Going to Glacier NP! Your advice?

funny you mention the stratospire 2, that is the tent I wanted to bring.

Awesome shelter–a real game-changer in my opinion.

Like I said, I've never had trouble pitching it at GNP campsites. Because of the large footprint, I did have to do a little creative thinking a couple of times (roots and such), but never any problems.

The SS2 heading caught my eye…
Yes it does have a largish footprint but it will stand up nicely without the vestibules (either or both) in place.
Something like this :

So the apex guylines provide the lateral tension and the vestibule fabric is either loose or tucked in (as in the photo) with a pack on top.
The trick here is to set it up sleeping rectangle first , ignoring the vestibule bits.
not that I expect this to be needed but just in case…
BTW , basically it is like this but just with the sides down :

Clayton, every time I've been looking at the availability, it has been in the evening. I checked this morning when I woke up (7am central), and there were many more sites available than there had been in the previous two days, which matches what you saw. If that is the case when we arrive, we should be able to get some nice sites. I don't know if it being Sunday morning will help or hurt, we will aim for an early arrival and wait it out.

So, what do I need to look for to get right to the permit office? Certainly not a sign that says visitor's center! Is it very clearly marked and easy to find? I'm looking on the park map but I don't see it shown.

Stephen, how was your trip? The weather changed pretty dramatically for the time you were supposed to be in, but I still had some great (but wet) days in the park.

What about your group? Which permits did you get?

Hey Clayton, thanks for all the help in preparing for this trip. And a special shout out to Dave, whom I was fortunate enough to meet in the park that Sunday morning.

Sunday morning we woke up before 4am to get to Apgar by 5:20. There were three people ahead of us, including a guide who had gotten there at 3:30! I wanted to get the north loop, but Stoney, Granite, etc. were booked solid. I got an out and back of (Many Glacier)-Helen Lake-Glens Lake Foot-Elizibeth Lake Head-(Many Glacier). The weather was pretty good for this itinerary, enough clouds to keep it cool but not too much rain. The first day was 14.4 miles which was a lot for us (straight out of the office) and we didn't hit the trail until noon, but we were rewarded by an awesome double rainbow as we turned the corner into camp at around 8:45pm. Oh, met a guy on the trail who had just taken the bar and was backpacking in a few different parks for 4 weeks. His buddy had bailed but he was pressing on. This guy was crazy heavy, but at least he was out there. He had a giant cotton covered K-mart special sleeping bag covered in a trash bag, and told us about how he was looking in his pack and "found" some cans of soup and some bottles of beer (yeah, full glass bottles). I think his last name was Umble (or as we do it in Texas, Humble with a silent H).
Day 2 to GLF was much more "in the woods" than I had expected, still pretty, though. Came across Mr. Umble again, who had taken a wrong turn and gone out to GAB instead of taking the left toward Glen's Lake. He was laboring under that load, with a DSLR in one hand and his pot and cup hanging and clanging from his pack. I know you should stay together in bear country, but I went well ahead, figuring being mauled by a bear was better than listening to that clanging for the remaining two miles! I later had a lot of fun calling his walk the "Umble Stumble". But hey, he was out there. At GLF met a guy who worked for a food company and had some ideas on packaging food specifically for Jetboils. I'm not sure the idea is something I would buy that often, but I think that the regular REI shopper might dig it, and riding on the popularity of the Jetboil seems like a good idea.
Day 3 to ELH, very familiar with this part of the park by now. Met the guide that was in front of us at Apgar (Drey) who was great to talk to and schooled us on some great looking trail food. Pretty short day so we got to relax a little.
Day 4 back to Many Glacier, came upon a bull Moose 50 ft. ahead of us on the trail, very cool and not aggressive. In fact, we made all kind of noise and he never so much as twitched an ear at us. Still, "Moose out, Mace out!", which is probably only funny if you had previously been making fun of people who wear "Suns out, Guns out" t-shirts, and if there is a huge moose in front of you, and you have pepper spray. We went around him off-trail without incident.

As we arrived back at Many Glacier, we saw the sign that Fifty was closed due to bear activity. In the parking lot we walked passed a car where someone had accidentally discharged their pepper spray inside. A rental car… Went to the permit office, and was greeted by a crusty girl with "have you seen the weather forecast?" and she informed us that "the backcountry has cleared out". We had wanted to do either Gunsight or Two Medicine with the time we had left, and got permits for (Two Med)-Upper Two Med-Oldman Lake-(Two Med) loop starting the following day, reasoning that we could think about it after we got something to eat. We decided to try to get a car campsite at Two Med, to which the ranger gave us a snarky "gooood luuuuck". We did get a site there, after a surprisingly long drive from Many Glacier to Two Med. The next day we decided to hike out to UPT, giving ourselves complete permission to bail the next morning instead of following the itinerary and going over the pass. After the short hike to UPT we had lots of time to kill, and soon enough a cool French guy named Denis joined us, followed by a group of three girls who I thought were going to annoy me, but we all ended up having a great time despite my being an introvert. The flask of whiskey and chocolate they passed around helped a great deal.
Day 6 – to press on or to bail? The previous day and night had not been bad, so up we went, with all in agreement that it might suck for a while and we could bail if anyone got uncomfortable on the way up. This turned out to be a rather bad choice, and was one we made in part because we hadn't studied the route very well at all. I had taken and quick look and had seen two passes along the way, and wrongly assumed that we would just be going over the passes and would be somewhat lower for much of the day. Reality was that when we got to the first pass, we had to continue up even further and then stay at higher elevation for about 6 miles. The wind and rain was very cold. My OR Helium II wet through, I didn't have waterproof mitts, and the only protection I had on my legs was a rain kilt. Because of the fog and repeatedly switching sides of the ridge, it felt like we were making no progress toward better conditions, and it was hard to judge our distance or if we were going the right direction. Eventually we saw a sign near the second pass and were very eager to get off the mountain. When we finally got to Oldman two of us were pretty stupid from the cold. We considered pressing on the remaining 6 miles back to the car, but my brain was having a hard time making a decision so we made camp, ate, and I took the Jetboil back to the tent to make a hot water bottle for my thoroughly cold feet. Once I actually got my feet warmed up I was able to sleep pretty well despite the chilling wind coming down from the mountain and through my tent (I really understood the appeal of the semi-solid inner for the Notch – but I was stuck with trying to shield my legs with the rain skirt.
Day 7 – We stumbled back to Two Medicine to the glorious fireplace in the General Store to warm up and dry out a little. We left the park and had lunch at the very cool Two Medicine Grill in East Glacier, and then it was back to Kalispell for showers and clean clothes. We couldn't get the only open shipping store to let us ship our bear spray back to Houston, but they wouldn't go for it. My friend called the local outfitter (Rocky Mountain Outfitters?) in Kalispell, and they said they would take our spray and donate it to one of the conservancy groups nearby, which we thought was much better than throwing it away (we didn't think to leave it at the permit office on the way out.)

All in all it was a great trip. The couple I went with were great trail companions and we had a fabulous time. I'm pretty sure we'll be taking another backpacking trip in the future.