About Glacier County, MT

My husband loves trains. This trip to Glacier National Park we stayed at a Hotel that had train tracks in the back, so we knew when trains were passing. Then we would head out and "chase" the trains. This Amtrak train had left the Izaak Walton Hotel about 30 minutes earlier. I'm sure the views from the train are spectacular of the all the scenery around there.

These two Burlington Northern Sante Fe engines are passing under a pedestrian walkway, I think it is the one from the Izaak Walton Hotel.

Sorry, this one is a little blurry. The Izaak Walton Hotel is converting this engine into living quarters. It should be ready to rent by November. You can contact the Hotel for rates. They also have cabooses you can rent to sleep in.

Call me when you are ready to buy, sell or build in the Houston/Tomball area. Liz Flint 832-816-8066 sales_by_liz@hotmail.com, Century 21 Hardee-Team Realty and Hardee-TexStar Homes

If you love trains, you need to visit this beauty at the Izaak Walton Hotel near Glacier National Park in Montana. It is being converted into a small apartment with sleeping quarters and living room. The renovation wasn't complete before I left the area, but it should be really wonderful. The hotel also has 4 cabooses you can rent and sleep in as well. They also have a regular hotel which is modeled after a train station.

This picture is kind of blurry, but you can get the gist of the construction. The rooms are very quiant, and the railroad tracks are right behind where I was shooting this picture from. A train fans dream.

This is looking toward the train yard with the hotel behind me. They also have that above the rail platform so you can take pictures of the Amtrak and freight trains that come through here. While the trains pass through 24 hours a day, they are very quiet at night.

Call me when you are ready to buy, sell or build in the Houston/Tomball area. Liz Flint 832-816-8066, Century 21 Hardee-Team Realty

The drive from Paradise to Kalispell took us along Flathead Lake for almost an hour. What gorgeous scenery. In my Missoula e-PRO Class one of the participants said there are over 150+ listings on the lakefront and none has sold in the past 6 months. Seems what I am hearing as I travel, is that the under $200,000 and first time homebuyer market is getting busier in most areas, especially in the last 60 days, but the higher end market buyers are still on the sidelines.

We ate a nice Father's Day dinner at Famous Dave's BBQ in Kalispell. It was tasty and then we swam and enjoyed the Jacuzzi at the hotel.

After an e-PRO Workshop in Kalispell where 7 out of the 8 attendees sign up, we took off to stay in the Glacier National Park Many Glacier Hotel.

We had planned to drive the famous Road to The Sun, but 12 miles of it are still not open due to snow. All of the mountains still have lots of snow and this is the second time in 2 weeks we've been in snow! How amazing for June for us desert rats.

We drove some new roads as we went on the perimeter drive around the park to get to the hotel

On Route 49, suddenly the cars in front of us stopped and we could see cars stopped coming the other way. We thought perhaps an accident, but then saw others out with their cameras. There was a large, brown mother bear and cub about 100 feet from the road ambling through the woods. The motorcycles behind us weren't as entranced and as they revved their bikes and passed between the cars, the bear ran off. We also saw deer twice on the side of the road. Last week I forgot to tell you on the drive back to Paradise from Poloson , a deer ran into the back of my car...thankfully, this time the deer stayed off the road.

The weather was very blustery. Raining hard with a strong wind, we thought it would change to snow at our altitude but it never did. One of the original railroad hotels, Many Glacier Hotel was built between 1910-1914. Many Glacier Hotel is situated on the shores of Swiftcurrent Lake and rests at the base of Mt. Grinnell. This Swiss-themed hotel has 214 guest rooms and offers a fine dining. We had hot chocolate followed by a trout dinner. Red bus tours, boat cruises and David Walburn evening entertainment are available at this extraordinary hotel. Our cozy room on the 4^th floor with a lakefront view. There was no cell phone reception, no internet, no TV's but the views were inspiringly breathtaking.

Glacier is a wonderful place to visit in the summer and fall. Early in the summer some of the park roads are closed by snow so July is a good time to go. The wesite http://www.glacier.national-park.com/info.htm will link you to information about Glacier and how the progress is going for this year on snow removal and road closures. Glacier was made a forest preserve in 1900 and became the 10th national park in 1910. I was encouraged to visit this area because our climate is changing and the glaciers are melting. We saw a lot of wildlife, some of which was in the road in front of our car! There are fantastic lakes in Glacier and on the way there. I love the streams full of rapids, the mountains, and the wonderful smelling pines trees. Here is a picture. Enjoy!