Montana - The Last Best Place

Montana is not what I'd expected it to be.  For some (ignorant) reason I thought it was flat and boring here, with brutal winters and lonely ranches dotting the terrain, but this trip is teaching me that there is a lot I don't know.  That is certainly the case when it comes to Montana.  I haven't seen all the states yet, but I am tempted at this point, to call Montana my favorite.  There is much to love about this mountainous state with it's peaks and valleys, it's vivid sunset skies, and it's friendly people.

Here are some pictures of some of the valleys we've been so lucky to have pedaled through.  To view them at their best, click on them.

We've seen more bee boxes here than anywhere else on the trip.  Good sign.

These horses were PLAYING in the water!  Jumping around in it and everything.

After seeing this sign the suspense was killing us!  7 Miles of WHAT?  Now we know it must have said, 7 miles of absurd winds.

Crossing these two passes it felt like we were in another world.  The wind was trying to knock me over and I literally had to sit on the left side of my seat and lean hard to the left to keep the trike from flipping.  It was so loud Ken and I couldn't even talk to each other.  It was terrible, and a bit frightening to be honest.  Tears ran down our faces (from the wind, we weren't crying, we're not babies) and our hats blew away. There was no place to hide and nothing to do but keep riding.  For hours we did this.  Hours.  Funny thing was, other than some dark clouds in the distance behind us, there were blue skies most of the time this wind blew.  Weird.

We finally made it over both of the passes and got to lower ground.  It was still windy but for awhile it was at our backs.  NICE!

Lots of happy cows out here.  Sure beats seeing them in those feed lots in Kansas.

These haystacks are GINORMOUS!  

They make them with these somehow.

There is more hay here than anywhere else I've ever seen.

We saw a pair of Golden Eagles!

She let me park the trike and get off to get a closer picture.  The other one circled overhead as I snapped pictures of his mate.  Awesomeness.

The road less traveled is sometimes less traveled for a reason.  :)

This was one of the most difficult rides so far.  Stupid wind.