Travelogues
2008 Rocky Mountains Trip

Monday, September 8

 

Today started and ended with wildlife sightings. This morning it was a huge herd of pronghorn antelope right along I-15 north of Dillon, MT. There were probably 50 - 100 in the herd. It was the first time I can remember seeing young pronghorn in a herd. This evening, shortly before sunset, we looked up to see a female moose right at the edge of our campsite. We're camping at Two Medicine Lake Campground in southern Glacier National Park. Our campsite is on the edge of the outlet stream from the lake. Evidently, the moose cow was curious about the new visitors in her campsite because she crossed the stream, climbed up the gentle slope, and walked up the trail that led into our campsite. She was just standing there peering at our motorhome when we first noticed her. Then we looked beyond her and saw her calf standing in the stream. Carol had her camera in the motorhome and got a few shots of the mom before she strode back across the stream and into the thickets on the other side.

The rest of the day was pretty uneventful but still interesting. We crossed the Continental Divide two more times and drove my favorite stretch of I-15 near Cascade, MT. This is Lewis and Clark Country and includes a stretch of the Missouri River that flows between vertical volcanic cliffs that keep the river narrow and deep. Each trip, we see fishermen in dories along the edge of the Missouri. It seems strange to see someone rowing the dory in such a big river. Unfortunately there are no turnouts to photograph this beautiful scene. When the Missouri exits the volcanic canyon, it escapes into a flat valley with gently rolling hills. Every time we pass through this area, I promise myself that we will return and spend some time exploring this amazing area.

Most of today was spent driving through wheat and alfalfa growing areas. Several farmers were doing the season's final mowing, while others were moving the bales to their winter storage areas. All the wheat had been harvested, but the fields along the road between Shelby and Browning provided a whole new scale to wheat farming. A single field went on for miles along the highway and seemed to stretch for a mile or more in the other direction. Farmers have their own storage elevators for their crops. This is truly a massive operation.

We got to East Glacier about 4:30 and reached Two Medicine CampgroundGoogle Earth View about 5:00. By 5:30, we had selected our campsite and were all set up. Of course, when you're dry camping, there are far fewer setups. This will be our first chance to check out how well our new solar power system works. Tonight, we used our inverter to run the microwave for making dinner, and it's now powering this laptop. We have all the comforts of home without having to camp in private campgrounds.

Hopefully, we'll be a little warmer tonight. Last night, we didn't put the warm comforter on the bed and paid dearly for it. I finally got up and turned on the heat about 4:00. It was 48 inside the motorhome. When we got up this morning, the water in our water hose was frozen. I'm guessing it got down to about 20 degrees last night. Tonight, we're getting out all the cold weather bedding, and we're getting prepared. If that doesn't work, the next step is our North Face sleeping bags. We are going to stay warm...