Day 6: Exploring Montana

This morning we decided to have breakfast in the charming town of Gardiner, located at the northern entrance to Yellowstone, before we headed north.  We ate at Rosie’s Bistro, had a delicious big breakfast, served by Joyce, then with full stomachs, we hopped on the highway to head northwest to Flathead Lake in Polson, Montana.

We hit the road and while I called home to check in with my mom, we came upon a family of elk on the side of the road…”Oh mom, hang on for a second, I have to take a few pics of some elk we’re passing by.”  You sure don’t see that everyday!

After a short while, we made a pit stop in Bozeman, to see if Greg could brush up on his handball (his big tournament is right around the corner) at a local athletic club there.  Shucks!  No one there available for a quick pick up game…so we did a few errands while we were in town…grocery shopping, replenish dry ice, fill up our water gallons etc.  Bozeman is a really nice city and it has maintained its small town charm.  We hopped back on the highway and hoped to see a lot of beautiful scenery on our drive.  Sadly, everywhere around us was very smoky so we couldn’t see much from the highway.  A recent thunderstorm here started the fire and with heavy winds, there are still 55 fires burning in the area.

Once we headed away from Missoula, the smoky air cleared up and we were greeted by beautiful Flathead Lake.

We arrived!! We’re staying at a very nice KOA campground that overlooks the lake.  Greg cooked us a nice dinner and we’re all relaxing for a bit before we decide between going to a Blues Festival overlooking the lake, OR doing a couple loads of laundry at this very nice facility.  It cracks me up how my perspective has changed in one short week…I get excited if our campground has grass for the girls and if it has a laundry facility!  Shangri-La!! Ours has both! Tonight is a banner night!  Until tomorrow….

PS. Greg wants me to update the list of wildlife we’ve seen so far…today we saw elk, deer, antelope and a bald eagle!