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Beartooth Highway

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⛰️ Mountains

Beartooth Highway

Red Lodge, MT · Beartooth / Absaroka

About

US 212 climbs out of Red Lodge in a series of switchbacks and tops out near 11,000 feet on the Beartooth Plateau, where the trees give up and the world turns to tundra, granite, and dozens of cold alpine lakes. Charles Kuralt called it the most beautiful drive in America, and the views off the East Summit pullouts make the case fast. It only runs from roughly mid-May to mid-October, so check the gate before you point the car toward Cooke City and Yellowstone's northeast corner.

Highlights

Switchbacks from Red Lodge up to the 10,947-foot Beartooth PassAlpine tundra and dozens of glacial lakes on the high plateauSeasonal road, open roughly mid-May to mid-OctoberNortheast back door to Yellowstone via Cooke City

Getting there

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Curated guides that feature Beartooth Highway.

The Rocky Mountains21 places

The Rocky Mountains

Alpine lakes, fourteeners, and golden aspen along the spine of the West. The Rockies at their most iconic: the Maroon Bells mirrored in their lake, the Tetons rising straight off the valley floor, Glacier's Going-to-the-Sun Road, the red spires of the Garden of the Gods, and Idaho's serrated Sawtooths over Redfish Lake. From Colorado's San Juans to the Wyoming Tetons, Montana's Glacier, and the Idaho high country, with high passes and old mining towns in between.