Be Glacier and Waterton Parks

One of my most successful cycling tours was in the northern Rockies of Montana and the Canadian provinces of Alberta and British Columbia. The cooler, and somewhat wetter, weather which prevails in the northern rockies means you have more greenery, forests, icefields, and rivers to ride through. By all means see Glacier National Park, and its sister in Canada, Waterton. There are high mountains, much wildlife, relatively little traffic (especially on the Canadian side) and many ice carven features such as cirques, glacial lakes and potholes.

Even more than on Colorado's Front Range, the Canadian rockies yawn onto the great prairies of central Canada. Here the flat lands seem almost out of place--even on a bicycle, it seems like only hours before you were among the towering peaks of the Going to the Sun Road. And these 'flat'land prairies can be deceiving: there are many streams the course out of the mountains. Each one carves its own basin; each one provides pleasant downhill but then a short annoying climb back up! I enjoyed this part of the country. If you continue north to Calgary--several days by bike, unless a whipping south wind makes it a one day ride at it did for me on Alberta Route 2--the distant rockies beckon you on the horizon.