Knittinggarden

We left our hotel in West Yellowstone fairly early in the morning.  We didn't have a really long drive, but we could not abide the annoying (Chinese) tourists in the hotel for another minute.  Someone needs to teach these guys how to behave before they go traveling internationally.  Rant over. Anyway, we hit the road for Butte, MT.  Before we had gone too far, we ran across Quake Lake.  This is a lake that was formed due to a massive earthquake/landslide that occurred in 1959.  An entire campground full of people was swept away and the river valley was turned into a lake.  Dead trees protrude up from the water in a ghostly way.  Reminder:  Click photos to enlarge. The drive was nice; we enjoyed seeing wide open spaces and beautiful mountains as a backdrop.  Now these guys have big yards! We stopped along the way in Ennis to have breakfast and did a little shopping for some Montana products but pressed on as DH was scheduled ...

Picking up where we left off, we drove away from Devil's Tower and continued on toward Gillette, WY.  If you're wondering why we picked some of these places to stop, it was because DH had dialysis appointments set up before we left CA and the availability and location of appropriate facilities somewhat decided our stopping points.  Anyway, we ended up going through some more mountains to get there and this time it was snowing quite heavily for awhile.  Of course, it was my turn to drive again and windy mountain roads with slush on the pavement makes for nervous driving.  We made it, of course, and then continued through spectacular mountain scenery with switchback roads cut right out of the rock in some cases.  Getting behind the slowpokes who think speeding up to 25MPH is what the road signs mean made it a little more interesting(!)  We arrived safely in Gillette, and stayed in a sort of industrial area that was nothing to speak of.  With dialysis out...

When last we left our intrepid travelers, they had made it out of the mega  yarn store with only minor damage and yarn, knitting needles, and a cute new bag to show for it.  Our next destination was Scottsbluff, NE and to get there you travel on secondary roads and look out mostly at fields.  Sometimes there are cows. Then comes the magic.  In the middle of these seemingly endless plains, there arises a magnificent stone structure, a giant bluff, or other geologic masterwork.  I haven't figured out how, through exposure to the elements over millions of years, some stone towers/bluffs/hillsides remain while others do not.  In any case, we saw some interesting topography at the Scottsbluff National Monument and again at Chimney Rock, which is a most amazing sight in the middle of a whole lot of nothing. Oh, but there might be snakes.  Probably not on the day we visited, though, since it was cold. The next day we headed out for Rap...