My Journey

[ClayH]

Might I suggest, if you haven't been already, you would be doing yourself a serious injustice to not drive the Bear Tooth Pass. Google Red lodge MT. Its highway 212 in southern central MT. I have seen many mountain passes across the US but this one is hands down the most impressive. Its open until late Sept I think, then the road is closed. This time of year, there will still be banks of snow 10' high on the sides of the road. I road it in Aug. 97 on a motorcycle. It went from 95* in Red Lodge to about 30* and sleeting on top. We stopped at a gift shop on top and the sun came out and warmed us up but the mosquitoes were relentless. lol Fun memories.
Very impressive views and well worth seeing. Red lodge then west towards Yellowstone and Bozeman.

 

[YukonMontanaTannerTrapper]

Yep I know the area well. Thanks. I consider Montana to be my second home so I've seen most of it, although I've never been in the northeast of Montana which is why I'm here now.

Anyhow, I'm picking up a friend in Bozeman, Montana on the 12th of August so that's why I've been moving along at a quicker pace than I normally travel. It was fun to spend a couple of days in Canada but with the rains and a gloomy outlook for the next couple of days, I decided to go back to the states. I enjoyed seeing a little of Manitoba and Saskatchewan although it was mostly farm land and it looked much like northern North Dakota or northeastern Montana. I wish I had the time to go further north (looking at the map really intrigued me). Hopefully I'll be back in a year or so to explore some more. Anyhow, the border crossing back into the states was simple and after a couple of questions, an inspection of my tow vehicle, and a look at my passport, I was on my way. The drive really is amazing through the beautiful farms in Saskatchewan. It's amazing how remote it still is. I wish my pictures would do it more justice. This afternoon we are in Glasgow, Montana doing some grocery shopping at Albertson's, lunch at McDonald's, shower at the civic center, and a visit to the BLM office to check out some areas for free camping tonight. I've got a good spot located along the Missouri River so we'll head out there soon.

 

[YukonMontanaTannerTrapper]

Pictures from my travels:

The geographical center of North America monument in Rugby, North Dakota...........



Me and the truck.............





Entrance to International Peace Garden.............

 

[YukonMontanaTannerTrapper]

Manitoba pictures..............



Manitoba Turtle (I think this has something to do with the nearby Turtle Mountains...........



My engineer buddy



Saskatchewan pictures.............

 

[YukonMontanaTannerTrapper]

Montana pictures:







Camped here last night at the jail. The police chief in Wolf Point was very friendly............



I helped take down a teepee last night after they had a pow wow..........

 

[YukonMontanaTannerTrapper]

Never made it out of town yesterday. We ended up camping out at the fair grounds. Unfortunately we missed the county fair by one day. On the way out of town this morning we stopped in at the rec. center for a shower and met a group of (16) people led by a Buddhist monk that are walking the proposed route of the Keystone Pipeline to protest it's construction. I chose not to photograph them but I did get a picture of their bus which runs on vegetable oil. Nice group of people and spent the last (2) hours with them. But now we are really leaving town...........

Vehicles of Glasgow, Montana...........







My neighbors at the fair grounds...........



The walkers........you can check them out at www.compassionateearthwalk.org...........

 

[YukonMontanaTannerTrapper]

On Thursday we departed Glasgow and headed west on Route 2 and after several hours of poking along the road we drove into Malta, Montana. Not a whole lot going on in this small town but we spent a few hours there just hanging out. The weather was perfect so I hated to spend the entire day behind the wheel of the truck.

Saw this interesting board trailer in Malta........



Here we left Route 2 again and began driving south on Route 191. This turned out to be one remote road with very little traffic (actually not much of anything on or along this road). And it's all the nothingness that makes this a particularly beautiful drive. We made several stops along the way, thought about hiking up to the summit of Old Scraggy Mountain (but didn't), and continued to crawl down the highway.





Late afternoon found us in Charles M. Russell National Wildlife Refuge and along the banks of the Missouri River. I had been listening to my Lewis & Clark CD's all afternoon and arriving at the river felt special for some reason. I could only imagine what these explorers experienced over (200) years ago when they traveled through this territory. We parked the rig and walked down to the banks of the river and the dogs were gone, so thankful to be back in the water, even if it was quite murky. For some odd reason Montana was really loving this place and swam way out into the river, further than anything I'd ever seen in the past.

That's Montana way out there.........



The Missouri River

 

[YukonMontanaTannerTrapper]

In the evening we set up our camp along the river bank. It was a really beautiful site, and away from everything and everybody. Life was good but as the night approached so did the mosquitoes. They were relentless and I don't know how but they are getting inside the camper. I decided that it was time for our evening walk but after maybe (5) minutes at most we returned to the camper. My legs were actually black from the mosquitoes.......hundreds of them were swarming all over us. I'm currently reading a book entitled "Down The Great Unknown". It's about Powell's expedition down the Colorado River. At one point in the book they describe the mosquitoes like this........."These were muggers, not mosquitoes. One of the men says that while out on the shore of the lake a mosquito asked him for his pipe, knife, and tobacco and told him to hunt his old clothes for a match while he loaded the pipe." I think these mosquitoes were from the same band. Anyhow, at dusk I decided to move to the top of a bluff. Here we had great views of the entire valley, a magnificent sunset and sunrise, and peace from the mosquitoes.







In the morning we unhooked the Jeep and took a drive into the refuge looking for the elk herd. We saw white tail deer (which the dogs chased) and plenty of birds, but no elk. The drive was nice and a great way to begin the day. The weather continues to be superb.



The remainder of the day was spent driving south and last night we arrived in Billings, Montana. We unhooked the Jeep again and drove around Billings for a few hours and then called it a day.

(3) Airplanes passed through town...........



Nice set up..............

 

[AA1PR]

Glad to see you are still out there doing what we all wish we could do

 

[YukonMontanaTannerTrapper]

The old hunger for voyages fed at his heart...... To go alone.....into strange cities; to meet strange people and to pass again before they could know him; to wander, like his own legend, across the earth......it seemed to him there could be no better thing than that. Thomas Wolfe, Look Homeward Angel

So today I'm in Bozeman, Montana preparing to pick up a friend from the airport. After almost (7) weeks of traveling alone I'm thankful to have a friend along. It's always nice to go solo but I also appreciate the sharing of my travels with a good friend. We have yet to discuss where we're going but he'll be along for (10) days. But then, I guess I'm getting ahead of myself.

I decided to take the route south along the Beartooth Highway and then cut through Yellowstone National Park, and then through Livingston, and finally Bozeman. It turned out to be a good decision as I met a few interesting people along the way. We made a stop in Red Lodge and checked out all the touristy little shops that line the main street through town. It was there that I met a very cool young couple that are making a living by selling metal sculptures. I didn't leave empty handed but the few things I bought will fit nicely in my new home. From there we drove south and west and made it to the summit of the Beartooth Highway and that was it for the day. We camped on the summit and enjoyed the solitude. I did have a group of Chinese students stop by for some nice conversation. They are in school to become international attorneys. They each had to have a photograph with me so I took one them as well. They were so grateful (??). We did have one near disaster that evening as Montana got his entire rear leg snagged in a group of boulders. He was unable to move and I was unable to pull the leg out. It was so sad cause he was crying like a baby and I had no idea how to free him. Finally, in total desperation, I lifted his entire body and twisted him until it finally came free. It was the scariest moment of the trip. We had a wonderful sunset that evening as we hiked through the boulder fields.

Our campsite.........



The Chinese students...........



The sky and the mountains............

 

[YukonMontanaTannerTrapper]

The following day was a quick drive through Yellowstone National Park. We were in and out of the park within (3) hours. I have visited the park plenty of times in the past and since the dogs are so restricted there, I prefer to spend my time outside the park. So really not much more to write about. We camped along the banks of the Yellowstone River last night, and we enjoyed the cool water, watching the Montana fishermen float by, and just the overall beauty of Montana. The weather continues to make traveling quite comfortable and enjoyable. But today we have lots of errands to run so it's time to go...............

Camper along the Yellowstone River............



Yellowstone River...........



Emigrant Peak (on my to do list)...........

 

[YukonMontanaTannerTrapper]

Hey Mike.....I'm happy that you are enjoying this read. You often wonder if people actually read this stuff. But even if they don't I found that last winter I enjoyed replaying my travels so either way it's a win win situation. Thanks again for the invite. My friend arrived last night and we are leaving shortly to kayak down the Madison River. Take care.......

 

[richjeeps]

...You often wonder if people actually read this stuff. ....

Oh yeah...we actually read this stuff. I look forward to your updates. Thank you for sharing your adventure.

 

[YukonMontanaTannerTrapper]

Hey no problem............

My friend got in very late Tuesday night and we ended up talking way too long into the night at the Bozeman, Montana Walmart parking lot where we were spending the night. Therefore we slept in quite late Wednesday morning and we were late for everything that we had planned for Wednesday. We spent the entire day running errands and visiting with friends of my mine in town. We decided to cancel our plans to float the Madison River and instead after a second night at the Walmart parking lot we would return to the Yellowstone River and spend the day floating it. It was a great day on the river and we floated about (10) miles which was just about perfect for us and the dogs. We camped again on the river bank of the Yellowstone River and it was a gorgeous night along the river bank.

Everybody sags them jeans in Montana...........



The dogs swam and ran about half the trip...........



The dogs kayaked the other half...........

 

[YukonMontanaTannerTrapper]

This morning we pulled out my road atlas and discussed places that my friend might like to visit. It seemed like Glacier National Park was the best destination with only a week to travel. So we left Paradise Valley and drove north on Highway 89 with Great Falls set as our goal for the day. As usual we drove slow, stopped often, and didn't arrive here until dinner time. The highway goes through Lewis and Clark National Forest which is an amazing drive. I loved the big mountain peaks thickly covered in pine trees with rock walls here and there. As I recall the road topped out at around 8,000' and the temperatures dropped by about 15 degrees. I thought about camping there and later on in the day wished that we had. As we pulled into Great Falls this evening the temperature hit 100 degrees. We spoke with a truck driver earlier and he said that he just came from Laredo, Texas and it hit 118 degrees there so he wasn't complaining. I'm dreading trying to sleep later tonight. At least we don't have the high humidity like we have back east. Tomorrow we'll continue north for the park..............

Cool statues of cool explorers............





A milestone for my truck...........



My friend liked my truck picture so...........



Antlers are easy to find in Montana...........