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Published: July 25th 2017
20170723_080725
Fire map from the day before. We were going thru the really dark areas that had fires. But today, they weren't there.Mileage 303.9
Today started out as usual, breakfast, pack the car and get on the road, except today was driving. I surely didn’t come close to my step goal today and I’ve been doubling it recently. We checked the fire map yesterday and it didn’t look good, but today it looked ok. We headed out and knew we would not be near civilization much till we got to Kalispell. At the turn off, we decided to get gas. Well, we see farm equipment at the pumps, then we pass a gas station with a silo as the main office. Ok, things you only see out west. We are now trying to do the state capitals whenever we are in a state, so we didn’t go thru Butte, but instead took the road into Helena. We got our picture of the capital building and then headed out of town.
We crossed the Missouri River, really, yes we googled it later and found that the headwaters started near Helena. We actually crossed it several times. Who would have thought…
About 20 miles out of town, we saw a sign for water, ¼ mile. Then we see the sign for water
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farm equipment at the pumps and it points to the hill. There was NO water there, NOTHING. That was mean.
We then got really bored so we started trying to remember and sing TV theme songs. The shows we did best were more from the 70s and 60s. Beverly Hillbillies, Gillian’s Island, Green Acres … Some of the songs we could only hum. Some we just couldn’t remember much of at all, but at least it kept us awake. We then tried to name all the states and the capitals and list who had been to which. We were really disappointed that after our first try we only had named 45 states, but we did figure out the other five. You know when you are on the road and nothing to see, well, you make up stuff to do. Of course we kept telling stories about family and things we have done throughout our life.
On the road we saw Montana – not much of anything but cattle and grass. There were mountains in the distance. The highway was a 2 lane road and yes, the speed limit was 70. Too bad we got behind some slow trailers that we eventually got to
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a silo???? pass. No internet – not much of anything on the road. At one of the few turns, there was a Sinclair station and it had the dinosaur and a big cow. We had to stop and take pictures. Then back on the road and into another national forest where we began to see a few lakes, lots of trees, slow vehicles and even a double tall (not wide) trailer. That was a first for me. We saw Swan Lake, no not the play but a lake named Swan Lake.
A little later we saw a dirt bike course that had multiple “No shooting” signs all around it. Wonder what kind of sport that is.
Finally we made it to Kalispell around 2. Even with my gold status with Hilton I couldn’t check in early, so we went and found a place to eat lunch. We ate at the Montana Club and we all had Halibut. It was very good but very filling. We then drove thru town to see the sights.
Katelin, we did see a pool in Montana that was not indoor. Your mother made me take a picture. We then came back to the hotel,
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ok, we've seen this several times. Most of the oil tanks are flat but a couple have this bump on them. What is this? checked in and started working on the rest of our trip. Susan worked on the route and I worked on the hotels as soon as we agreed on the route. It took some doing but we finally finished it. The rest of our trip has been booked.
Ok, what gives around here, I’ve seen 3 Foot and ankle clinics and there are only about 22K people here. What are they doing to their feet and ankles???
Tonight and tomorrow we will stay at the Hilton Garden Inn Kalispell and yes, I scored free breakfast for today and tomorrow. It’s good to be
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