The Little Things: Walmart Here We Come

Glacier NP

We're now staying with our friend Katie's parents outside of Sheridan, WY, which means I have internet again and can regale you with tales of our travels. Where did I leave off... Keller Ferry, my favorite campsite. After we packed up our tent, we headed for Glacier NP in northwest Montana. So beautiful. Just like Crater Lake, a lot of the park was still closed because of snow, but we were able to take a nice 2 mile hike up to Avalanche lake where you could see three large waterfalls way up on the mountains surrounding the lake. It felt great to stretch our legs a bit, and we got to see some wildlife, including an elk and chipmunks begging for food. No bears though, which was fine with me.

Falls on the way to Avalanche Lake

We headed out of Glacier to make camp a few hours south at Holland Lake campground. Of course it started raining as soon as we arrived, which squashed any attempts to make a fire and cook dinner. We had a couple contingency plans if it started to rain like our first night: 1) sleep in the car with the front seats laid down, 2) shift everything in the car to the front and attempt to blow up our air mattress in the back, or 3) if the rain wasn't too bad, set up the tent anyway. You might notice that getting a hotel was not an option because, well let's be honest, Mike doesn't like to spend money. So we decided to drive to Missoula for dinner and then figure out from there what to do. We found a little fried chicken place that was amazing (not the service though...), and over dinner we discussed our options. After I searched through terrible reviews of local, cheap motels, Mike suggested Walmart. It was close by and lets anyone park overnight for free so we chose that option. I've never slept overnight in a car and certainly wasn't looking forward to it, but I wanted to be a good sport since we stayed in a really nice place (Duck Inn Lodge) the night before. The tricks to sleeping in a car in a Walmart parking lot are to not park too close to other people (it was packed!), stay away from the parking lot lights, and find a spot away from sketchy vans. Once we found a spot, we made our "beds" and went to sleep. Certainly wasn't the best night of sleep I've ever had but it beat a roach motel.

Avalanche Lake

Bison!

Early the next day, we headed to the National Bison Range, which had more than bison! We saw elk, a bear (from very far away though), deer, and antelope. And of course we saw lots of bison up close. From there we drove to the middle of nowhere outside Philipsburg, MO, to the Gem Mountain sapphire mine. It's pretty much a tourist trap where you buy a bucket of rocks, wash and sift them through for sapphires, which look almost like glass. I was pretty sure we wouldn't find anything but we ended up with almost 20 carats of sapphires! A lady at the mine evaluated our sapphires and said four of them weighing over a carat each were "cutable" if we wanted to set them in jewelry. Of course I want to do that! We left the mine quite happy and set off for the Lewis and Clark Caverns campground. Again, it was raining but not enough to keep us from setting up our tent. The next day we toured the caverns. It wasn't as pretty as other caverns I've seen like Luray Caverns in Virginia but you got quite the cave experience. There were many points along the trail where even I couldn't stand up, so I don't recommend it for anyone over 5'5.

Then we headed to Yellowstone NP, and it is everything that everyone says it is: gorgeous, bizarre, full of wild life. We headed toward Old Faithful and saw many amazing geysers, mud "paint pots," and boiling pools along the way. We also saw a ton of bison, even more than in the bison range, and they just did whatever they wanted. Walk in the road, block traffic, poop by the boiling pools even though the ground isn't very sturdy around them. Worse than the honey badger.

So I'll stop talking and again let the pictures say everything. I'll finish my story about Yellowstone and the hunt for the elusive big horn sheep when we head to Denver in a few days.