Indian Springs / Eureka, MT

Rodeo, small-town stores, Glacier NP drive, golf course views and a drive that took our breath away.

Eureka is a tiny town tucked into the far northwest corner of Montana, with a population of just over 1,000 people. It’s about 10 miles from the Canadian border, and it’s clear the crossing gets used often. If you cross here, you’ll find yourself heading toward Cranbrook, British Columbia, one of the larger cities in that part of Canada.

Just north of Eureka is Indian Springs, a quiet little community built around a scenic golf course. Beautiful homes are nestled along the fairways, and the area has two RV parks. We stayed at the more traditional one, a gravel park with enough room for our Super C and Jeep. It had a well-maintained clubhouse for check-in and a bathhouse that was impressively clean and central. Each site included a fire ring, and the park sold firewood right from the clubhouse (even delivered it to your site if you asked).

Though Eureka is small, it’s got a couple of great places to eat. Cafe Jax was our go-to for breakfast, the food was solid, even if the staff felt a little scattered. But the standout was Front Porch Dewey Burger & Fish Co. The burgers were excellent, but what really caught our attention were the display cases filled with Lego builds, especially Star Wars sets and other memorabilia. A fun, quirky place that somehow makes you feel like a kid again.

We spent two weeks in Eureka, giving us a good chunk of time to explore. One weekend, we took the drive back through Whitefish and on to Glacier National Park (more on that in a future post). But just before we left, we saw flyers for a local rodeo and decided to go. It was my first rodeo ever and it turned out to be one of the most memorable nights of the trip.

If you’ve never been to a real rodeo, you’re missing out. It’s an action-packed event with almost no downtime. Calf roping, bronco riding, bull riding, riders get in, do their thing, and get out. It’s all grit and timing.

But for me, the event that stole the show was the barrel racing. I’m not even sure I have the right words for it.

If you don’t know anything about Barrel racing,  it’s a women’s event where three barrels are set in a triangular pattern, with the third and final barrel at the far end of the arena. The rider and horse enter at speed from outside, pass either the left or right barrel, and then make a tight loop around it. From there, they accelerate across the arena to the second barrel, loop it, and then charge full tilt toward the third.

And that third turn, that’s when it all changed for me.

As the rider and horse approach the final barrel, you can feel the intensity build. You sense something big is about to happen. And it sure does. They round that last barrel with a precision and power that’s hard to describe. The horse digs in. The rider shifts her weight. There’s this brief, electrifying moment where both of them are all in, no hesitation, no second chances.  Then comes the sprint for the finish, and it’s like a rocket ignites under them. The sheer force and speed in those final seconds is breathtaking.

And just as like that, it’s over. They cross the line and somehow come get back to a walk before they hit the end-wall like nothing happened.

That one event moved me more than I expected. Two athletes locked in perfect rhythm. My hat’s off to the women who barrel race. You earned a fan that night.

As our time in Eureka wrapped up, we needed to head out of town in a different direction, on Montana Highway 37. We had no idea what we were in for.

The weather was overcast with light, on-and-off rain. MT 37 quickly led us to Lake Koocanusa (thankfully I’m typing this because I still have no idea how to pronounce it). This massive, 90-mile-long reservoir was formed when the Libby Dam was built in the early 1970s, backing up the Kootenai River. As we started down the eastern edge of the lake, the speed limit said 55 mph, but the road begged us to slow down and soak it all in.

And what a drive it was.

For over an hour, we followed the lake’s edge, sometimes right at water level, other times climbing high above it with sweeping views across the water. The scenery was simply jaw-dropping. Low clouds draped the mountaintops. Towering pines lined both sides of the road, their reflections rippling across the still lake surface. The road rose and dipped, turned and twisted, every stretch revealing new, cinematic views.

This wasn’t just a scenic drive. It was one of the most beautiful and unexpected stretches we’ve encountered in two years of full-time RV life. The kind of drive where the views just keep getting better, where even the rain adds something to the mood. Where you find yourself saying, “Wow, just wow”

We ended the day just outside Coeur d’Alene, Idaho, right between there and Spokane, Washington, perfectly positioned to explore both. But honestly, even now, it’s that drive down MT 37 I keep thinking about.