We left Custer State Park on the 5th of September, drove through Spearfish Canyon (where Dances with Wolves was filmed), stopped at Devil's Tower just as the sun went down, and stayed overnight in Gillette, Wyoming.
Devil's Tower was made famous by the movie, Close Encounters of the Third Kind.
A
snow fence on top of a mountain.
This was one of the best places we camped. The stars were so bright that evening. We saw the stars of the Milky Way go from one horizon all the way across the sky to the other side - 180 degrees of Milky Way! First time either of us had ever seen that. Of course, we never see the Milky Way back east because of all the light pollution.
How
fast was she driving???
Chirps had told us about this place when we were in Madison, Wisconsin. It was everything he said it would be!
And they talk about banker's hours . . . .
This was the scariest road Jack had EVER been on! There wasn't always a guardrail, and the drop off dropped off about 3000 feet, almost straight down!
They never said what the special rules were!
Today, we decided to end the trip on the 18th of October. Five more weeks to go!!!
We happened upon this place in rural Montana because of the sign out at the road: "Fresh Vegetables". It led into a huge farm complex. They were selling vegetables they had picked on the farm. They ended up giving us a two hour tour of the complex. It was extremely interesting!
This was where we entered Glacier Park, on the southeastern side. This lodge was the most beautiful one we visited on the trip. There was a good sunrise the next morning.
This was the place that Jack most wanted to visit in the United States. We drove through Glacier on the "Going to the Sun Road", going east to west. That was the recommended direction because of the sun. However, it rained most of the time we were there. In some ways, that was a bummer, but in other ways, we saw lots of waterfalls and rainbows. We were on one mountain and saw a rainbow below us in the valley!
We stayed overnight at Lake McDonald Lodge in a small cabin. We had hoped to camp and hike in Glacier, but the rain was just too much.
We had breakfast in the Lodge. The fireplace used to heat the whole lodge and cook the meals back in the 1920's. We did get in one hike on this day, around part of Lake McDonald.
We left Glacier to drive to Nisca's place in Hot Springs, MT. On the way, we drove past Flathead Lake in Montana.
We enjoyed out time with Nisca and her exchange student, Bell, from Thailand.
Previous: Wisconsin to South Dakota
Current: Wyoming to Montana
Next: Oregon to Arizona
All pictures Copyright © 2004, Jack Stansbury