I've been trying to get a map of our route, and I hope this works! Our trip might be overload for Google Maps, though. Let me know if it makes any sense to you or not!

Today we left Columbus, Montana and drove into Wyoming! I was sound asleep when we entered the state, but I was awake by the time we reached Devil's Tower. This is the area of the country that I saw about 30 years ago on a long trip to National Center West with the Girl Scouts, and we camped one night near Devil's Tower. It's so cool! It's the core of an ancient volcano, and the mountain is all eroded away while the cooled magma is still there. Neat, right?

It's rained nearly all day today, but we managed to look around and take some fun pictures. We drove down to see Crazy Horse Monument, which is privately owned and funded. There is also a big Native American museum filled with all kinds of artifacts, both old and more modern. Simon coined what sounded to me like a new term . . . "leech town" for the little towns around the monuments where everything around town has something kitschy to do with the point of interest, and it all costs more money than it should. Suffice to say that the Black Hills area is rife with Leech Towns.

We drove around Custer State Park and were able to see some great wildlife. The donkeys were blocking the road with their grazing and begging, but they were really cute!






The Buffalo herds were mostly far away from the road, but there was one large herd that was very close to the road that had a lot of calves. It was exciting to finally see a real herd! I tried to get Simon to run at them and get them to stampede, but he wouldn't play along.




Finally we got to Mt Rushmore. We'd saved it for last because we kept hoping the rain would clear. It didn't, and neither did the fog, as you can see. If you enlarge the pictures you can see better! I did manage to get a few clear shots of the big stone heads with great patience. The visitor's center is greatly changed from 30 years ago when I was here before. It's really big and impressive now, and I don't remember it being like that before.




Tomorrow we will go through the SD Badlands, visit Wall Drug and maybe get all the way to the Corn Palace or further. Then we'll be in the Chicago area, staying with dear old friends, Scott and Tony. So far we're still having fun with one another, too, which is a great thing, don't you think?

I promised you last night that I would get around to sharing yesterday's adventures with you, and I don't want to break my promise! We woke up fairly early yesterday after a great night in the Driftwood Motel in Waterton National Park, Alberta, Canada. See the red awning in the pic? That is the entrance to our hotel. It was clean and very comfortable and one of the most reasonably priced places we've found so far.

Yesterday morning was full of fog and clouds and more rain, but Mike was up before Si and I and went outside to get some pictures. He managed to find this beautiful rainbow, and take a few other amazing shots. Like most of our days in the Rockies, it was very chilly, and it rained on and off all day.

We found a beautiful frozen lake . . . partially frozen, really. It was COLD! up there!

We had a lovely hamburger picnic for Second Breakfast - yum!

Then we drove up and down the mountain roads in the park VERY slowly, looking for wildlife. We spotted this moose right near the road, munching on bushes and leaves. He was big, and he didn't seem to care about the cars going by. Simon even got some movie footage, but we'll wait til we're home for that project. (Oh wait, maybe this was in Glacier and not Waterton)

We didn't have to look far for the Bighorn Sheep, as they were right near in the town in Waterton. They are obviously shedding their winter coats and looking rather bedraggled. I must admit that I was inclined to try to collect some of that wool and get it spun into yarn, but Simon reminded me that those sheep are most likely dangerous, not to mention protected by law, and I don't want to be knitting unlawful scarves and hats!

And speaking of the law . . . . we crossed back into the US around 1:00 or so yesterday afternoon. (I have to say the border gate is a really boring picture!) We had our passports ready for them and so on, and they opened our van and looked into our coolers and asked us questions. They seemed to ask Mike a lot of extra questions, though. Then they asked us to park and asked Mike (only Mike) to come inside. He was apparently going to be undergoing further questioning. According to Mike, there is another person with his exact name who is wanted for murder in Atlanta, GA. When the border guards looked up the file and picture, though, one guy said "Uh, I don't think this is the guy. The guy who's wanted is 6' tall, weighs 122, and is black." One of the other guards said "Well, you've been a better sport about this than most people we bring in for questioning. Thank you for playing!" Mike said it was a little nerve-wracking, but it sure makes for an interesting story! I guess that's what you get when you have such a common name! I figure since we didn't have to give them any money and Mike didn't have to be stripp-searched, it's no harm/no foul.

So we've made it to Glacier National Park. Yesterday and this morning we've been exploring, driving around, looking for wildlife. We did see some Mountain Goats way way up on the mountain through our telescope - that was really cool! It is beautiful here, and we've seen some spectacular waterfalls, but the main road, the Going-to-the-Sun road, is still closed in the middle portion because of weather. Sigh. Mike and Si are still out exploring this afternoon, and I am using this as some quiet time for myself. I do love them, but a.) this altitude is hard for me to deal with and b.) they're wearing me out and c.) we're doing so much chatting in the van I can't get my naps in!

Ok - some quick stats before we sign off. As of 2:00 this afternoon (Mountain Time):

• we'd hit 3005 miles on the trip odometer
• Mike has seen 30 new life birds
• we've seen 22 interesting new mammals
• we haven't had to call home for more money (which is a good thing because honestly, I don't know who we'd call! LOL
• we've seen license places from all US states except for, I think, 4 of them (Hawaii, Delaware, Connecticutt and Vermont are the only ones I can remember)
• we have gotten no traffic violations or any other arrests (although apparently there was a close call at the border! yipes!)
• stuff we've forgotten in hotel rooms: bottle of shampoo (big deal), Simon's retainers (ugh)

More later!

This morning we woke up in Banff and drove around some more. There are several long back roads through the valley where wildlife is often spotted. It was very cloudy and we couldn't see much of the mountains around us, but we did have fun going around some more. Simon saw a red fox, which I think was our only new mammal in Banff.



Mike was still snapping lots of pictures, though, so we saw a lot of that! LOL It was raining on and off, so some of our pictures from today in Banff are drizzly. Well, the pictures I took are drizzly . . . Mike's are probably all still gorgeous.






Oh, and isn't the waterfall pretty?








When we left Banff, we headed south towards Waterton National Park. We decided to take a side trip to Head-Smashed-In Buffalo Jump. The name drew us in, but the views and the history were very cool. It's a museum dedicated to the First Nations and the buffalo hunting. We met a guide named Edwin Small-legs who was very friendly and we had a good talk with him.

We saw some ermines and marmots at Head-Smashed-In, and also some great views of the prairies.
The tipis you see are a group campsite they have. The woman who checked us in said that a group of students was staying the night there tonight.

We've made it to Waterton, and it is, indeed, lovely. We're all exhausted, though, so info on Waterton is going to have to wait til tomorrow. Maybe I'll be able to post before we're on the road again. This should be our last night in Canada. It's been fun, but it will be good to get back to more reasonable gas prices (and other prices, too, we hope!)

I will quote my dear husband, who said this afternoon "Wow, I think this is the best day I've had in my life, since . . . . well . . . since yesterday!" We left Drumheller this morning and drove around Calgary and up into Banff. Banff is one of those rare places on earth were you can literally drive down the road and stick your camera out the window, randomly snapping pictures, and come up with amazing shots.

The weather guys were predicting rain on and off all day today. While there was some rain early in the day, by the time we really reached the mountains the sun was peeking out and we had some lovely views. Seriously beautiful views.

We stopped in Canmore first, on the way to Banff, and found a little yarn shop called Knit and Caboodle. I found a very friendly knitter/owner, and some great yarn! I only bought a few skeins, but it is Alberta-made wool, hand-dyed and everything. Yay! One ironic tidbit is that the owner is heading to Columbus, OH this coming weekend for the big TNNA trade show! How funny is that? She goes to Cbus every year. Of course, she FLIES like a sane person.




So we got to Banff, drove around the town a little, and then headed to the Gondola. This is a suspended cable car that runs up to the peak of Sulphur Mountain. I didn't take a picture on the way because I was doing deep breathing and trying not to yak. LOL The peak, though, was beautiful (of course - I've totally run out of adjectives, haven't I?). I made Si pose with me for a pic.



Mike saw 3 new life birds just on that gondola trip - 2 of them in the same tree at the peak! In the tree he saw Clark's Nutcracker and the Grey Jay, on the way down he found the 3-toed Woodpecker. We also saw some more ground squirrels - a different species than we'd previously seen, and new chipmunks!




After all of that, we drove along the #1 Highway up through the National Park and saw a lot more wildlife. There are a lot of pull-offs for people who want to view nature, and Si and Mike did a bit of extra walking.
Mike was taking many pictures (over 1000 just today!) and Simon was looking for animals.



Si saw a Grizzly Bear, a Brown Bear, they both saw beaver, and a wolf, and all three of us saw Big Horn Sheep, Mule Deer and Elk.