Grand Finale Part 3 - Hamilton, Nancy, Steaks and Arriving in Yellowstone

Dateline May 23-24

After leaving Hamilton I headed to Bozeman to pick up Nancy at the airport.  I took back roads to Butte then I-90 to Bozeman.
My route headed south down the Bitterroot Valley on Highway 93 to Lost Trail Pass (Lewis and Clark got lost in the snow and spent extra days up there.  The nice campground at Indian Trees was even nicer than the one at Blodgett Canyon and not snowed in as I expected.  I didn't stay there.  I continued from Lost Trail Pass east on Highway 43 through the Big Hole.  Think of big skies, wide open spaces, high open grasslands and lots of cattle. "Give me land, lots of land, under starry skies above.  Don't fence me in..." They must have driven the cattle down the highway for some miles.  The result was a splattering of dung on my truck.  Speed limit is 80 mph.  Many people go faster.  I stuck to 65-70 mph.  I drove through Wisdom and Wise (not being qualified to stay), and ended up in Butte for lunch.  I ate carrots and tomatoes from the cooler then visited the rock museum on the campus of the Montana Mining College.  Butte is known as being a mile high and a mile deep because it is at elevation 5000 feet, but the mines that permeate under the city are up to a mile deep.  I also paid tribute to the Berkeley Pit open pit copper mine.  The stew in the abandoned pit is so toxic that a flock of geese once landed in it and died.  You can open a mine for almost nothing and leave a polluted landscape for generations to come.  We do not pay enough for our metals, coal, oil, fracking and minerals.
The visitor center in Butte had exhibits of over a dozen fishing flies.  They gave the history of each fly going back 100 years.  They described the type of bug they were mimicing, the performance of the flies, and the person who first made them.  Each exhibit showed how the fly evolved over the decades. Cool, but overwhelming for a non-fisherman.

On leaving Butte, I had a huckleberry milkshake.
I arrived in Bozeman with time to "clean up good" before Nancy's arrival.  We immediately decided to drive 35 minutes east to Livingston to eat at THE BEST STEAKHOUSE IN THE WORLD,  Montana Ribs and Chop House.  We waited 20 minutes for a table at 7:40 on a Thursday night, but it was worth the wait since we had wanted to come back since the first time we were there 15 plus years ago.  Green beans, salad, beer and 8 oz sirloin steak so tender you can cut it with a butter knife.  So tasty you could come back every day (we did circle back for an early steak lunch on our way back to the airport 4 days later).  We drove back to Bozeman in mixed snow and rain.
The next morning we stocked up on food at the Bozeman Co-op. Then we skedadled up to Yellowstone via the Gallatin River.  At West Yellowstone there were only 2 cars in front of us at the entry gate.  I used my old man's national park pass to get in free.  We continued on to Old Faithful Inn with stops to stretch our legs and lunch.  Lunch was sitting in the camper in the rain along the Firehole River canyon.  After some geyser walks, and a stop at the visitor center we chilled out on the third floor of the Old Faithful Inn lobby.  Dinner was in the camper in the parking lot of the Inn.  We had steak and green pepper stirfry.

We settled into our primo room on the third floor with views overlooking the upper geyser basin.  A romantic spot to say the least.

Next post will be about our stay in the Old Faithful area.

Grand Finale Part 2 - Lolo Pass to Hamilton Montana

Dateline: Wednesday May 22, 2019

After sleeping in a nice campground along Highway 12, I got on the road to finish the last 25 miles to Lolo Pass and go as far as I felt.  I only needed to get to Bozeman Montana by 6:30 pm Thursday to meet Nancy at the airport.  I had two days to cover one day's worth of travel.

After about 10 miles I pulled off at Weir Creek.  One quarter mile trail led to a hot springs.  Since I arrived at 8am and got to the springs before 8:30, I had them all to myself (except for the garbage left by others).  There is a photo of the hot springs above Weir Creek.  After an hour soaking, I headed back downstream, using my plant ID feature on the Ipad to check out the flowers.  There were calypso orchids, monkey flower, trillium and several others.  Other couples started up to the hot springs about the same time I was having a snack along the creek at the trailhead.

The drive up to Lolo Pass is littered with historical pullouts describing Lewis and Clark's descent out of the mountains.

Lolo Pass visitor's center was closed but the fat and sassy ground squirrels where out running around.

Highway 12 slowly descends into the Bitterroot River valley.  I stopped for lunch at Bouilla cafe.  I had a great meatloaf sandwich.  The french fries were battered in flower, parmesan cheese and garlic. Yum.  I spend an hour using their wifi to scope out campgrounds along the way to Bozeman.  In the end the best lower altitude campground (i.e. snow free) was just outside of Hamilton at the opening to  Blodgett Canyon.  I topped off my half growler (a howler) with beer at Bitterroot Brewery.  After setting up the camper, I hiked up the canyon a ways then sat by the creek for an hour or two.  For dinner I ate a pound of asperagus that I bought at a roadside stand near Royal Washington.  No need for more after the filling sandwich and fries at Bouille.

The next morning I ate my oatmeal and drank my coffee in the camper.  Then I circled back to Hamilton to take a picture of the Roxy billboard.  I guess they have run out of horses in Montana (see the photo).
Other photos include my campsite in Blodgett Canyon and views of the canyon from my hike.

Grand Finale - Part 1 - Ice Age Floods and Road to Lolo Pass

Dateline: Tuesday May 21, 2019
I had reservations for 4 nights in the Old Faithful Inn and Nancy had non-redemable airline tickets to Bozeman Montana, so I am off with Black Bart and the Alaskan camper to Yellowstone National Park via the channelized scablands of eastern Washington and Highway 12 over Lolo Pass.

With "On the Trail of the Ice Age Floods - The Northern and Southern Reaches" (Bjornstad and Kiver) sitting on the passenger seat, I headed towards Lewiston/Clarkston in Southeast Washington.
After crossing the Columbia at Vantage, I got off I-90 and headed into the lands sculpted by the Great Missoula Floods from 14000 to 11000 years ago.  The last glacial age blocked off the Clark Fork River near Lake Pend Orielle in northern Idaho.  The lake was 1200 feet deep and backed up well east of Missoula ( a couple of hundred miles away).  Eventually the lake burst the glacial dam and in 3 days the equivalent of 10 times the combined flow of all the rivers on earth raced across eastern Washington.  In about 7 to 10 days the last of the waters drained out into the Pacific ocean.  The waters clawed away the basalt rocks creating huge waterfalls and coulees

, dug out elongated lakes, made ripples 30 feet high and 200 feet apart, carried pebbles the size of Volkswagen Beetlebug cars, and rafted erratic boulders from Montana on icebergs as far as Tom and Claudia's old house in Lake Oswego Oregon.  These glacial dams and floods repeated 40 to 100 times.  After the first few floods they followed the same coulees and ate away at waterfalls that slowed eroded upstream for tens of miles.

The photos are of former Palouse silt hills sculpted into long sandbars over a 200 feet high and 600 feet long, Palouse Falls that started on the banks of the Snake River and migrated 7 miles upstream, and giant ripples on the side of a coulee.

After cruising thru the coulees, I drove thru Clarkston and up the winding Highway 12 along the Clearwater River towards Lolo Pass.  There is a photo of a sign for "winding road next 56 miles".  Actually the first sign was for "winding road next 99 miles."  It was a glorious river road up the valley.  Why did I choose this route?  Two reasons: 25 years ago a friend took a picture of himself next to his Miata and the 99 mile sign.  That was a challenge I have always wanted to take.  Second, "A River Runs Through It" has scenes set at the gambling joint near Lolo Pass.

Next post - Lolo to Hamilton Montana.

Side trips in May

I had several planned parts of my voyage that got short circuited (if you don't mind the pun).

My plan was to fly to Denver and travel to Gulnare where there is a family cemetery.  The family cemetery has gotten mixed up with one or two other cemeteries in the find-a-grave website.  I planned to photograph the other cemetery headstones and then update the info in find-a-grave.  Then I was to continue to Oberlin Ohio by Southwest Airlines to see Ruby's final recital.

Instead I changed flights (thank you Southwest for allowing rebooking and transfering the fare to another flight) and headed to Phoenix.  I am sad to say that my sister Sara is transitioning to hospice care.  She has been mobile and alert since I arrived on Friday.  Her husband Marc is doing the great and difficult job of caring for her.  My other sister Claudia is also here and we have had the gift of sharing family stories, going out twice for meals and watching SNL.  I am not sure how long I will be here, but it doesn't matter.  It is good to be able to share hugs and support each other.  Sara is a model of grace and courage in these difficult times.

To add to my grief, last week we found out that Assemblies of God Pastor Pierre Ouedaogo was murdered by Ansarul islam a terrorist group in the Sahel.  Nancy and I spent many days with Pierre when we were MCC volunteers in Burkina Faso.

Peace and Love,
Paul

Updates

Apparently my groupie fans have been wondering what I have been up to.

When I left Grand Canyon, I was getting tired of the cold.  Three snow storms in 2 weeks and being forced to stay in the camper at night instead of siting out under the stars because it was 35 degrees out.  I think I started my trip a month too early.
Then I had an electrical short in the truck.  I had to jump start twice, including the day I was leaving Grand Canyon.  That sealed my decision to head home.  I drove 22 hours over two days.  Grand Canyon to Ogden north of Salt Lake City then on to home through Idaho, Pendleton Oregon, Yakima and home.
No regrets.  I was still having fun on my trip when I headed home and the next phase of the trip would have taken me 40 miles from the nearest paved road, let alone a town.  The thought of needing a jumper with no cell phone service and no one nearby was part of the decision.
I surprised Nancy by calling her at work from home.  She asked, "Where are you?"  I replied, "Home.  What do you want for dinner."  I think she was happy I came home.  When she asked why I came home, I explained as described above.  My friend Ken said I flunked that test.  I should have said, "Because I missed you!"  May be in another 35+ years of marriage, I will pass the test.
It took some adjusting to remember where things were in the kitchen and to rebuild my vocabulary that was not necessary while traveling alone in the camper.  Why do you need words when talking to your self?  You know what you mean!
Another friend Jay came over with a proper volt meter (he implied that our 1970 Sears volt meter was cute but not up to the job at hand).  He immediately clued into the possible fault in the truck electrical system, then confirmed it with the volt meter. The battery management system that controls electrical charging to the Alaskan had shorted out.  I probably damaged it on that 15 mile round trip washboard road to Fossil Springs.  (Side note:  Fossil Springs was worth the effort.  See photo.)  After a few days I replaced the damage part and the short has been eliminated.
After a couple of days at home, I realized that I was glad to be home and did not regret coming home early.  But the trip is not fully over.  More in the next blog.