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When the entire 50-mile stretch of pavement once again welcomes cars, buses and RVs, traffic jams are common. This year, the road won’t fully open to cars until July 13, at the earliest. Before then, typically starting in late April or May, hikers and cyclists are allowed on the cleared sections of the road. Considering the upper road can see snow drifts of up to 60 or even 80 feet, it takes until June and often well into July to fully plow. It closes fully during winter and remains closed to motorized vehicles while park road crews take on the monumental task of clearing accumulated snow. Going-to-the-Sun Road is the only road in Glacier that traverses the park, running east to west over the Lewis Range’s Logan Pass. Despite the fact that we were riding along Going-to-the-Sun Road, the park’s most scenic and wildly popular thoroughfare, we hadn’t seen a car since we passed Lake McDonald and Avalanche Campground an hour earlier. Every now and then I glanced over my shoulder-as a regular road biker, I’ve developed an almost obsessive habit of checking for oncoming cars-but I didn’t see or even hear a single vehicle. Montana Scenery Mission Mountains, Montana - Image 0862 Sunset, National Bison Range, Montana - Image 0978 Mission Mountains, Montana - Image 0861.
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With scenery this distracting, you’d forgive me for dawdling. In the distance, the snow-capped peaks of the Lewis and Livingston ranges loomed. We pedaled leisurely for miles, following a thin ribbon of pavement set between a roiling creek, where icy, turquoise-green water crashed around huge boulders on one side and a steep cliff draped in emerald-green moss and speckled with wildflowers on the other. ONE SUNNY DAY in late May, my friend Sarah and I decided to spend a day biking through Montana’s Glacier National Park.