Onward into the Pacific Northwest

Wow, we didn’t realize how much time had passed since we wrote our last blog.   Where has the time gone?!?!   We have traveled so far and seen and done so much, plus we haven’t really had any internet access to speak of.   To keep the blogs from being too long, we’ll break up this last stretch of our trip into 2 or even 3 separate entries.

 After leaving Miles City, we left the interstate and went northwest on US 12 across the vast, openness of the great plains of Montana.    The “Big Sky State” truly lives up to its namesake.  It was simply beautiful… and with a rich history to match.  Our first stop was in Harlowton, at the Chief Joseph City Park.   We spent 3 days there relaxing and exploring the little town’s few shops that were still in business.  We ate dinner the first night at the only restaurant, in an old restored hotel which was built in 1907 and is said to be haunted.  It was perched on a hilltop that overlooked the vast emptiness of the surrounding area and made us wonder what it must have been like to live here back in the turn of the century.  While we were there, we met a fellow camper who told us more history about the area and recommended that we visit the “Bair Family Museum” just 20 miles down the road in Martinsdale.  He even told us about Ringling, Montana just a bit further down the road from there.  It was the summer home of John and Mable Ringling but now it is almost a ghost town.  He was interested in hearing that we live so near Sarasota, which was the Ringling winter home.   We didn’t drive the extra miles to Ringling, but we did stop to visit the Bair Family Museum, which was well worth the stop.  The docent there had actually known the last surviving daughter and had some really interesting stories to tell.  The art collection and the history of the area back then was quite impressive.  We spent 2 hours there and could have spent more.

We continued on US 12 to our next stop at Devil’s Elbow Campground just 12 miles northeast of Helena.  This campground was situated on a bluff overlooking a bend on the Missouri River.  The days were hot and dry (in the 90’s) and we had no electricity for air-conditioning but the cool, strong evening breezes and temperatures into the 50’s at night, along with the waterfront views, made the $7.50 per night fee worth it to stay here for 4 nights.   During the hottest times of the days we spent the time exploring the surrounding area.    We took the 2hr boat tour “Gates of the Mountains” up the Missouri River and listened to our boat captain make this area come to life for us, especially at the gulch where 13 fire-jumpers died in 2007.    Helena is the capitol city of Montana and is a big city with a small-town feel to it.  We took the “Last Chance Tour Train” and walked through the museum, which we thoroughly enjoyed as well.    This area is so rich in history and we have learned so much that we didn’t know before.  The museum has an extensive collection of C.M. “Charlie” Russell’s paintings and sculptures .    He is the most well-known of the western artists and we had just learned of him at the Bair Family Museum, because he was a personal friend of the Bair family, and there are several of his paintings there as well.  We love Montana, Helena especially, and definitely planned to return here for a visit again.

Devil's Elbow Campground - our camper is the second one from the right

Sunset at Devil's Elbow

Gate to the Mountains - boat tour

We decided that we really wanted a place with electricity so we could use our A/C for a bit.   We stopped in Drummond, another tiny, mostly boarded-up, western town out in the middle of nowhere.   We stayed 3 nights in the Drummond City Park which at one time was a really pretty little place, but now could use a lot of attention.   We’re pretty sure that the town just does not have the funds to maintain it properly, which is really sad.   It’s right next to a beautiful, crystal clear, rippling stream which was visited by fly-fisherman throughout the day.    There are 3 train tracks that run through the town and long trains pass through it all night long.   We could still feel the rumble of the vibrating ground, even after the train whistles faded into the distance.   The local’s here boast of their restaurant “Parker’s” which offers 135 different hamburger choices made by their chef who used to be the chef at a famous Beverly Hill’s restaurant.    Since we don’t eat red meat, we didn’t try a hamburger, but we did enjoy the local “flavor” and our meal.  Jerome’s kayaks are not only “pieces of art” as we have been told,  but have become quite the conversation pieces.   People stop us frequently to comment on them and to ask Jerome questions about making them.  We have met so many people this way and it has become fun for us.   I mention this because while we were eating in Parker’s, a couple walked in and asked us if we were the ones with the kayaks out front.  She had a bet with her husband that she could pick us out in the crowded restaurant and darned if she wasn’t right!   We found out that the man’s father, Bill Orhmann, was an artist who has paintings and sculptures (both metal and wood) that are well known and that he himself (John) makes metal sculptures.  They told us that just a mile down the road, they have a “museum” that has huge metal sculptures outside and a sign that says “usually open.”  Of course you know that we could not pass this up, right?  The sculptures and wood carvings are phenomenal and the paintings are quirky and bizarre.  This place was so much fun to see. 

 

Jerome noticed a slight propane gas smell when we were in our bedroom at night and it kept getting stronger.   He determined we had a small leak in the valve.  We mapped out our next stop, at Quartz Flat Campground in the Lolo National Forest (which was accessed from a rest stop, with a tunnel under the interstate to the rest stop and campground on the eastbound side!), between 2 small towns in the northwest corner of Montana.   Jerome ordered the part that he needed to fix it and had in shipped general delivery to the post office in Superior, 12 miles west of our campground.  When we drove into town to pick up the part, lo and behold, there was the restaurant that we had been looking for as we had been crossing Montana.    We ate here last summer and we think the Durango restaurant in Superior serves the best “Montana Smoked Cuban” sandwich ever!   Yes, we non-red- meat-eaters think these sandwiches are worth “cheating” for!   We loved the Quartz Flat Campground with its beautiful, towering Ponderosa pines, overlooking the Clark Fork River.  The little town of Alberton, just 15 miles east of our campground had an old used bookstore that rivaled the one we found in Helena (an old house turned into a bookstore, that held 18 – 20,000 books), a great sandwich place (The Flying R Café), and had a great little art shop that sold work done by the locals.    The grocery stores are little mom and pop stores with minimal stock on the shelves.   These little towns in the middle of nowhere are some of our favorite places to visit.  We stayed in Quartz Flat Campground, dry camping (without electricity, water, or sewer hookups), for 5 days before heading into Idaho …  thank heavens for our solar panel!

(if you want to make the pictures larger, just click on them)