Driving through Montana toward Yellowstone

Sunday - Monday Sept 18 and 19


Spent the day driving from Missoula, Montana to what we hoped would be Cody, Wyoming.  Along the way we encountered a Prison Museum in Deere Lodge Montana.
    Facts:  the Old Montana Prison was built by inmate labor, this turn-of-the-century fortress was home to at least one member of Butch Cassidy's "Wild Bunch".  

It was really creepy walking through the hallways and into the cells, but it was interesting all at the same time.  The conditions were less than I could imagine living in.  We went down to "The Hole" where they put prisoners in solitary confinement and that was little much for me being claustrophobic.  


After we left Deere Lodge we traveled to Bozeman, Montana.  Just outside of the town there, we almost missed it, was the Grizzly Encounter, as seen on NATGEO TV.  We stopped there and saw Brutus the bear and Sheena.  What magnificent creatures bears are.  Just to be in there watching them was amazing.  

The wind was whipping around us and Tom was getting tired so we stopped and fueled up.  We spent our first night as Wal-Martians in a Wal-Mart parking lot along side a couple other rigs.  It wasn't so bad until the guy who cleans the parking lot did a couple of laps around the motorhome with his sweeper at 3:30 in the morning.  We ended up getting up around 4:30 am and heading to Cody.  

Currently in Missoula

We are currently in Missoula Montana for a little rest and business.  Travel day tomorrow to Yellowstone National Park.  One of the first stops we plan to make on this adventure.  Check back for updates.  I will try to post daily or every other day on the blog to not get behind.   Thanks for traveling along with us.

Our Big Fork Adventure Continued.....

The following  day we headed out early to Glacier National Park for our day in the Park and our drive to on the Going to the Sun road.  This drive was beautiful with lots of great picture opportunities. 

The waterfalls looked and sounded fabulous, as we hiked a little closer to them one could feel the chill come from the water.   It was truly a breath of fresh air because it was really warm up there in the park that day, close to 86 degrees.   The glaciers were truly melting.  We filled our water bottles with glacier water and drank it as fast as we could, ice cold and refreshing.   There were some guys diving in the ice cold water and swimming around a bit.  They couldn’t stay in long that’s for sure.    

Our Big Fork Adventure

We arrived in Big Fork on The Flathead River, to a beautiful place, I will call paradise.  A new friend to us on this adventure has a house on the lake which has a motorhome pad.   This is most defiantly paradise in Montana.   We were greeted by the locals, Bambi and her mom.  

We had dinner on the porch with a burning orange and red sunset.  An eagle graced us with his presence and then  glided away.  

Some turkeys came to greet us too.  They were very cute.  All we did was shoot them with the camera.  No turkey dinners here !!!

The New Beginning

The summer came to an end Idaho for us a little bittersweet if you ask me.  We packed the truck with a lot less stuff then we had when we left Redondo Beach, that's for sure.  After many ebay sales, craigslist listings, and yard sales we downsized even more.  Now our stuff is in a safe place waiting for our return after our adventure.   We now begin living the dream of traveling this country, meeting people, seeing what there is to see, learning about our history and ourselves.

The final month went faster than expected.  I (Lorraine) had the single best summer I ever could have had with a terrific brother who I got to spend time with like I never have before.  It's a summer I will cherish forever.  It made the beginning of this trip the best way to start.  We had great BBQ's on the weekends, spent mother's day, father's day and the 4th of July together.  It was quite a summer.  Thanks to them for the hospitality.  I could not be happier right now. 

 My brother and his wife (above)

Here we are on the last weekend saying bye.  Verlin (in the riding gear), Jan, Tom !!  Chloe is the Brown dog  and Hunter is the blonde dog.   

More updates this weekend about our boat trips on the lake, our trip to Glacier National Park and our Zip Line Tour...coming soon!!!!

HIAWATHA BIKE TRAIL AUG 1, 2011

This is the beginning of the Hiawatha Trail...It's a rails to trails kind of path.  Used to be an old railroad track winding 15 miles through the mountains.  The original trains ran from Chicago to Seattle.  The 15 miles is all downhill on a slight grade.   We passed through 4 tunnels, the first being the longest and most scary for me.  I (Lorraine) am a bit claustrophobic so it made for a little panic in the beginning.  We needed to have good lights on our bikes since the first tunnel is 1 3/4 miles long.  It stays a chilly 45 degrees all year round in there.  The temps outside that day were over 80.   So we packed up and moved on to the bikes with cameras in hand.  

Here is the end of the first tunnel.  My hands were ice cubes and my teeth were chattering.  Our lights were barely enough to see though blackness of this tunnel.  It was a crazy ride.  I kept wanting to open my eyes wider but that didn't help and I probably looked like an owl.  

Upon venturing out of the tunnel we were greeted with this beautiful waterfall that sounded as wonderful as it looked.  I think I could have sat there all day and just enjoyed it.   It would have been nice to dive in had I not been a Popsicle from the first part of the ride. 

Tom plopped himself down and starting snapping away to his perfect shot.

This was the end of the tunnel opening.  See it's a wee bit dark in there.   The smell actually reminded me of Pirates of the Carribean at Disneyland.

The was the next tunnel.  Not so bad since we could see the other end.

One of the first crossing over a tressel.

It's very high.  YIKES!!

Looking back at the tressel we crossed.

Here we go again......across another tressel and then

another tunnel....

This next tunnel they kept us out of and we rode around it.

We were told not to feed the animals, should we encounter any.  I don't think the other people before us or this little guy got that memo because he was very friendly and seemed to know what we were there for.  I figured he knows how to pose for the camera and then get a cracker...

The rest of the trail was pretty much like this....Which was just a joy to ride.   When we got to the bottom we had the option of riding back up or taking the shuttle bus.  We opted for the shuttle bus since we purchased tickets and Tom's knee couldn't do much more.  The bus took us back up the hill to the long tunnel we did in the beginning and we had to done the jackets and ride back through the black hole of darkness to the other side.  

I must say it was a splendid day...

And the funniest part of the day was coming out of the final tunnel with a stripe of mud up both our butts from out back tires spewing the muddy water up.  Our backpacks and backside had this stripe, as did everyone coming out of there.  Too funny.

Update

,I really didn't realize how long it has been since I have updated again. Since we are not traveling and have been staying put here in Idaho there's not much to blog about.  We are just living life.  We continued to have problems with our coach and have been attempting to fix them.   Here's a review of last 2 months.

June 1 We moved to a cute little RV park called Alpine.  It was in a wooded area behind a little store and on highway 95.  The traffic sounds were not bad at all.  We heard trains sometimes but that was okay.  Our coach, we realized, had mold in it.  This was found when cleaning under the bathroom sink when a foul smell was noticed.  The mold was caused by a leak under the sink.  It grew on the cabinet shelves.  We cleaned it twice and it came back.  We also had a leak in the salon area or living room by the kitchen.  The month of June was spent trying to find the leak and contacting the dealer who was a nice enough guy and said he would get us into another coach and sell this one.  The bummer thing was that he was leaving on vacation for 3 weeks.  (Fabulous)  We had to wait until he came back.  He did email us other coaches which were available but more money than this one and smaller.   Upon his return after the 4th of July holiday we decided not to change coaches but to fix the problem with this one and keep our humble little home which we love.  We have also effected many repairs which we would not be reimbursed for.  To much moula to lose and then pay more for another coach, No thanks I take what I have.

We also had to move out of our spot at the Alpine RV park because they booked up and we didn't tell them we planned on staying all summer.  So we moved to a spot next to our storage shop where all of stuff is for us to go through, sell and repack etc.  We realized we have a place to dump, we have water and all we needed was electrical.  My brother sent over one of his guys to help us out putting in a 50 amp plug.  Now were are set up next to our garage that is bigger then our house.  It great because we don't have to pay for our space only the rent on the shop.

My food allergies have been kicking my bootie.  For those of you who don't know I am allergic to corn, citric acid, chocolate and peanuts.  My big 4 list.  I have also chosen to go gluten free, vegetarian  and no milk which is really not offering me much in the form of food.  I have to be creative.  Now I am just looking for different ways of cooking veggies, getting my protein and dealing with this.

August: Currently still going through out stuff from selling the house.  We have sold all the furniture and only have our bed and 2 bar stools left with some assorted boxes with pictures, accessories etc.  Tom has his tools left but he seems to be keeping those for now.  The truck will have more room in it now.

Tom has had another bout with skin cancer on his forehead and will be needing to take care of that soon.

Next post will be our adventure through the Hiawatha Bike Trail...