Bill, Beth, and Matthew's Ramblings: Out of the parks, into Montana.

Montana - Day One

On Friday, June 25, we left Grand Tetons and drove north, headed toward Glacier NP (but not immediately). Yellowstone NP is north of GT NP, so we went into Yellowstone again through the south entrance, drove north, and exited the park through the west entrance. Actually this let us see a part of the park we had not seen before - there is a stretch of the Madison River (remember that name) that flows through the park and the west entrance/exit road follows the river. We were able to see some eagles and a trumpeter swan.

Soon we were out of the park. There is a little town right at the entrance. As soon as we saw the McDonald's, Matthew knew we were back to "civilization."

We were in Montana at this point and continued to drive north and west. The terrain was kind of bleak. We followed the Madison river and we could see boats and people doing fly fishing, but the landscape had very few trees. We followed a valley with mountains in the distance. We drove along and went to Virginia City, a former booming gold rush town that became deserted and is now kind of a tourist attraction.

After Virginia City, we drove to Dillon. You've never heard of that, right? Well, Beth wanted to experience some "real" western town in addition to the touristy ones. Friday night, so we went to a rodeo! (As you might recall, the previous Friday we were in Cody and went to a rodeo.) This was the real deal, however. There was the usual bare back riding and roping and barrel races. There was also a new event for us - tag racing. In this event one person (usually a man) rides a horse and ropes a calf as quickly as possible. But there is another person (usually the guy's wife) on foot who has to run up to the calf and grab a ribbon that's been attached to the tail, and then run back to the finish line. There was a tremendous thunderstorm about 20 minutes into the rodeo, but the show continued. Fortunately it cleared up pretty quickly.

That last one shows the woman grabbing the ribbon (or something). Here is some fancy footwork or photography by Matthew.

Oh, Matthew loved our hotel! There was also a bike race going on in Dillon and Beth got the last room in the inn, more or less. It was a suite! Three beds! Three TVs! After five days in national park lodges with no TV, Matthew was in heaven! He wanted to spend the rest of our vacation right there!

Montana - Day Two

On Saturday we drove from Dillon to Bozeman. We visited the Museum of the Rockies (lots of dinosaur displays).

Montana - Day Three

This was a full day. We saw a prairie dog town outside our hotel window. After being in national parks we were accustomed to seeing them, but it was strange to see one in town. We went to church at a local UM church. They were celebrating the end of their vacation Bible school week. The theme had been "Blast Off" or something like that. At one point during a puppet show a local celebrity joined in. He had been a scientist on one of the shuttle flights 25 years ago!

We left Bozeman and drove north west, again heading for Glacier. We saw lots of signs for Lewis and Clark and it turns out that not far from Bozeman is the headwaters/starting point of the Missouri River. There are three rivers that come together to form the Missouri - the Madison (remember that from Yellowstone), the Jefferson and the Gallitan.

This is kind of cool not only because Lewis and Clark where there, but also Bill and Beth visited this spot about 15 years ago when we spent a week at a dude ranch outside of Bozeman. Small world.

There was a town at this spot in 1867 and this building is all that remains. Beth and I took a picture of it 15 years ago!

After this excitement we drove north to Great Falls. This was another big deal place for Lewis and Clark because they travelled up the Missouri river on their trip and they encountered a number of rapids and waterfalls in this area.

Along the way we passed by Helena, the state capital.