Pet Friendly National Park Guide

We drove from St. Louis to Denver which was just over a 12-hour drive. We stayed in Denver for two nights so we could catch the Luke Combs and Zach Bryan concert. Our original plan was to camp at Bear Creek Lake Park for $35/night, but when we got to our campsite, it was covered in snow. Wally was SO happy to run around and play in the snow. This would have been our first night camping and we weren't fully prepared to camp in snow, so we called the hotel we would be staying at on Saturday night to see if they had any open rooms, which they did. We ended up staying at the Radisson Hotel for $300 for both nights. We got to Denver pretty late so we explored Larimer Square and got Mexican for dinner before heading to bed. In the morning, we explored more of Denver (Union Sation, LODO, Confluence Park) until we went to dinner at Happy Camper before heading to the concert. Sunday morning we woke up at 4am to head to Red Rocks to catch the sunrise before making the trek out to Wyoming.

When arriving to Jackson, we stayed at a dog friendly hotel called Continuum Hotel; 10/10 stay. Staff was super friendly, dogs were allowed anywhere you were, there was a cozy upstairs where you could sit and relax or hang out by the pool. Paid $185/night. After exploring the park, we went into Jackson Hole to check out the town, making sure to sit on the saddles bar seats at Million Dollar Cowboy Bar and getting milkshakes from Jackson Drug.

After we checked into Continuum Hotel, we picked up pizza from Dornan's and headed into the park for a picnic and saw Cunningham Cabin and Mormon Row. Before heading into the park the next day, I dropped off my dog at DogJax boarding which was $35 for the day. It took about 35 minutes from the facility to the park. Once in the park, we did a two-mile hike (it took about 1 hour) at Phelps Lake Overlook. After our day in the park was over, we went and picked up Walloon from DogJax and brought him back up into the park to camp at Jenny Lake Campground. We stayed booked site 16 for $45/night. We got up early in the morning and caught the sunrise at Schwabacher Landing then started the drive up to Yellowstone.

After catching an early sunrise at Schwabacher Landing in GTNP, we started the 3 hour drive up to Yellowstone. We stopped in Island Park, ID to drop off Wally at Spartacus Run Daycare, this was $70 for the day with a $50 deposit required. We then headed into the park with the plan to do one of three hikes: Lewis Lake Trail (8 miles, 3.3 hours), Shoshone Lake via Delacy Creek Trail (6 miles, 3 hours) or Yellowstone Natural Bridge Trail (3 miles, 1.5 hours); all trails were covered in snow so we opted to drive over to the Grand Canyon of Yellowstone. We finished our day in the park a bit early, picked up Wally and headed to our campsite for the night. We stayed at site 15 for $38/night at Lonesomehurst Campground; this was my favorite campground of our trip; we had a large campsite that backed right up to the water. The next morning we left the campsite early to check out all the Yellowstone attractions. We planned on getting to Old Faithful early, but traffic was extremely backed up because of the Bison! We saw some extremely close up and to our luck, walked right up to Old Faithful as it erupted! We then went on to see the Morning Glory Pool, Biscuit Basin Geyser, Beehive Geyser, Midway Geyser Basin, Grand Prismatic, Upper Geyser Basin and any other stops along the way! Wally hung out in the car while we made these stops. The temperature was cool enough that I didn't need to worry about him overheating and we weren't gone long enough at each stop so he was perfectly fine napping in the car! (According to the national park website, pets are allowed within 100 ft of roads/parking areas, so he was able to get some walks during each stop!)

Once we were done seeing all the attractions at Yellowstone, we made the 7 hour drive up to Glacier NP. We stopped in Big Sky, MT and to our surprise, it was pretty much a ghost town. They were in their off season, but so many restaurants were closed. We tried about five different restaurants before we went to Hungry Moose Market and Deli for some sandwiches. We had two different hikes picked out, Ousel Falls Trailhead (1.5 mi//1 hr) or Reflector Loop (4 mi//2 hrs). We then made it to our campsite at West Shore Unit Flathead Lake State Park. We stayed at an incredible site (T001) right along the water for $38/night. In the morning, Wally was dropped off at A & A Glacier boarding so we could spend some quality time in the park. We started off with a two-hour horseback ride at Swan Mountain Outfitters via the CM Russell Trail. After that was done, we picked up some lunch and had a picnic at Lake McDonald. We had planned to do a 6-mile hike at Avalanche Lake via Trail of the Cedars, which would have taken around 3 hours, but we opted to go pick up Wally and head back into the park. After picking up Wally, we picked up and burgers and shakes from Mudman Burgers and drove dirt roads to Kintla Lake and Bowman Lake, (near Polebridge) (**side note, make sure you turn towards Polebridge, otherwise you will end up at the Canadian border) There was not a soul in sight in either part of the park and it was nice to sit and relax while watching the sun go down. We stayed at Best Western Plus in Kalispell for $150/night. This hotel included free breakfast and parking and did not require a pet fee! In the morning we had breakfast at the hotel and then headed to McDonald Creek Bike Path. It is the only trail in Glacier NP that is dog friendly (as long as there is no snow). It is a 2.5-mile trail between West Glacier and Apgar Visitor's Center. While our ideal plan was to drive along Going to the Sun Rd and camp at St. Mary's campground on the east end of the park, the road was still closed due to snow, so we went around the park. There were many trails and pull-out spots with river access in the national forests that surround the park. We got to our campground at St. Mary's, and stayed at site A48 for $23/night. This was our windiest night camping. It was so windy that I ended up sleeping in the car due to the noise of the wind against our tent. At 9AM my friend woke up because she thought I had started to take down the tent, but it was the wind blowing the tent away!

If you are traveling through Bozeman with your pup, PLEASE stop at Snowfill Recreation Area. It is a 38-acre off-leash dog park that is incredibly beautiful and scenic. We could have stayed here for hours. So many friendly humans and pups! We had a 5-hour drive from Glacier to Bozeman and stopped in the Helena National Forest for a pet friendly hike. We headed to Montana Ale Works for dinner and had every intention of staying at Bozeman Hot Springs Campground. Somewhere along the way of this road trip, (in the middle of nowhere Montana) my car's check engine light came on. Autozone gave me the number of an incredible auto repair shop who was available last minute, on a weekend night. It turned out to be a faulty sensor, but Luigi ran diagnostics/fixed it fast, and soon enough we were on the road again. We did stop at the campground to check it out, but we decided to drive through the night to get to Mt. Rushmore. If we had stayed the night in Bozeman, we would have headed to Canine Beach at Bozeman Pond in the morning to let Wally run around before starting our drive. Seriously, if you ever have car trouble close to Bozeman, give Luigi a call (406-580-7649). He was incredibly helpful and extremely genuine. He even reached out a few days later to make sure we had made it back home safely and that the car didn't have any other issues on the way home.