Back Country Adventures, West Yellowstone MT

We had a great experience with this company. We took a snow shuttle in to the Old Faithful Snow Lodge and we were traveling with our 1 yr old son. They were very helpful and accommodating. Both drivers, Mike and Ben, were great tour guides on the way.

We had the best experience on a snow coach tour in January! Saw so many bison, swans, even a mountain goat, which was a rare sighting! Our guide Darren was super knowledgeable. Saw Old Faithful, thermal pools, waterfalls and more! Highly recommend!

We did a snow coach tour to Old Faithful and Mindy was our guide. We had a great trip with Back Country Adventures. Mindy was very knowledgeable of the area and did a good job sharing information and letting us enjoy the views along the way. I thought we were able to stop at each spot for a good amount of time as well. The snowcoach we were on had room for 12/13 people, which I thought was a great group size for a tour. Some other companies had a lot larger snowcoaches/tour sizes. Definitely book with them!

If you are thinking whether or not you want to try this adventure, what are you waiting for? This is by far one of the best snowmobile trips I’ve ever been on! We had Brock as a guide one day and Benny the next day. Both of these guys are exceptional. Thank you Back Country Adventures. Y’all are top notch!

Great place for winter tours of Yellowstone National Park. Great staff & guides are excellent.

“SORRY” WONT GET MY FAMILY BACK THE 8 HOURS OF FEELING ANXIOUS, UNSAFE AND LET DOWN AFTER A DISMAL TOUR BY “BACK COUNTRY ADVENTURE. ”

Date of tour - 12/26/21 8am - 4pm
(Old faithful & geysers)
Jerry - Manager
Zach - Tour / driver
Van - #4
Our group - 2 seniors, 4 adults, 2 children (2 & 4 years old)
(2 other adult guests not in our party)

I got off my second phone Call with “Jerry” the manager of Back Country Adventure feeling let down. I initially called on 12/27/21 where I kindly expressed my concerns to Jerry about our experience and politely asked for a refund. I was clear, I was direct and I didn’t raise my voice, yell or use in appropriate language. Jerry called me back this morning and said he could not give us a refund. He was rude, said he didn't care about my concerns and said "there are two sides to every story" and that "Zach" the tour guide painted a different picture. As a business owner myself, I would never dream of treating my customers this way.

Here is a very important list of concerns that I expressed to Jerry, the manager on our phone call.

We felt unsafe. (The conditions on the tour took a turn and we basically were in a blizzard.) Zach continued the tour even though we asked about safety moving forward.

Zach talking about redskins / politics saying that it wasn’t even that offensive.

Zach talked about his friend Carl twice who was killed by a bear In graphic detail including specifics regarding the injuries sustained by the deceased. (what does this inappropriate story have to do with a Yellowstone tour?)

Zach's general macabre stories and constantly reverting the conversation back to death.

Zach said it was a “suicide mission” that we even drove to Yellowstone for our tour. (Apparently he thought the weather was too bad for us to drive in but fine for him to take us on a tour?)

Constantly saying we won’t be able to get home because of the storm.

We had to ask Zach to enforce your company’s mask policy When another customer constantly took their mask off. (In a small van crammed with people)

Zach made light of the serious situation that we found ourselves in. (White out storm, sliding off the rode, getting stuck in a ditch etc.) We were all scared while he was making jokes.

Zach making a joke out of us potentially getting stuck in Yellowstone overnight and "for up to a week" because of bad weather. (We had two seniors in their 70's without their medications and a 4 year old with a medical condition with us. This wasn't funny to us or appropriate.

Zach promoted his flyfishing Business several times and told us to come back and fly fish with him.

We were in flight or fight mode the whole trip

Too many personal stories

Anxiety inducing

Why do tour in blizzard?

Driving off before everyone was buckled

Forgot to put the van in park before attempting to get out almost rear ending another coach.

Mentioned a hearsay story about a man whose wife contracted tuberculosis over the winter and her widower had to stuff her body in a barrel before burial. Made a joke about the death of the wife making the winter easier on the widower in a misogynistic tone.

Overall we thought that his priority was not our safety

He said that conditions were so bad that if he had the choice he would’ve stayed home and that kind of implies that he thought that the conditions weren't safe for him even come to work.

We learned nothing from him about Yellowstone

In the future I hope Back Country Adventures learns that the safety of their guests is more important than money.

Backcountry Adventures is who we used, Saturday January 15th. We met Darren at the Chamber of Commerce in West Yellowstone which was a great location and very easy to find. Darren was very easy going and pleasant to be around. He had vast knowledge of the park and Montana in general. He was always on the lookout to find the wild life.spotted several Bald Eagles in the van none of us could have even noticed. He would stop any time we wanted to take a photo op or just explore if we could.
Because it is exceptionally slow during the winter months and the lack of crowds along with the snow the whole experience was nothing we could have imagined. I highly recommend this company to tour Yellowstone with and please always remember to tip your guide. Great job Darren and Backcountry Adventures! We will definitely be back.

They were amazing! The people were so helpful and patient. The guide was awesome and took great care of our group. He was super patient as i was the problem child for sure (dropped something and had to break from the group, buffalos got between us and the group, my knee decided to go out). We did a tour in the park the first day and just rode the local trails the next. It was amazing. Thank you! The prices are very reasonable as well.

Great option for rental sleds in West Yellowstone. The staff was helpful. Prices were reasonable. I’ll definitely use them again when I’m in the market.

What a wonderful group of people to work with. We had such a great time. Over the top. I can’t wait to work with them again

We rented 4 sleds (2 RMK 155”s and 2 RMK 165”s). Prices were decent and the sleds were awesome. Every sled we rented had less that 300 miles on it. Gas and oil were provided daily (you will NOT need more than a tank). They all started 1st or 2nd pull, no blown shocks, or major issues.

We did break a few things, but they were understanding as we did back country riding and we’re more than fair on repair prices.

Would only recommend the option to rent shovels, beacons, and probes. We ended up having to buy them.

We rented snowmobileds one day and went on a snow coach tour the next day. The snowmobile rental was flawless. Great service, instructions and snowmobiles. Darin was our tour guide to Old Faithful and he was very knowledgeable and accommodating to everyone on the tour. He was happy to stop anytime for pictures and answer any questions. We stayed warm in the van and it was a very cold day 12 degrees for a high. We had a great time both days. A very reasonable price and great service, we would definitely recommend them!

We thoroughly enjoyed our time with backcountry adventures for 2 days. My husband & I did a day in the national forest (our first time on snowmobiles) and they made sure we were comfortable with the trail system and machines. Thanks to Chris - he was our guide for a full day in Yellowstone to old faithful. We were fortunate to see so many beautiful sights along the way. Chris was beyond knowledgeable about the park and charismatic- he made our day the best!
Thank you all

Brock was the best guide and host hands down! I had such a fun time with him! Snowmobiling is so amazing! Winter is a beautiful time of year!

Snow-coach with Pierre to the Grand Canyon of Yellowstone was a 5/5. We saw wolves eating a carcas… What else needs to be said?
Snowmobiling with Lindsay to Old Faithful was also a 5/5.
-you can’t dictate who you ride with/others in the group. Our tour was VERY slow. Lindsay did her best to accommodate everyone.

Mindy was our guide for snowmobiling and Darren for the snow coach tour AMAZING GUIDES! I highly recommend this family run business it was a great way to see Yellowstone in the winter!

This was me and my wife's first experience, renting snowmobiles with a tour and we had a blast. Considering this being my first time ever on a snowmobile, I found our guide (Lindsey) very knowledgeable and understanding in educating us before launching off. After the first 30 minutes, operating the sled became 2nd nature and fun to ride after that point. We can't thank Lindsey enough for her leadership in taking us all on an adventurous expedition to old faithful and back. Back Country has very clean and very well maintained machines to help you enjoy an amazing adventure in yellowstone. The only problem I would say I've had with Back Country, is I'm now looking to finance a snowmobile for myself cause of this experience. Thank you Back Country and especially Lindsey for an awesome experience. We'll be back!

DO NOT BOOK A TOUR WITH THIS COMPANY. THEY ARE UNSAFE, UNPROFESSIONAL AND DISMISSIVE OF LEGITIMATE CONCERNS. IF YOU VALUE YOUR SAFETY OR THAT OF YOUR FAMILY, BOOK ELSEWHERE.

What an absolute nightmare of an experience. It started with the tour guide, Zack, greeting our party by telling us he would have rather stayed home and that us driving that day was a "suicide mission". We have children of 2 and 4 who heard this comment. It was white out blizzard like conditions and the business should have not been operating that day but they clearly put profits over the safety of their clients and their employees. Zack made constant comments about poor visibility and falling off the road to an embankment or canyon because conditions were so bad. His premonition would be validated when he drove us off the road into a snowy ditch ON WRONG SIDE OF THE ROAD.

Zack also recounted brutal details of his friend's recent death on multiple occasions in the presence of children. It was wildly inappropriate and completely tone deaf and unprofessional. He joked about us getting stuck in the park, falling into a canyon and the snow coach rolling over. It was obvious that his main priority was not the safety of his passengers but including specifics about the horrible injuries and deaths that other people had suffered. He failed to educate us at all about anything other than people dying in the park. That is not why we came here. We came to learn about the park and Zack failed horribly in that sense. Zack also drove off before everyone had a chance to buckle up with further reinforces his disregard for the safety of his passengers. I can't imagine being an owner of a business and thinking this is OK.

Worst of all, when my wife called to talk to the manager, Jerry, he was dismissive and condescending and would not let her finish before he "had to go" and abruptly ended the conversation.

Overall, we paid over $1,000 to have our lives put in danger and our safety disregarded.

Do yourself a favor and book with a company that values your safety because this one is not it.