GOING-TO-THE-SUN ROAD!!!

We arrived in Montana a few weeks ago, and I hate to complain in paradise...but....

In the last 2+ weeks we have fixed the refrigerator, 3times; replaced the ice maker, 2 times; installed a new fresh water hose, only 1 time; ate/cooked food out of a cooler and someone else's freezer for 10 days (at least) and wound up flat on my back for 3 days thanks to a pair of arthritic hips. In the middle, and certainly not the least, my dad had several falls and is now nicely recovering from a hospital stay of 4 days. So we have been in the towns of Helena, Polson, and Kalispell with little to share in the way of a tourism report. We can tell you about some helpful folks and good repairmen, however.

So, today we made a short 20 mile trip to Coram, MT, which is just 7 miles west of the west entrance of Glacier Natl. Park. Nice drive, great RV park, more glorious weather, all systems still working, attitudes nicely adjusted.

We were set up before noon in perfect time for an easy at-home lunch and then a drive to Glacier. The Crown of the Continent is well named! The rugged glacial-shaped peaks really do resemble a crown climbing to the continental divide at Logan Pass. The famed Going-To-The-Sun Road is open every summer, between the end of June and early to late September if there are no avalanches or mudslides. This is a narrow window! One we missed several years ago, in fact the road never completely opened that year. Going-To-The-Sun Road is a 50 mile climb and descent from the town of West Glacier and St. Mary's on the east side. It bisects the American portion of the International park. There are less than 10 drivable entrances to the 1800 square mile expanse. Only 1 road connects two sides. All others are an in and out situation, at best. There are countless places to hike in and out for as long as the body and terrain allow. For me, that is a very limited proposition.

I only took 75 pictures today! Russell took a few also. Our drive started in West Glacier, along the south side of McDonald Lake and then climbing up from the Flathead River into the "Crown" of the Rockie Mountains. Wildflowers, Alpine meadows, craggy mountain ridges, waterfalls, more waterfalls, and glaciers. We stopped at the visitor center at Logan Pass for a walk around. The drive up included a 30 minute delay waiting for our turn on a 1-lane road due to construction. It was nearing 4:00, long time since lunch, long drive back. So we headed west. We will leave early another day to make the full 100 mile round trip.

As we neared town I read really good reviews of a local pizza restaurant. They were right! We had a fabulous BBQ chicken pizza with pineapple and onion. Home by 6:00 with a sip of wine in the shade and breeze of the evening. What a nice day!

Helena, MT

July 9, 2012

We drove west out of the Black Hills on I-90 to the town of Sundance, WY. Sundance is the town that gave an outlaw and an actor the famous name. It all started when Harry Longabaugh broke out of the local jail. We stayed at a nice owner-operated park for 2 nights. The owner recommended that we take the loop through some beautiful country instead of just the out and back trip to the Devil’s Tower.

The legend of Devil’s Tower is that some Indian girls were playing when a bear surprised and chased them up a large, flat-topped rock. The gods heard their prayers to save them so the rock grew up to the heavens as the bear scratched and clawed at the sides of the mountain-sized rock. The girls went directly to heaven; the bear was just out of luck. The eroded columns of the tower lend credibility to the legend. Once scientist thought it was a volcano core, but it is now considered an igneous intrusion. The columns are in a continuous, if slow, state of deterioration as evidenced by the boulder debris at the base of the tower. Kids veer off the mile-long hiking path that encircles the tower to climb and play in the boulders. More experienced kids scale the sides to ascend straight up the face. On the loop back to Sundance we stopped at the town of Alpine, population 15; but passed on the sink hole at Vore. The pre-horse Indians would stampede a herd of buffalo off the cliff into the sinkhole.

 I-90 heads west and north out of Sundance towards Billings, MT. We are into our 4^th trip to Montana. It is really a beautiful state. Our first stop was to revisit Little Big Horn. We happened on an archeological documentary of the battle on the evening prior to our visit. With that info and a CD that we purchased to guide our tour, we really did enjoy the stop. Custer is proof that arrogance just can’t be cured.

 The drive from there to Helena is 300 miles of beauty. We crossed over and followed along the Yellowstone, Jefferson, and Missouri rivers numerous times. What Lewis and Clark would have given for our ride!

A truck stop parking lot was a pretty good place for lunch, views of snow-capped mountains from each window. We had plenty of Weight Watcher (too many steaks and desserts!) frozen dinners to choose from due to a stock-up the previous day. So we went in the c-store to buy drinks and ask about the off-freeway road just ahead. The nice lady verified a good, easy road so off we went.

Ammonia. It is a very distinctive smell; not bad, clean, fresh, and totally out of place in an RV. So I began searching for the source. Russell suggested the refrigerator workings might be involved. A Google search confirmed his fears. A hole rusted through spewing ammonia gas from deep in the guts of the ‘fridge.

 The road was not the gem promised. Assorted sections of construction, at one point a gravel road, had been sprinkled along the way. So we were bouncing along trying to figure out how to take care of the refrigerator problem, how bad is it, and how much will it cost. We called ahead to the RV park in Helena and the owners offered to let us put all of our frozen food in their upright in their garage. When they take a trip on Wednesday, they will leave the back door open for us to have access. The office carries block ice for us to fill the cooler we have been totin’ around in the car. Today we found a service shop that can take us on Thursday and it will cost less than expected. Not a bad outcome! It is amazing that every time we encounter problems, nice people are there to help, where ever "there" happens to be.

 We have hopes of seeing some of the town in the intervening days and leave Friday for Kalispell. At least that is the current plan.

Black Hills, SD

July 4, 2012

 The Black Hills are in the southwest corner of South Dakota, famous for the natural wonders and a few man-made ones. Mount Rushmore and Chief Crazy Horse monuments are in a loop that encompasses monuments, caves, lakes, rivers, amazing rock formations, and some wild roads. The only major town in the area is Rapid City to the north. Hill City, Keystone and Custer City are tourists’ towns touting their historic roles in the ol’ west and selling t-shirts.

To me, the roads are a story in themselves. A man named Peter Norbeck was a water well driller in the early 1900’s who saw the need for a road through this beautiful wilderness. He spearheaded a group who devised the best path through the mountains, creating the Needles Highway. Needles are the best way to describe the rock formations that are found among the pines. Norbeck built towering bridges to support roads that wind over and on top of one another. He blasted rock out of mountains to create tunnels of varying height and width. The shortest tunnel is 10’7”. The narrowest is 8’4”. There are a total of 6 tunnels, each different from the last. There is one where you enter with Mount Rushmore framed in front of you. Understandably, each tunnel comes complete with cars, motorcycles, and tourists with cameras dodging one another. The best was the woman who followed their car on foot so she could film the process! (Russell found it more irritating than funny.) So at each tunnel the driver stops, honks, waits and carefully comes through to find a parking spot to join the crowd.

 Peter Norbeck went on to become a state representative, governor and US senator. His committee presided over the investigation of Black Friday of 1928. Quite a man!

 We have stayed in 2 RV parks in this area. The KOA is very close to the monuments on the western side of the loop. It is huge, family oriented and expensive. Short Stay. Wolf Campground is small, personal, retirement oriented and reasonable. Long Stay!  The owners have 2 wolves and give each visitor an education about the animals while you are free to pet them through the fence. They had a pot luck dinner last night providing the ribs and corn on the cob! We look forward to leftovers and more visiting tonight. This park is on the east side of the loop just miles away from the well-known Custer State Park.

We did drive through Custer State Park, saw a few animals, had a picnic and took short hikes. It is very pretty, diverse and sprawling. You drive in and out of the park to several lakes and along the Needles Highway.

 We leave in the morning for the area around Devil’s Tower in Wyoming.

South Dakota

June 28, 2012

We arrived in our newest state to get colored in on the map on Monday. We traveled west along I-90 from Minnesota and stopped for the night just over the SD border after driving over 400 miles from Duluth, fairly tired.

The drive south began on I-35. With our previous trip to Grand Marais, we drove most of the eastern length of the state. We talked about stopping at Mall of America in Minneapolis, but decided to conserve the time for later stops. At that point the glacial lakes of northern Minnesota had given way to rolling farm lands, looking much like Wisconsin and other states at the eastern edge of the Great Plains.

I-90 intersects I-35 just north of the small town of Aurora Lea, MN. The drive west skirted most all of the farm communities along the way. The most interesting we saw was Blue Earth, MN, home of the Green Giant of vegetable fame. The town constructed a 65 foot monument to the big fellow. Big enough that we expected to see him from the highway, but no such luck. From the Internet pictures, he looks just like the one you see on all of those cans and frozen packages, so we called it done and drove on.

We stopped just shy of Sioux Falls, SD. We took time for laundry and a dip in the hot tub. We met some folks who were returning from Mount Rushmore who gave us some good pointers about the place.

We stopped the next day in Mitchell, home of the world’s only Corn Palace. We enjoyed the huge arena that is decorated with murals of corn, wheat, and other local products. The palace is the brain child of 2 businessmen in 1910 who were concerned about the lack of growth in the town. The corn festival has been held in August every year since except for interruptions like drought and war. Volunteers were working the day we were there on the 2012 theme of Sports. It was interesting to watch them prepare the wheat and then staple it to the wooden mural bases. The corn work, in 12 different colors, appeared to be finished. Inside this modern arena, not the original building of 1910, we saw a film of the history of the palace and its town. A souvenir shop is set up on the basketball court. Corn murals are high up on each wall surrounding the stage. This building serves the community in many ways!

We continued west, the land getting more flat, producing more hay and cattle than corn. We were entering the Badlands of South Dakota. We spent the night at the National Park. I’m hoping that the temp of 110 was a record high, but maybe it gets that hot on a regular basis. Just before sunset the temperatures dropped to only 90 so we went for a walk in the formations. The area consists of dried up mud beds and eerie sandstone peaks that erode at a rate of about an inch per year. We didn’t know that the first dinosaurs were found in this area. The science of paleontology was born and continues in this area.

Yesterday we started out with a drive through the remainder of the loop through the Badlands. We enjoyed the 30 mile drive and were rewarded with getting to see bighorn sheep at Pinnacle Point. It is weird to see how the grasslands weave in and out of the parched hills.

The famous Wall Drug of Wall, SD was our next stop. The line here is, “free ice water!” This simple small-town drug store of the 1940's has become an iconic tourist stop due to the cleaver advertising of the druggist’s wife. It is now 76,000 square feet of photos, food, t-shirts, hats, restaurant and even some drugstore items. Wall and Mitchell prove that a little ingenuity and hard work can pay off for everyone in a community.