Montana Vacation: Day 9 - Butte

Last night was spent at the very beautiful Lost Creek State Park just outside of Anaconda. Another very primitive camping area but very pretty - a short hike took you to a waterfall at the end of the creek which we walked to. The only huge down-side to this Park were the mosquitos.... sooooo many of them and they were everywhere! Alfredo and I got bitten all over our arms and legs - at the last count I have 23 bites on my legs alone... and they're still itching like crazy 4 days after we've returned home! The morning was spent in Butte, an architecturally very interesting city with some amazing old buildings from the 1800's but this mining town has definately seen better days and was somewhat of a ghost town in that a lot of the buildings were abandoned and the old town didn't have much in the way of shops / commerce which was kind of sad. We did however find a cute cafe to have an early lunch at and I had the Butte speciality which is a pasty - very like an English Cornish Pasty but about 5 times the size - Alfredo and I sharing it still struggled to eat it all - meat and potato crammed into a pastry shell and topped with a thick beef gravy, served with coleslaw which was a very bizarre addition but actually quite tasty. Sadly this was our last day in Montana. We had planned to slowly work our way home and stay in Idaho for a couple of days but the rain poured down again - really hard this time with the largest size hail i have ever seen. Our plan was to keep driving south (hopefully for just an hour or two) until we escaped the rain..... 13 hours later we arrived home ..... not a drive I would recommend doing with a 4 year old but he was a trooper and was excited to get back home to Buzz Lightyear and the rest of his toys!.... so a very happy vacation was had by us all and I'm already planning the next one wherever that will be.... stay tuned.....

Montana Vacation: Day 8 - Missoula & Phillipsburg

Missoula is a delightful small city where we spent a couple of hours wandering the downtown area. The weather was actually really warm and sunny so we were happy to be outside. The highlights for Owen were definately the hand-carved Carousel and the Big Dipper ice-cream parlour that make the most delicious home-made ice-cream; the Huckleberry flavor was the best! After Missoula we went on a long drive headed East toward the little town of Phillipsburg which was adorable. The Main Street is so tiny and all the buildings are from the 1880's and full of charm - this little town has so much pride. The best shop by far was a candy store - i have never in my life seen one shop full of so much candy/chocolate - and it was all done in the old-fashioned way of how you would imagine the inside of a store would have looked in say the 1920's.. it was so cute! ... the funny thing is that Owen was fast asleep throughout the whole store-visit.... phew, lol.... huge relief that we didn't have to deal with a huge tantrum because he couldn't have every single candy in the store... and it all smelled so good.. mmmmm.. we sure lucked out on that one, lol.

Montana Vacation: Day 7 - Great Falls & Glacier National Park

Loren & Jane, Alfredo's friends from a previous Mexico motorbike trip, had invited us up to stay with them in the KOA they own in Great Falls which I guess is the initial reason for this road-trip and I am so very pleased that we decided to go visit them; they are wonderful people and made us feel very welcome... the deluxe Kabin they put us up in was a very welcome sight after several nights in the tent! Jeff, another friend from Mexico was also there and it was with him that we had a lovely morning at the Fish Hatchery and Giant Springs State Park in Great Falls. Owen had a blast at the Fish Hatchery - for 5 cents, kids got a handful of fish food to sprinkle in the ponds which were over-flowing with whatever kind of fish they were growing. The Fish Hatchery is within the Giant Springs State Park so we wandered on over to the thermal springs area which is so pretty - Lewis and Clark, the original pioneers of the Missouri River around 200 years ago discovered this area so it has a lot of history behind it in that sense. After a quick lunch, it was North for 2 hours to Glacier National Park which I enjoyed a lot but was somewhat disappointed with because of the 70ft snow drifts they had the days before our arrival which closed the road going through the park so we got to see very little of it. We did do a short hike to the St.Mary's falls which are very pretty and with all the recent snow-melt they were roaring.. it was wild! I loved Glacier National Park and I can't wait to go back some day.

Montana Vacation: Day 6 - Helena & Lincoln

After a very stormy start (not much fun packing up a tent in heavy rain and gale-force winds!) we travelled on to the State capital of Helena which was an ok place but doesn't really hold any special memories for me... it probably would have looked better in the sunshine and not the heavy, gray thunder clouds that greeted us. We did see another very long train though which Owen was thrilled with. We then took the very stunning Stemple Pass up over the mountains and along a 30 mile gravel/dirt road to the town of Lincoln.... soooo totally nothing like the Lincoln where i'm from but very nice in its own right. On the back-side of the Stemple Pass we followed a river pretty much the whole way... Alfredo with his fishing pole never far from his reach took the opportunity to fish at 2 or 3 spots along the way and caught a variety of Trout he'd never caught before so he was happy... Owen on the other hand was rather freaked out by the wiggling fish and the blood on alfredo's hands when he unhooked the fish to throw him back in the water. We had a very nice lunch in a real small-town / locals kinda restaurant in Lincoln and then went to the Forest Service office where they have taxidermied the largest grizzly bear ever found West of the Continental Divide... this thing was HUGE!!! Some poor guy driving his truck hit it on the road just outside of Lincoln and killed it instantly... the bear weighs over 800lbs!!! and stands 8ft tall! From Lincoln, we continued North to the city of Great Falls where we were staying with Alfredo's friends Loren & Jane (who he met on a motorbike trip in Mexico).

Montana Vacation: Day 5 - Livingston & Bozeman

Owen is VERY into trains right now; we don't have many trains here in Southern Utah but somehow through watching many hours of Thomas the Tank, he has become very obsessed with them, so imagine his excitment when we pull into the town of Livingston and a nearly 100 carriage freight train pulls through the station.. his whole world had been made in the half hour or so we stood there watching it and the other hustle and bustle of depot life... he was thrilled! Livingston also has a claim to fame for being the town where 'A River Runs Through It' was filmed (Brad Pitt / Robert Redford).. other than that, it was a pretty non-descript little town that has definately seen better days but it provided a nice way to spend a Sunday morning drinking coffee and watching the trains. After that, it was on to Bozeman for lunch.. a very big, artsy, upscale kinda city that was nice to walk round. From Bozeman it was North to Canyon Ferry Reservoir (East of Helena) for the night... and yep, you guessed it, it poured down with rain again!

Montana Vacation: Day 4 - Bear Tooth Scenic Byway

The Bear Tooth Scenic Byway is the beautiful road that takes you from the North East entrance of Yellowstone National Park up through the Wyoming state border and into Montana... and oh wow... I said that word a lot on this road!!.. the views were amazing. It's a very twisty turny mountain road (not for people with weak stomachs!) that takes you to at least 10,000 ft over a mountain pass and there was still a lot of snow up there - 5ft in some places, for mid-June, it was insane! - they even had a ski-run still open. Despite beautifully clear and sunny skies, the wind was icily cold. You'd think that Owen had never seen snow before because his little face lit up when he saw how much snow was on the summit and we just had to get out and let him wander round. The back-side of the mountain isn't as dramatic as the drive up there but still very pretty in its own right. We took Hwy 78 up into Montana and camped just South of Colombus where it poured it down with rain... again.

Montana Vacation: Day 3 - Yellowstone National Park

Wow.... Yellowstone National Park.... this place is HUGE!!! If you're going to go, you need a minimum of 5 days to begin to cover it all; sadly, we only had a half day and a night and the weather was soooo cold!! The wildlife viewing was spectacular; within minutes of being in the park we had seen too many bison to count, big-horn sheep, antelope, deer and a black bear which I was very happy to see from the safety of our car and not skulking round our campsite looking for food which campers and hikers are warned about everywhere! We didn't make it to Old Faithful but we did see the very beautiful West Thumb Geyser which I can't begin to count how many times I said 'wow' at... it was so amazing... the colors... the smell of the sulphur... the heat from the steam blowing off the pools.... just everything, the whole atmosphere was magical. We camped the night in the primitive and very pretty Pebble Creek campground at the North East entrance to the park and pitched our tent next to 2 very cool guys, Steve & Jeremy. Jeremy was a real mountain man and taught us how to make fire the traditional way... think Tom Hanks in the movie 'Castaway'... it was cool! ... and I was obsessed with making fire.. my hands were blistered and very sore the next day but I made fire and went to bed a very happy camper!

Montana Vacation: Day 2 - Grand Tetons National Park

So the Grand Tetons National Park in Wyoming was the second stop on our trip; I guess not knowing much about this Park, I wasn't that excited to see it but as it turned out, I think this was my favourite of the 3 National Parks we visited on this trip. Jackson Lake, at the center of the park is just stunning. It is set in the most amazing alpine location with the beautiful Grand Tetons mountains as a back-drop. The weather here again wasn't that great and it poured with rain on our drive up there so unfortunately we didn't stop in the scenic town of Jackson Hole, so that little place is still on my 'need to see' list since it's a very cute town and I could have very easily passed a couple of hours strolling the historic downtown and browsing the shops. We camped the night in one of the campgrounds inside the Park which was very pretty and I'm pleased to report that we didn't see any bears! :-)

Montana Vacation: Day 1 - Utah & Wyoming

Well we finally found the time and money for a well-deserved vacation... our first in 5 years and I was soooo excited to go on an adventure and see new places. Day One took us up through Utah via Provo Canyon and Heber City, home to the beautiful Bridal Veil Falls - see picture. We spent the night at Fontenelle Reservoir in South West Wyoming (just north of Kemmerer). The reservoir had 100 camp spaces and we were the only ones there - it was weird! - but at $5 per night, a real bargain! ... unfortunately it poured it down with rain and we got very wet - but hey, what's camping without rain, a deflated air-mattress and achey bones the next morning ;-)

Let the Games Begin....

So, the Utah Summer Games Opening Ceremony was last night.. it's like the second biggest event to come to our little town (the first being the Shakespeare Festival) - people come from all over the State (and other places too probably) to compete in the Games. Last night was the official Opening Ceremony; the SUU stadium was filled with spectators watching the various acts / entertainment that had been scheduled... we however are too cheap to pay the $15 entry fee per person, so, like the rest of the town it seemed, we were camped out on the South side of the ball field, on a grassy area, visiting with friends and waiting for the fireworks to begin. We sat and waited for 2 hours, but wow, was it worth the wait!!!!! .... probably the best display of fireworks i have ever seen, and it lasted for at least 15 mins if not more. Owen really enjoyed himself although the finale kinda scared him because there were so many fireworks going off and we were right next to the 'launch' area so the bangs were really loud. So, with the Opening Ceremony officially over.... let the Games begin....

In the beginning....

Hi and welcome to our new blogspot! I've never given much thought / time to this blogging lark but since everyone else seems to be doing it (and since i'm getting kinda bored with Facebook), I figured i'd give this a go, so please bear with me while i figure out how to use this thing. Hope you'll check in regularly on us. Hopefully i'll be posting some pictures soon.
Thanks,
Melissa, Alfredo & Owen :-)