Kalispell, MT Suggestions

[Jfreek65]

Looks like we’re planning a trip to Kalispell at the end of May for a friend’s graduation. I want to turn it into a nice weekend trip and haul the TT with the dw and kids.

I saw a lot of good suggestions for flathead and Glacier on the site but does anyone have experience with rv sites closer to Town? We’d prefer our longer drive from basecamp be to head to something scenic, not the graduation.

Any suggestions welcome, thanks all!

[Bob R]

Take a look at Columbia Falls. Closer to West Glacier and not too far away from Kalispell. Should make getting to either venue reasonable. There should be some places up around Whitefish also, a quick run down 93 puts you into Kalispell.

bob

[millwright01]

I have stayed many times at Spruce Park on the River. Great park and it’s in town. Short drive to most anywhere. The park is right on the Flathead River. The managers are great people. Not a wilderness campground but we really like it and the sites are a fair size for the area.

[B-O-B'03]

We went to Wyoming last May, for the DW nephew's college graduation (not Montana I know) and it was cold as crap.

I had put in for 2 weeks of vacation, so we could see the sights and do it right.

We had booked a few days at Curt Gowdy State Park and pulled out and came home after the graduation... I told the DW "as much as I love you, I am not spending the next 2 weeks huddled in the camper with you and the dog".

It was snowing and looking around at weather for other locations within a hundred miles was not any better.

Good luck, your weather mileage may vary, but, IMHO that is the wrong part of the country for May.

-Brian

[Jfreek65]

Originally Posted by millwright01

I have stayed many times at Spruce Park on the River. Great park and it’s in town. Short drive to most anywhere. The park is right on the Flathead River. The managers are great people. Not a wilderness campground but we really like it and the sites are a fair size for the area.

Originally Posted by Bob R

Take a look at Columbia Falls. Closer to West Glacier and not too far away from Kalispell. Should make getting to either venue reasonable. There should be some places up around Whitefish also, a quick run down 93 puts you into Kalispell.

bob

Originally Posted by B-O-B'03

It was snowing and looking around at weather for other locations within a hundred miles was not any better.



Good luck, your weather mileage may vary, but, IMHO that is the wrong part of the country for May.



-Brian

Thanks for the suggestions from each of you!

And to B-O-B, yes snow is possible, but that’s half the fun. We lived in Colorado for a short spell and weird snowstorms sandwiched in between 70 degree days was the norm. As We still have school it’ll only be a long weekend so we shouldn’t suffer from cabin fever too much. And the trailer has more room than a hotel room for a 3 1/2 yr old and what will be a 1 yr old.

[B-O-B'03]

Originally Posted by Jfreek65

Thanks for the suggestions from each of you!

And to B-O-B, yes snow is possible, but that’s half the fun. We lived in Colorado for a short spell and weird snowstorms sandwiched in between 70 degree days was the norm. As We still have school it’ll only be a long weekend so we shouldn’t suffer from cabin fever too much. And the trailer has more room than a hotel room for a 3 1/2 yr old and what will be a 1 yr old.

LOL, good to know.

As a former Canadian citizen and naturalized Texan, for the last 57 years, I am out on any kind of cold weather

Enjoy, take lots of pictures and post the results.

I still want to spend a lot of time in that part of the country and now that I am retired, I plan to do it.

-Brian

[Bolo4u]

Originally Posted by Jfreek65

Looks like we’re planning a trip to Kalispell at the end of May for a friend’s graduation. I want to turn it into a nice weekend trip and haul the TT with the dw and kids.

I saw a lot of good suggestions for flathead and Glacier on the site but does anyone have experience with rv sites closer to Town? We’d prefer our longer drive from basecamp be to head to something scenic, not the graduation.

Any suggestions welcome, thanks all!

We stayed at the Columbia Falls RV park for about a week in mid-July, 2017. Its a very nice clean park and very well maintained.*** The spaces have grass and its easy in and out. One of the assistants walked us to our spot then helped to guide us in when it was time to park.

One really cool thing is on Thursdays, there is an outdoor food truck and farmers market type event about two blocks away. There were several food trucks, vendors selling different things and a wine/beer garden with a band playing, There were lots of families there.

There is a really good butcher shop about 4 minute walk outside the park, and they have really good meats, sausages and other items. Try the Taco sausage, its really good. The nice thing about how they package their ground meats, they freeze them FLAT so you can get several and they stack nicely in an RV freezer.

The park is about a 30 minute drive to Glacier West entrance, about 15 minutes to Whitefish and 20 or so to Kalispell downtown.

*** During our stay in 2017, one of the owners was having health issues and actually had left during our stay to travel to San Diego? for treatment, and I do know the park was listed for sale, but I don't know if it sold or stayed with the same owners while we were there. So things may have changed since our stay but I don't know.

There is a brand new RV park there that just recently opened, Montana Basecamp. It looks really nice and super clean. Its at the south end of Kalispell which would be about another 15-20 minutes to Whitefish or Glacier.

Off topic... We've made 3 trips there (Kalispell area) as a family (summer '17, Winter '18, and Thanksgiving '19) and I traveled there in January alone... And we are in escrow (closing March 18) to buy a home in Kalispell, and leave California.

[vampress_me]

Originally Posted by B-O-B'03

We went to Wyoming last May, for the DW nephew's college graduation (not Montana I know) and it was cold as crap.

I had put in for 2 weeks of vacation, so we could see the sights and do it right.

We had booked a few days at Curt Gowdy State Park and pulled out and came home after the graduation... I told the DW "as much as I love you, I am not spending the next 2 weeks huddled in the camper with you and the dog".

It was snowing and looking around at weather for other locations within a hundred miles was not any better.

Good luck, your weather mileage may vary, but, IMHO that is the wrong part of the country for May.

-Brian

Having lived in both Laramie and Kalispell, I can say that they have different weather conditions usually, and wouldn’t base a trip to Kalispell on Laramie weather. Curt Gowdy is up at about 8,000 ft elevation (Laramie is at 7,200 ft). Kalispell is at about 3,000 ft. That in itself had a huge impact on the weather differences. And yes, there was many a May/ June in Laramie that we would get decent amounts of snow (golfing while it was snowing the end of June is something I will not forget, it was fun). But, I would not hesitate to camp up in Kalispell the end of May. The weather up there is much more temperate than the higher elevation of Laramie. (We won’t mention the endless wind in Laramie that doesn’t help things either if it’s a little cold).

Unfortunately, the only time we had the camper back to Kalispell to visit in the past few years we stayed at the Glacier Peaks RV Park, so I can’t recommend any other places. The Glacier Peaks was definitely nice enough for us! It suited us with friendly people and decent pull-through sites in the trees. We just took Hwy 2 down to Kalispell when we wanted to head that way. Other times we’ve gone back, we stayed at a friend’s house who had full hookups by their garage. Now that was an awesome campsite!