Babb, Montana, United Statessep 7 Johnson's campground - Babb MT little north of St Mary's Entrance to Glacier NP
| Johnson's of St. Mary | |
| 21 Red Eagle Road | |
| St Mary, Montana, 59417-9701 | |
| Phone: | (406) 732-4207 |
I woke up very early today. I was up a few minutes before 5 AM! I went down to check on the breakfast but only the coffee was usable so I went to the car to get a banana, granola and took the rest from my room refrigerator. I made a pot of coffee in the room coffeemaker with cremora and mixed it together with the breakfast one and yesterday's English toffee cappuccino. It was now tolerable. It seemed as if everything I needed to do to pack up, I needed to something before it. As it was, I brushed my teeth before finishing the potato salad so I could wash the container. Oh, well. Just before 7:30 am, I managed to get out. Getting up so early really didn't help at all.
All I really wanted to do was drive to Glacier National Park and get a campsite - preferably for more than one night. So I headed west. I think I stopped first for some field pics, then there was an abandoned farmhouse that I passed and then turned around and went back and spent quite awhile taking photos of it. It was not that old I don't think. It had a modern washing machine or dryer in it. I began to think about abandoned farms and machinery. There are a lot of junk yards and junk car lots around here. I guess they don't need to recycle them so much because space and unsightliness is less a problem. I think in ND I saw far fewer old abandoned buildings and fewer junkyards. Pawn shops, these ranch towns have their necessities, the grain silos and ag supply companies, the casinos and bars and tobacco shops.
What do the women do, I wonder. Maybe, the same.
I think my next stop may have been a field that I wanted to photograph that was across the train tracks and when I went to go back, the train crossing lights were blinking and a train was coming. Then the train sat on the tracks. I could not see an end in either direction. A man in a truck was in front of me and a woman in a car, behind me. Eventually the woman got out of her car and started talking to the man who also got out. I got out too. Then I asked, so this isn't typical? And they both ignored me completely - they didn't look at me, they just talked to each other. It turns out that these long, long trains are a problem because they block the intersections for so long that people can't get to work on time. There aren't many overpasses. I saw one overpass in one of the bigger towns. When the discussion turned to how to get around the train and move on, the lady lightened up a little and would look in my direction. She went back to her car and then the man talked to me about the roads and gave me directions for how to get around.
I ended up not backtracking though. I just started my car when the train started inching along. It took awhile before the train got up to speed and went totally past. It was a huge number of cars - lots of BNSF where the SF was Santa Fe. )Burlington Northern Santa Fe Railway) It was an interesting experience.
Next I must have made a few more stops - one for lunch in Shelby MT, more for gas, a rest stop or two, and then I was approaching Glacier NP. When I went to look for the Visitor Center, I found that I should have looked at the map earlier because I was too far south coming in on rt 2 as I did. For some reason, I thought rt 2 turned into the Highway to the Sun. Maybe I should have stayed there (where I originally reached the Park) because they had the only campground with any opening in the entire park....except for back country probably. So I talked to a few fellow travellers and found out I had to go north to get to the visitor center and it would be about 40 miles. The road I was on led north so I followed it for the first 12 or so miles and it was hairy. I don't like roads with cliffs and no guardrails. They had a couple of signs poking up but what good would that do to prevent you from rolling off the top of a cliff? So the views were utterly amazing , so beautiful, but I couldn't look because it was too scary, plus I was driving. I didn't want to pull off on the pull-offs because they didn't seem to have guardrails either.
. Finally I got onto hwy 89 and it was not hairpin turns over cliffs. But I had a problem with a worsening squeal on rt 49 and now I was thinking this could compromise my Glacier NP visit.
When I finally got to St Mary's Visitor Center, I parked and then walked to the visitor center once I figured out where it was. I followed a couple whose van had that same squeal. I asked the man about it and he said he thought it was the breaks: If the noise got worse when you went fast, you definitely had a problem, but he had come from Wisconsin with the squeal. So I was comforted but maybe that is not a good thing. Once the car cools, it gets better for awhile. When it overheats, it gets worse. So I talked to a ranger inside with all my questions - only the one park campground back where I had come from, but several private ones in the area. Only one company giving bus tours and I tried googling them but their website is too confusing for me. I cannot tell where you have to be picked up - or if I can, it is not where I am, so maybe I can try on the west end before I leave the park.
I got my stamp and a sticker so now I am all set.
I googled a campground from the parking lot and got a site in Johnson's campground here. It is probably the worse one so far. Not horrible - a decent picnic table, a decent space for car, not much space for tent, but I decided not to stay another night so I will not put it up. There is a shower. There is a notice in the bathroom not to wash dishes there but there appears to be no water that I can find - no faucets - and no electricity except there is supposed to be wifi at the office but they are closing for employee appreciation day at 4:45 pm. I am lucky that I am in a wooded area with decent cover, close to the little brown house by private paths, but so far the picnic table is in the sunlight and it is still hot around 5 pm. or is it only 4 or so??
It will be another early night because there does not appear to be much to do here unless I walk down and party in one of the bars in St Mary's. It is not too far, but I am not so inclined really.This is all for now.
2025-05-22