Fires didn't put much of a dent in visitation

Fires or not, visitation to Glacier National Park hummed along at a record pace, with 11 percent more visitors overall this year than last year.

Visitation in July, even with the Reynolds Creek Fire shutting down the east side of the Going-to-the-Sun Road, was still up one-half of one percent, with 689,064 visitors. All told, 1.331 million visitors have come to Glacier so far this year.

The fire did impact the community of St. Mary. Visitation for July was down 21 percent at the St. Mary entrance, but Many Glacier was up 3 percent over last year.

With the Sun Road closed over Logan Pass, visitation surged at Walton and the Goat Lick along U.S. Highway 2, as 38,000 people visited what amounts to a parking lot and a bathroom, compared to 22,000 in July last year. Two Medicine was also a popular place, up 12.5 percent and more than 19,000 visitors went to Polebridge in July, up 14.7 percent.

Backcountry camping is up substantially over last year, with nearly 11,000 backcountry campers in July, an increase of 24.6 percent over last year. To date, more than 15,000 people have camped in Glacier's backcountry, an increase of 42 percent over last year.