30 June ‘06
Another South Dakota day…nice and warm sunny day here in the Black Hills. We were slow to move away from the campground, but when we did we had a great time. I had asked about a good location for us to go kayaking and they sent us to Sylvan Lake. Sylvan Lake is about 7 miles further up into the Black Hills in Custer State Park. Sylvan Lake is a small lake that had been developed by damming up a small opening between some large rocks. This allowed a stream to fill and keep filled this beautiful lake. Fishing is very good and kayaking was excellent. We spent about 2 hours in the water, and then headed down the “Needles Highway”. The Needles Highway starts at the far end of Sylvan Lake and continues down the mountain for 14 miles. The road is something that we have never traveled before. The “Needles” are large rock formations that sprout directly out of every crevice of un-used land on the mountain. Some spring as far up as 200 feet. We had to circulate through very narrow roadways that wound us up like a top. During the 14 miles we drove through at least 8 to 9 tunnels that were cut out of the stone, and were just wide and tall enough for a standard sized car to go through one at a time. All this was traveled at a 7 to 10 degree decent. Our drive from the campground and through the sweeping circle took us about 5 hours including a stop in Custer. We were both hungry and wanted to try out this restaurant that I had seen a couple of days ago…”The Purple House of Pie and Ice Cream”….

29 June ‘06
Day 2 here in Hill City, South Dakota and it is getting hotter. Today we were close to 94 degrees, but that didn’t feel un-bearable. This morning we went to an “All you can eat” breakfast of pancakes. They have a large tent set up behind the office of the campground in which they serve up these great pancakes every morning. The first helping was 3 large pancakes, and I can’t remember when I was able to finish a plate of 3…hell, here it was easy and I went back for more. One of the best I’ve had (not quite as good as those I get at home).
Before it got too hot, we headed up to see the presidents at Mount Rushmore. You can see the pictures of Mount Rushmore, but until you have a chance to see them in person, you haven’t really seen them. As they looking down on you from above, you are taken back with the history each of them represents for us in this country and how many people come to see them to personally reflect themselves. The visitor complex here is also well done. They have you moving in with your car or motor homes, easily finding a parking place, and walking the Plaza of State Flags as you approach the monument…very nicely done.
A couple of hours at the memorial and then we went to see the towns of Keystone and Hill City before heading back to catch up on a couple of loads of laundry. Tonight we went back to the tent and enjoyed a Buffalo Hamburger, potato salad and baked bean dinner…very good, I must say.

28 June ‘06
The drive from Moorcroft (just outside of Devil’s Tower) to South Dakota and the Black Hills took us about an hour. Louise thought it might be a good route to go though Deadwood and then on to Keystone were we hoped to find a campground for the next week. The other route would have continued on I-90 through Sturgis, to Rapid City and then onto Keystone. Well, our new route turned out to be directly through the Black Hills…Hills, Hell these are mountains… It was a great trip, but it did take a load of gas to get through the ups and downs of these hills. Now we’re in Keystone and we’ve got to find a campground. Finding a campground that will take us through the 5th of July turned out to be tough. We thought it might be fun to enjoy the 4th of July celebration at Mount Rushmore, but unfortunately so did just about everybody else within 300 miles as well. Finally on our 4th or 5th try, we found a site that would take us with a stipulation. We would have to move 3 times in 7 days…
We had no longer set-up the coach for our stay and we were off to see the mountain carving in progress of “Crazy Horse”… This memorial to Crazy Horse in the Black Hills of South Dakota is really something special. The huge visitor complex lay at the base of this mountain were Crazy Horse is being carved. All this started with the first blast of hard rock on June 3rd of 1948. Sculptor Korczak Ziolkowski was asked by the Lakota Indians to come to the Black Hills and carve this memorial. We had the opportunity to see and hear the wonderful story of Korczak and his family of 10 kids who all grew up on this mountain and helped with almost every aspect of carving Crazy Horse. In 1982, Korczak died, but his wife and 7 of his kids (now grown to adults) have continued to work the dream of the Lakotas and Korczak. The work is progressing daily. Even as we stood there looking at the mountain and the head of Crazy Horse completed, we saw 2 blasting that was designed to take out “tons” of rock needed to complete the project. 20, 30, 40 more years…that is the goal for completion

27 June ‘06
We left Yellowstone through the East Gate, which just about made our day…road construction for better than 9 miles. Now I mean road construction. They were rebuilding the road that ran right on the side of a mountain. There were spots that made us stop because there just wasn’t any room left on the down-side of the mountain as we approached on-coming traffic. The road bed was nothing but dirt and rock, not gravel, but rock. Again we just happened to be the front vehicle, so that saved us from any possible rock chip damage. When we finally pulled out of the park, we entered some more absolutely beautiful Absaroka Mountains (Central Rockies). The colors, the designs of the rocks, and the totally unspoiled countryside made this a complete package of beauty. There were these formations that looked and reminded us of the fortress walls of Old Europe. Even a couple looked so much like castles that we had to look again…where are we anyway??? Well, we are in Northwestern Wyoming and being entertained through our eyes all the way to Cody. After lunch and filling our gas tanks in Cody, we headed for Sheridan and our next campground. Now we are in the rolling hills of Wyoming, which were made up more of sage and open range. The next morning we headed off to see “Devil’s Tower” and our next overnight campground. As we crested the top of the ridge and saw Devil’s Tower rising up out of the ground as if it had been thrust out of the crust of the earth as a punctuation point…all by it’s self. Many times we have driven by the basalt stone alongside I-90 going to Spokane. This stone, almost 6 to 8 sided columns, that is the same with Devil’s Tower, only on the tower, it rises 867 feet. Looking at the top of the tower, it is like looking as a parquet floor, only octagonal vs. squares.

Happy Birthday Leslee !!!!!
Boy it got cold last night…we had to pull on all the standard spring blankets and then through the Winter Down Quilt on top. Besides that, the furnace came on 3 times this early morning to tell us that it was “really cold”. Because we were both too chicken to roll out of bed at a reasonable time, we were late getting out seeing this wonderland. I think we rolled through the gates of the campground just before noon. We can’t keep this up if we want to see anything while we are here. The first thing we did was to find the post office, so we could get a letter out. Since we are “roughing it” at this campground, we have to resort the old fashioned means of communicating…general mail. We have no electricity, water, TV cable, and, can you believe, no internet wi-fi. Heck, our cell phones wont even work. After finding the mail box, we headed off to Artist Point and the Mud Volcano to see some thermal features of the park...mudpots, were the supper heated water spouts mud into the air or just makes like a boiling pot of “mud”. Some of these pots are absolutely huge, while others can be as small as a foot in diameter, or colored a bright or opaque blue, red rust, green, or just plain light mud. All that, and you could smell a slight odor of sulfur all the way to strong battery acid. I think in the 4 days we were there, we visited and walked at least 6 totally different thermal basin areas. The earths crust is so thin in a lot of Yellowstone, it isn’t uncommon to find steam rising almost everywhere you go. Then it was “The Grand Canyon of Yellowstone Park”. Now we’ve never taken the opportunity to go and visit “The” Grand Canyon, but this one in Yellowstone was absolutely incredible. The high walls as much as 1200 feet deep with the Yellowstone River running through it below, the rock panicles coming up the walls like sharp knives and best of all, the thundering Lower Falls of the Yellowstone taking your breath away with it’s beauty. We hiked “many a mile” to see the above and even more to see “The Best” (in our opinion) geyser in Yellowstone…Lonestar Geyser… It had a 12 to 14 foot cone, and spew hot water 30 to 40 feet into the air with steam shooting much higher. When the Lonestar Geyser erupted it lasted just over 20 minutes of full eruption and made a special impression on all 7 of us that hiked the 5 mile round trip into see the show. We took in the Mammoth Terraces. I really don’t think there are more than two areas in the world that have travertine terraces like these, and the second is in Turkey…we’ve now seen them both. They are really something special. Our last full day in the park, we did take time to see the most visited site…”Old Faithful”. It was nice, but it is getting “Old”. In the 4 days we were there, we also drove through 3 of the 4 entrances to Yellowstone. We saw a lot of the park animals, especially bison. They were just everywhere, even 2 that seemed to make their home right beside our coach. Fact is, one of them decided to scratch its back on the living room slide and then have the audacity to leave a token of appreciation lying on the ground beside the slide-out. If it weren’t for the signs that warned us of the yearly deaths inflected by the bison I might have just jumped out of the front door and chased them off…well, I didn’t.

21 June ’06, Wednesday
This morning we were out of the campground at Lewis and Clark by 8:30am. The sun was shining, but being up here in the higher altitude, it was cool. I had met a man and his 15 year old son from Alaska last night who were camping in their tent right next to us. They are bicycling from Kalispell Montana to the Mexican border, following the Continental Divide as close as they can. When we awoke this morning, they had already left, but about 45 minutes into our drive we came across them as they were just cresting this 3 mile, 7 degree climb. We honked as we went by and wished them a safe journey. A few years ago their whole family had taken their travel trailer and covered 46 of the lower 48 states in 6 months. Most of our drive today was heading south towards Yellowstone Park but before we got there, we came upon Earth Quake Lake. On the early morning of August 9, 1959, this area suffered a major earth quake that still shows a lot of the devastation. In a small way, if it had to happen, it couldn’t have happened at a better time. Most of the tourists hadn’t arrived for their day journey to Hebgen Lake, for picnicking and hiking the many trails or swimming and boating in the lake. When the earth quake hit, the side of a mountain slid down and across a valley, “tilting” the lake. Half of the lake rose double in height, while the rest of it dropped to a puddle. There is much more to this story, but you will have to find it by going to your own sources. Louise and I were totally taken with this mammoth change in geology of the area and how you can see the changes now starting to come back through nature again. About noon, we entered the Yellowstone Park, and headed in to find a campground for a few days. It was a little surprising to me as to how far we were from the mountain peaks, but then again, we are over 7,000’ above sea-level and I can really feel the change in my breathing. It will take a day or two for us to get used to this altitude, but with a few hikes, it will get there. There is no doubt, but this is one of the natural beauties of America. The way the rivers gently curl and twist around and make all these patterns through the grasslands the valleys. Then there are the rolling hills of grass that are ringed with trees to create the perfect pasture for the animals here in the park. We are parked right on the banks of a HUGE lake, the Yellowstone Lake. It is much larger than any lake that we have been on so far, and we understand that the fishing is great. Well, the animal sightings for the day are: deer, elk, bison, pronghorn antelope, grizzly bear, and squirrel.

20 June ’06 Tuesday.
Last Saturday and Sunday we were in Polson and enjoying our kayak on Flathead Lake, walking the Polson Street Fair, and driving up to Big Fork. The street fair was small and Saturday had by far the largest crowd. It was fun and enjoyable because of the Native Indian dancing, food, and all the hand made items (which we didn’t load up with). By the way, the mini doughnuts that we had there were the best I’ve ever had…nice and crunchy. Our drive up the lake to Big Fork was also very nice. We actually drove by Big Fork the first time (missed our turn) and found our way to a very small rock and gem store, that had some of the most incredible stones and fossils. Besides that, as we drove down this very narrow dead-end road to the store, we found at the end (right at waters edge) a marker that told us a story of the area back in the early 1900’s. It kind of reminded us or the history of Lake Coeur d’Alene with the logging and boat traffic that took place back then. Then it was back on the road to find the elusive Big Fork. They have tried pretty well to keep Big Fork looking as it did in the early days, sitting beside the Swan River as it flows rapidly into the Flathead. We walked the streets and enjoyed looking into a lot of the “artsy” shops that lined both sides of the street. I also found “my” coffee shoppe that sat right on the Swan River which was over-flowing its banks and making the most beautiful sound of a rushing river. They also had “the best” chocolate cupcake with mocha frosting….I know, I’ve just looked at the scales…it’s a hard habit to break. Yesterday (Monday) we left Polson and drove here to Missoula. Highway 93 is totally under construction !!! We were very lucky to have been the first vehicle in line to make it through the 20+ miles of road construction. After arriving here in the campground, we headed fight off to find a grocery store, have lunch, and Louise had to have her haircut (not that it was getting long or anything…). This morning after breakfast we are picking up and heading towards Yellowstone.

What a day, we left Missoula a little later than we wanted, but we had to go in and fill our propane tank. We have learned to use this product with a little better control. And besides that, we found it “on sale”…$.99 a gallon and it only took 8 ½ gallons. Wouldn’t you know it, when you find a real good deal, you only need such a little amount. We’re now heading towards Yellowstone. We took a break at the 6,500’ summit just outside of Butte, which was also the Continental Divide. The day was absolutely a Montana Big Sky Day… It was a day that allowed us to make a detour when and if they presented themselves. As it was, we followed two. The first one took us from I 90 on to Montana 1. The road took us along the “scenic route”, with a river, rolling hills that turned into rough and tumble jagged hills that stretched high into the sky from the river bottom. A spectacular waterfall came tumbling down from an earthen dam which we found out made up Georgetown Lake. This lake was high up in the mountains, and really one of the prettiest you can find anywhere. The other one presented itself a little later when we headed off to “Lewis and Clark Cavern State Park”. We had no idea what that was, but we were going to find out. The route to the park was on a small winding and twisting road, a beautiful stream following each turn of the wheel and a HUGE cave on the side of one of the hills above us. Just beyond this cave we came to area of the “Cavern State Park” and we found that they also had a campground. This really worked out great, as it was getting to the point that we wanted to settle down for the night. We soon found out that the campground was just a small bit of what we had gotten ourselves into. Those “Cavern’s” that make-up the full name of “Lewis and Clark Cavern State Park” turned out to be one of those special jewels that come out of the dark just when you don’t expect it. 3 miles straight (a lot of winding and twisting) up the mountain from the gate of the campground, we found the visitors center and the starting point of the guided tour of the cavern. With our journey through Europe, we had a chance to see some wonderful caves and caverns, but this one…WOW !!! It is something very special. Heck, it was a 2 ½ hour tour with one incredible sight after another for the whole 2 ½ hours. We are still talking about this one !!! If you are ever in the area, make sure you see it…you will thank me. Oh yes, the campground is very nice as well. It is a State Park without “hook-ups”, but the rest of it is wonderful if you don’t need the electricity and TV (for those of us without a satellite dish)….

16 June ’06, Friday.
We’re really enjoying Montana, but on the other hand, we wish it would quit raining. We haven’t had rain every day, but they have just announced that Montana is breaking all the records this year on rainfall. They have even opened up a couple of the gates on Libby Dam to relieve the possibility of having it soon go over the top and really create a problem. So far, all the rivers and streams have just come up to the rim of their banks, but haven’t yet caused any serious flooding. Day before yesterday we moved to a campground in Polson so that we could be a little closer to the big Polson festivities this weekend, and other sites that we want to visit while in the area. Today we spent the day at the National Bison Range. It covers over 18 thousand acres of absolutely beautiful Montana land, and we had a chance to drive through it. We first stopped by the Visitors Center to see some of the displays and learn a little on why the government stepped forward to put this “Reserve” in place. At one time there were over 30 to 60 MILLION Bison (“Buffalo”) that made this area their home and then the settlers came into the area and all the sudden there were less than 50 left on this planet. As we made our way through the hills and valleys of the reserve, we saw deer, elk, antelope, and a few bison all in their natural habitat. Just a little ways outside of the reserve, we found our next stop. We’ve been reading about this wonderful “Mission Church” at St. Ignatius that is sometimes called a “country cathedral”. It was constructed in the early 1890’s by the Flathead Reservation Indian parishioners, with some help from local ranchers, and Jesuit missionaries. What made this stop so very special was the 58 frescoes and murals on the walls and vaulted ceiling. These frescoes were the vision and the artistic work of Brother Joseph Carignano, who was also the cook for the mission. An interesting note was, he was born in Turin, Italy (1873) and died in Yakima, Washington (1919).

12 June ’06, Monday.
We made a short drive yesterday from Coram to Kalispell and then following the west side of Flathead Lake to our next campground in Elmo. The scenery is very lush green. Because of the time of year and the rain that they have had we are seeing it before it turns to the more traditional tan of summer. We are also missing a lot of the crowds of tourist that will be coming. I’m almost ashamed that it has been so long for us to make it to Montana, because it is really spectacular. This afternoon, we drove into Polson, which is about 12 miles further around the lake on 93. We were there yesterday, but just long enough to go to Safeway and do some shopping. Today we were heading to Kerr Dam, which is just 5 miles outside of Polson. We had seen a picture of the dam and I just had to take my own. We were hoping for a full “spill” over the dam, and we weren’t disappointed. With the water table so high from the run-off of the mountains and the rain, it was unbelievable. We were both surprised at the lack of signage that the state or even the city of Polson has given to Kerr Dam. It is 54 feet higher than Niagara Falls, and was completed in the late 40’s. The river runs out of Flat Head Lake and winds its way through a very high wall of solid rock until it comes to the dam. The rock walls continue after the dam for another mile of so before it winds it’s way out. After our ride to the dam, we headed back to Polson for lunch. To our surprise, we found a great little Turkish restaurant on one of the side streets. The owner and chef, was from a small village just outside of Cappadocia. We really enjoyed his food and had a good time talking about Turkey with him…If you are ever in Polson Montana, you’ve just have to try his restaurant, and you will not be disappointed. Well we have disconnected ourselves from the electrical system and are running on batteries. We are right in the middle of a very large electrical storm. Louise is up front looking out the windows going uuu-aaaaahhhh….
We did have a great time on the lake this afternoon kayaking. Let’s see just how our arm and back muscles re-act in the morning to our excursion.