Glacier National Park Backcountry Guide – Key Dates & Application Process

Over 2.9 million people ventured to northwest Montana and the border between the United States and Canada to visit Glacier National Park last year. There are no large airports nearby. It snows there, and snows a lot. The roads are not always open, the weather is not always considerate, and there are bears galore all through it.

Bears! Galore!

Convenience is not Glacier National Park’s calling card. What is, though, is over a million acres of the most amazing rock formations, waterfalls, lakes, and rivers you could possibly imagine, the remnants of ice age flows having their way with that portion of the northern Rocky Mountains. The sharp cliffs give their best freshwater fjord imitation, the quickness with which the mountains rise from base to peak elevation simply breathtaking.

As the National Park Service notes, there are over 700 miles of trails traversing Glacier. Some are casual laps around the over 130 lakes within park boundaries, chances to stretch your legs while walking and your necks while gazing upwards at the mountains surrounding them. Some, though, take you deep into the heart of the Glacier backcountry, providing you with the opportunity to see the features no road could ever reach – and the wildlife that calls those far reaches home.

To get there, you’ll need to have a permit. Here’s what you’ll need to go through to score one of those prized, prized permits.

Key Dates – Large Groups (9-12 people)

March 1st (from 12:00 AM MT to 11:59 PM MT) is the lone date you have to get your information submitted if you’re trying to pull off a large group trip (9-12 people).

March 4th is when you’ll find out whether or not your application was successfully plucked from the lottery system. The Wilderness Permit staff will contact you with details on how to finalize your reservations, as only 5 large groups are granted permits all season.

March 11th is the final date when you’ll have to have your reservation application completed and returned, should you be one of those lucky enough to be chosen in the lottery process.

Key Dates – Standard Groups (1-8 people)

March 15th (from 12:00 AM MT to 11:59 PM MT) is the lone date you have to get your information submitted to the early access lottery if you’re trying to pull off a standard group trip (1-8 people).

March 17th is the day you’ll find out if you hit the early access lottery. You’ll be given a specific date and time when you’ll be able to access Recreation.gov to book the trip.

March 21st is the first day any lottery winners will be able to access Recreation.gov to book their trip. This window will be open to lottery winners at their pre-determined booking times through April 30th, when the early access reservation window ends for lottery winners.

May 1st is the day the general permit sale window begins, and it runs all the way through September 30th. It’s worth emphasizing that some 70% of all permits are available for reservations during the early access lottery window, and they almost always get completely booked.

Application Information

Up until just recently, the lottery process meant you had to submit an application with your entire route planned – daily trail mileages, specific campsites, and tight date ranges. A lottery system would then pull your requested trip out of a hat, and the rangers would try to work your trip in with those that had already been randomly selected, and if your trip was already booked by someone else, well, you were out of luck on that permit entirely.

That has changed, and put more of the flexibility in your hands.

Now, you simply need to provide the most basic information for your application, like your name and basic contact information (along with the $10 fee). If you hit the lottery nowadays, it won’t be a ranger trying to fit your trip on the books alongside everyone else, it will be you searching what routes/campsites are available at your pre-determined online booking window at Recreation.gov!

With that new process comes some additional planning. Whereas it used to just be that you submitted whole trips and simply waited to find out if you got one, now you’ll have a few days (or weeks) to plan multiple routes so that when your window opens you can make sure you get to go at least somewhere even if your first choice route is already completely booked. That means you need to be prepared with alternate routes if your booking time is later in that March 21st to April 30th window – obviously, there is going to be more availability to those with the booking times closer to the first date of the window than the last.

Additional Notes

• I mentioned earlier that some 70% of all campsite availability will be open to booking to those who win the early access lottery. That leaves just 30% for all those who wait until May 1st to start planning and booking, or for those who did not get lucky in the early access lottery. That doesn’t mean you can’t still go backcountry camping in Glacier! It just means there’s a heightened importance towards planning earlier, and on getting your name in the early access lottery.
• You can’t win the early access lottery twice. So, if you do score one booking window through it, that’s your one early access booking. That doesn’t mean you can’t try for additional routes once the general booking window opens, though – if you’re aiming to pull off multiple backcountry trips in Glacier this summer, you still can (if you get really lucky).
• You’ll need a Recreation.gov account to go through this entire process, so it wouldn’t hurt to get that set up ahead of time.
• Finally, if you really just happen to find yourself in northern Montana this summer, want to go backpacking, have a window of free time, and have no permit, there are still a very limited number of walk-up permits that are held for just such a rare occasion. Spontaneity is not entirely dead, even if it’s a lot more difficult to pull off! Day-before and day-of permits can still be had, and there are inevitably cancellations (and no-shows) by people who booked their trips ahead of time. It’s a last-ditch roll of the dice, but you could still get lucky!