St. Mary / East Glacier KOA Holiday — Hotel in Browning

Our family had such a great experience at the last KOA we stayed at, we rescheduled two stops on our 14 day trip to stay here.

Good things: The location to the St. Mary entrance of Glacier National Park was very convenient. The Many Glacier area is also nearby. The view was lovely, surrounded by mountains. Overall the park was mostly clean. We had some great experiences with a few employees. Casey was extremely helpful and Malachi was super friendly. The water was very fresh and had a good taste.

Not good things: The Wi-Fi was terrible. You’re forced to login and accept the terms of service multiple times. It’s a several step process and annoying after the first few times. Don’t expect to be able to work here remotely unless you have an alternative plan. It’s inconvenient when you can’t look up the weather or navigation around the area. They advertise streaming quality wifi at the campground check-in but often we could hardly log in. There are very few trees. In the afternoon sun, your camper is cooking on the inside. When we arrived at our site, there were many cigarette butts on the ground and a sewer smell nearby. The amenities are just okay. For $130 a night for camping, I expect more of a resort experience. The hot tub was closed on the one cool day we had. Everything here and in town was quite expensive. Make sure you’re fully stocked when you arrive or you’ll be paying a premium on anything you buy. Gas in town was $1.00 a gallon more expensive than anywhere else. Finally, we discovered that many of our desired activities (raft riding, fly fishing) were located in West Glacier. It’s a two hour drive one-way,

Lastly, my husband had a very poor experience with the owner of the campground, which was surprising in such a service oriented business. There is pizza available for delivery in the evenings. The Wi-Fi was poor so we walked up to the desk and ordered two pizzas. We ordered a large 1/2 pepperoni & sausage, 1/2 Canadian bacon & pineapple. We also ordered a small 1/2 cheese, 1/2 pepperoni. The gal told us they don’t do 1/2 orders so each topping would be full price. That was fine and we paid $45 for the two pizzas. When they arrived, the 1/2 Canadian bacon & pineapple was missing the pineapple and looked to have onions on it. My husband tasted a slice to confirm it was incorrect and went to the office to let them know the order was wrong. They asked for the incorrect half to be brought back, which he did. The girl at the desk offered to make a mini pizza, but that’s hardly an appropriate replacement for half of a large 16” pizza. Then, a woman came out of the kitchen and shook an onion at him to insist there were no onions. He said, “okay but where is the pineapple?” She never answered and loudly insisted that she made the pizza correctly. By now, my husband was frustrated about the situation and used profanity. The cook told him that she was the owner and that language was unacceptable. She told him to get out or she was going to call the sheriff. He left to de-escalate the situation. They kept the 1/2 pizza we paid for and we were never refunded anything.

There were several things that could have resolved the situation easily before becoming a problem. Maybe starting the conversation with “I’m sorry this isn’t what you ordered, how can we resolve this?” would be better than aggressively insisting she made the pizza correctly. Perhaps the order was entered incorrectly? She could have given us some pineapple and we could have put it on the pizza ourselves. They could have refunded us 1/2 the cost of the large pizza. They could have made a small pizza to our correct order. It’s such a silly thing but it left us with a poor impression of the campground. Threatening to call the sheriff for someone using profanity seems extreme. A better solution would have been, “I would appreciate if you didn’t use profanity while we work to resolve this.” The situation could have been so easily resolved and turned an okay experience...

(Warning Long In-Depth Review)

Let us first go over the highlights of my families stay. The staff are very pleasant and friendly. The views of the campground are truly stunning. The mountains off in the distance are towering beauties. The facilities are fairly close to the cabins. And the park is so close to Glacier you could walk there. The campsite is also very close to the Canadian border, so if you have any Canadian adventures in store, this is a decent stop. Coffee is pretty darn good too, coming from a coffee lover. There is also a really nice dog walk.

Now...for the reasons why this campground is receiving a one star. While pretty much most of the staff was very kind, the front office employee who helped us seemed lethargic, almost annoyed to help us. Also, this campground seems to have no security, no lights, no window tags (which are fairly regular at other KOA locations). Not even license plates are recorded. Someone could sneak in without any proactive measures in place. As the summer sun beats down on you, run to your Cabin, Tent, RV, or the pool. There are no trees or shade hardly anywhere. The bathroom facility near the cabins is close, but hoowee does the septic tank stink. They are modern and nice but the floor mats need to be cleaned just a little more thoroughly. Cabin 11 and 12 are located right next to a boarded up cabin. What happened I do not know, or want to speculate, but simply stated, it is creepy.

We stayed in a cabin, sorry if this hasn't been clear. The cabin itself was musty, needing a new coat of finish, had outside mats that smelled like urine, and didn't even have garbage bags. Most KOA's have two in every can, this one didn't even have one. Our picnic table (yes only ours) was covered by a plastic table cloth, cute, but why? There was also a cigarette butt, bottle cap, and bread clip left near our porch, guess the last guests also didn't have a garbage bag. We are a little squeamish so we wiped down our bed mats with Lysol wipes, and each one came away dirty. There were also dead bugs scattered throughout the window tracks and light covers. Gross. I myself slept like a log, thanks to long adventures in Glacier and Canada, but my mother and dog were both abruptly awoken by gunshots, continuous dog barking, and the loud refrigerator placed directly by the bed. Speaking of dogs, this campground has no dog policies, most campers knew to be courteous, but sadly not everyone is courteous...

Now for the biggest kicker of them all. THE PRICE!!! It was $160 a night for beds, a microwave, and a refrigerator. Sub-par ones, at that. I have taken many business courses and understand you have to remain competitive to stay in business, but you also have to be reasonable. Parks on the much nicer side of Glacier are cheaper or the same price for better services. A mile to Glacier and amenities are not enough to justify these prices.

Before I conclude I do want to say my family did not use any of the activities such as the pool or bocce ball, and we did not eat at their restaurant, so I will remain impartial on these and leave it up to you to see how you feel.

The East Glacier St. Mary's KOA has the potential to be great but currently is a solid no thank you. For the prices being asked, a lot of grounds work needs to be done and the cabins need major improvements. If you are desperate and need a pit stop for the night, then I would recommend this KOA, but if you are planning an awesome vacation adventure, do your research, save some money, and go...

There was some confusion when we got there though my boyfriend was ultra clear about our 16’ trailer and truck when he reserved, plus leaving a few messages to clarify after he reserved, and that we use solar, plus the reservation clearly said trailer. We reserved a tent site, since we don’t need electric unless it’s really hot. The spot they gave us was way too sloped for us to get flat. Note many of the spots there have slope, we noticed, even the ones set up for trailers with hookups. We almost ended up without a spot in peak season at Glacier! But the manager had a brainstorm and put us in a flat spot in one of their group spots. It was perfect. We had enough sun for the solar, and water right next to us. Bathrooms feet away, along with the pool and hot tub, which were always too crowded for us. My biggest complaint is that there are not enough bathrooms. I waited 20 minutes with people behind me in line, while the people in the three showers took forever. One was occupied by a family. The other two seemed to be teenagers who goodness knows what they were doing in there. This was at 9:30 at night when we’d just set up camp after a long drive, so it was not pleasant. The middle one was gross as it collects the drain from all three. But I used it once it became free. And I still came out before either of the other two that had been occupied when I arrived. The mother and daughter behind me in line were still there, and she looked exasperated. She said, ‘you were still done before the others!’ As I was leaving, the mother of one of the teens came in and apologized, trying to get her kid out of there. From then on, we drove to the bathrooms at the office instead. Those bathrooms are just not enough for all the tent campers plus the users of the pools, and people like us who prefer to use campsite showers over our little one. Also, there were both a women’s and a men’s toilet that were out of service when we got there, and maintenance did nothing until the next afternoon when we reported the problem. I don’t understand why people don’t report problems. And why maintenance didn’t fix them when they cleaned, since they were obviously out of order. One even had a sign that a camper must have put up. All that said, the desk staff there is great, the store is big with both necessities and gifts. They have ice cream! And they offer both breakfast and dinner at the pavilion. A mile off the main road, in a beautiful setting with awesome mountains and creek. Birds, squirrels, a fox, all visited. Their WiFi was only marginally usable only right outside the office, but they have new towers for high speed internet, awaiting approval from the tribe (the park is on the Blackfeet Reservation). Note only Verizon works there. After a fire 7 years ago, they apparently replaced their tower within days, but AT&T never replaced theirs. Very annoying. But not the park’s fault. Reserve early, by February, for summer. Overall good experience. Most other campers were friendly and considerate, especially considering how big...