Quaint nice small towns in Montana (Missoula, Helena: mobile home, living, moving to)

[rambrush]

Originally Posted by hlazyfbar

Grew up in Deer Lodge...home of the state prison and a sawmill.....TOURISTY?????....hardly!!! Another nice "quaint", but DEFINITELY touristy place is Virginia City and Nevada City!!!

Ok Ok I do like the fresh donuts and coffee at the little bakery in town, the electric train engine did not do much though.
Park off the main drag in the residential area in the shade, then walk along the waters edge behind the ol prison. that is nice and the dogs chased a chicken back there.

[prairierose]

Three Forks or White Sulphur Springs. Some ghost towns along Hwy 12.

[tom62]

Originally Posted by billybob1050

I will be traveling through Montana in the next several months, and am interested in visiting small, quaint, charming or historic towns with old buildings, some interesting stores and restaurants. Any suggestions would be greatly appreciated. A friend told me Hardin may be a possibility. Thank you so much.

Hardin is a bit gruff. However the Pizza Hut and Conoco station were aweful handy in our travels!
Someone mentioned the Bitteroot valley towns, like Stevensville. Good choices, nice little towns. We used a building contractor from "Stevi". Also check out Big Fork up at the NE corner of Flathead lake. And another cool little town we liked was Phillipsburgh. You wont find many "old" buildings in Montana. Even the oldest from deserted ghost towns are almost brandy new compared to New England and the southeast. Enjoy your trip.

[citigirl]

Big Timber has a lovely downtown with most of the original buildings. One of the few Carnegie Libraries left standing and recently renovated. A couple of antique shops and the Crazy Woman shop has some very interesting items. The historic Sharps rifles are made in Big Timber. You would like the Grand hotel and restaurant (fine dining). If you continue onto Harlowton it was an old railroad town with a couple of really nice museums and I strongly advice eating at The Cornerstone restaurant. Some of the best food I have had in a long time! Lewiston is about 30-45 min from Harlowton also has some nice buildings.

[orygun]

We just moved to Polson and it seems like a nice quaint small town.

[citigirl]

Originally Posted by citigirl

Big Timber has a lovely downtown with most of the original buildings. One of the few Carnegie Libraries left standing and recently renovated. A couple of antique shops and the Crazy Woman shop has some very interesting items. The historic Sharps rifles are made in Big Timber. You would like the Grand hotel and restaurant (fine dining). If you continue onto Harlowton it was an old railroad town with a couple of really nice museums and I strongly advice eating at The Cornerstone restaurant. Some of the best food I have had in a long time! Lewiston is about 30-45 min from Harlowton also has some nice buildings.

I have to revise my statement about the Cornerstone restaurant. We were through there the other day and was very disappointed. Maybe they were just having a bad day....

[rickers]

citigirl don't you mean Lewistown rather than Lewiston ?
Lewiston is in Idaho.

[citigirl]

Originally Posted by rickers

citigirl don't you mean Lewistown rather than Lewiston ?
Lewiston is in Idaho.

Yes. My mistake. I'm still learning the Montana towns.

[imbobbbb]

i ate at the cornerstone a few weeks ago and it was great.of course there arent a whole lot of dining options in harlowton anyway.the sportsman inn was pretty good the other week too.

[francej16]

I live in Livingston

It's an old railroad tourist town... 3 stoplights LOL

It's cute and old. Right outside of Bozeman and about a 45 minute drive to Yellowstone