Museum of Early Montana. The displays contain hundreds of Western Plains Indian items that depict the past life of all the Tribes of Montana and surrounding states. These items are not reproductions, but true artifacts. Because the Flathead Reservation was opened to homesteaders, the displays also represent the life of cowboys and early settlers, the fur trade and the Black Robe Missionaries.
After a stop for lunch, on your own, we arrive at Flathead Lake for a sightseeing cruise. Flathead Lake is the largest natural freshwater lake west of the Mississippi in the lower 48 states, with over 200 square miles of water and 185 miles of shoreline. The southern half of Flathead Lake is within the boundary of the Confederated Salish and Kootenai Tribes Flathead Reservation.
After our cruise, travel continues to Kalispell where you’ll enjoy some free time on Main Street. Steeped in history and filled with locally-owned shops and boutiques, restaurants, art galleries and more, downtown Kalispell beautifully combines touches from the past with modern offerings in a charming setting. A must-see is the Western Outdoor shop located underneath what used to be an opera house that dates back to 1896. Step inside the shop and you’ll be welcomed by more than 2,500 boots and 1,500 hats, as well as all the western-inspired attire you can get your hands on.
Check in to the Red Lion Kalispell for a two night stay and enjoy the lodge and western décor of the area. The hotel is within blocks of restaurants, theaters, art galleries and shops. The hotel also offers complimentary WiFi, an indoor pool and fitness center, and an outdoor courtyard with a fire pit.
Dinner is included this evening at Mercantile Steak. The restaurant’s roots date back to over a century when the Kalispell Mercantile anchored the Flathead Valley as the premier retailer of quality goods and merchandise. Montanians from near and far depended on “the Merc” for everything from tack and buggies to household staples and cooking supplies.
Today, Mercantile Steak echoes that heritage and style with its original Tiffany-style lamps, its stained glass windows and the copper-tinned ceiling. The marble dining bar and the original rolling library ladder round out this classic Kalispell spot.

Day 7

Day 7: Sunday, August 13
After enjoying the breakfast buffet at the hotel we’ll enjoy a full day in Glacier National Park with a local guide. Established as a National Park in 1910, it is a land of mountain ranges carved by prehistoric ice rivers. It features alpine meadows, deep forests, waterfalls, 25 glistening glaciers and 200 sparkling lakes. The vistas are breathtaking, and the wildlife is abundant – it’s a photographer’s paradise.
One could say this park was built for the railroads. Who, once they became trans-continental, helped influence the construction of National Park Lodges to increase ridership. Once there was a hotel, they began to enhance the experience and the desire of tourists to visit. Going-to-the-Sun-Road, is a 50-mile engineering marvel that is one of the most scenic highways in the world. The park bought canvas-topped buses (so you can see the eagles soaring above) and painted them red – thus their nickname “Reds.” With a shortage of driver-trained guides, the park then hired native Americans and taught them to operate vehicles with a standard transmission drive. The drivers quickly earned the nickname “Jammers.”
Your touring will be on board a “Red” with a “Jammer” at the wheel and will climb over the Continental Divide at Logan Pass (6,646 feet). You will make many photo stops once in the interior of the Park at many of the most popular spots with names like Iron Teepee’s, Wild Goose Island, and Jackson Glacier.You’d be hard pressed to find a more scenic drive in the lower continental United States than the Going-to-the-Sun Road in Glacier National Park. Lunch is included today while touring the park.
Dinner will be included this evening at a nearby local restaurant before arriving back to the hotel.

Day 8

Day 8: Monday, August 14
After breakfast this morning, your first stop is the Lewis & Clark Caverns State Park. Montana’s first and best-known state park featuring one of the most decorated limestone caverns in the Northwest. Naturally air-conditioned, these spectacular caves lined with stalactites, stalagmites, columns, and helictites are electrically lighted and safe to visit. Please note: the cave access is by guided tour only and is rated as “easy”. The tour consists of a ½ mile walk, or golf cart ride if necessary, on a flat pea gravel trail.
After our Paradise Cave Tour, we continue on our journey towards West Yellowstone today. Check in to our local West Yellowstone hotel for a two-night stay this evening and have time to rest and freshen up for dinner.
Our dinner is included at a local restaurant near the hotel followed by an evening visit to the Grizzly Discovery Center to watch bears and wolves in their natural environments. The center offers every visitor to Yellowstone a chance to uniquely experience the world of grizzly bears and gray wolves. All the animals at the Grizzly & Wolf Discovery Center are unable to survive in the wild and serve as ambassadors for their wild counterparts. Before departing, you’ll view an IMAX movie about Yellowstone as well.

Day 9

Day 9: Tuesday, August 15
Enjoy breakfast at the hotel this morning before we depart for a full day tour of Yellowstone National Park. The world’s first national park is a wonderland of natural beauty and geologic oddities that has delighted visitors over 100 years. It is a mysterious land of steaming geysers, fumaroles and bubbling mud pots. A land so amazing that the first explorers to bring back tales of Yellowstone were called liars.
Today, you’ll visit the centerpiece of the park, Old Faithful! There will be plenty of time to explore the area, witness an eruption of the world’s most famous geyser and have lunch, on your own. After enjoying Old Faithful, explore more of the geyser basins including Midway Geyser Basin and the Fountain Paint Pots. After some free time, explore Old Faithful Village, on your own, travel along the beautiful Madison River as you return to West Yellowstone. Dinner will be on your own this evening.

Day 10

Day 10: Wednesday, August 16, 2023
Have breakfast at the hotel this morning before departing to make our way back to Wyoming today. Enjoy rest and refresh breaks along the way, as well as a stop for lunch, on your own, before we arrive in Sheridan, Wyoming this evening.
We’ll check in to our hotel and have time to rest and refresh before departing for dinner at Wyoming Rib and Chop House. Enjoy dinner where fabled Western history and dramatic mountain vistas meet. Sheridan is known as “Wyoming’s Jewel.”

Day 11

Day 11: Thursday, August 17, 2023
Enjoy breakfast before we depart to make our way East this morning. As we head into South Dakota, we make a stop in Deadwood. In 1876, the Wild West town of Deadwood was born when prospectors came across a gulch full of dead trees and a creek full of gold. Historic Deadwood, South Dakota is just as wild today as it was when legends like Wild Bill Hickok, Calamity Jane and Seth Bullock roamed the streets. Have some free time to shop and have lunch, on your own.
Check in to the Holiday Inn Express Rushmore South this evening and have some time to rest before dinner.
This evening, enjoy the Fort Hays Old West Chuckwagon Dinner and Music show, the Best in the Hills! The dinner consists of mouthwatering BBQ beef, chuckwagon potatoes, mesquite chicken, baked beans, chunky apple sauce, spice cake, coffee or lemonade, all served on a tin plate and cup.
When you’re finished eating, put your hands together for a hand clappin’ toe tappin’ foot stompin’ good time! The music is a variety of everything from Son’s of the Pioneer, Elvis, Saxophone medley, a little bit of gospel and of course some corny comedy! This is also where they filmed the Dances with Wolves, so you can also explore the film set this evening.

Day 12

Day 12: Friday, August 18
After breakfast, enjoy a visit to the National Presidential Wax Museum. This museum is an exciting patriotic experience for everyone. Meet over 100 lifelike wax figures, including all 46 U.S. presidents, all depicted in stunning visual recreations of iconic moments in U.S. presidential history.
Explore the stories behind the faces with a self-guided audio tour narrating the context and history of each scene. Witness the intricacies of the wax sculpture process with a seven-minute theater video showcasing the museum’s ten artists as they create America’s leaders out of wax and bring a vision to reality. Want a memorable experience? Play the part of the White House press secretary and give a speech from the teleprompter podium in a spot-on recreation of the White House press briefing room!
Today, have a wonderful buffet lunch at the Custer State Park Game Lodge. It’s a gracious native stone and wood lodge built in 1920 and listed on the National Register of Historic Places. It served as the “Summer White House” for President Calvin Coolidge in 1927 and was visited by President Dwight D. Eisenhower in 1953.
After lunch, enjoy an off-road buffalo safari Jeep tour at Custer State Park. Drive past herds of free roaming buffalo, antelope, prairie dogs and more. The wildlife in this park is beautiful.
The last attraction of the day is Mount Rushmore, where you’ll have a chance to walk up close to the monument, visit the artists studio, and then enjoy dinner and the evening lighting ceremony.

Day 13

Day 13: Saturday, August 19, 2023
After breakfast and a leisurely check out today, we’ll head out towards Sioux Falls, but your first stop is one the world’s most well-known roadside stops. It’s hard to believe this tourist attraction got its start with something so simple – free ice water! Stop at the famous Wall Drug Store where you’ll have lunch, on your own.
While traveling today we’ll stop in Mitchell, South Dakota and visit the original Corn Palace. It was originally built as “The Corn Belt Exposition” in 1892. Early settlers displayed the fruits of their harvest on the building exterior in order to prove the fertility of South Dakota soil. The Moorish Revival building is decorated with crop art; the murals and designs covering the building are made from corn and other grains, and a new design is constructed each year.
Lodging tonight is at the Best Western Ramkota Hotel in Sioux Falls and dinner is on your own at the hotel restaurant or downtown Sioux Falls.

Day 14

Day 14: Sunday, August 20, 2023
Enjoy one last breakfast with your fellow Trailways Travelers this morning before we depart to make our way back home today with our wonderful memories made out West!