Oklahoma Bound- Day 3 Montana

Wouldn't you know that after such a tiring day yesterday that I would wake up at 4:30am.  What!??  Ugh....:-(.  Well, might as well get up then.  Scootard wasn't far behind me either.  We started our routine of getting coffee and packing up our things.....

Three lumps please......:-)  Well, make that six.

packing went quickly this morning and we were right on schedule to start our day.

The only problem was this.....ha.  And I thought I did a good job by down sizing our content and leaving some stuff in Oklahoma on the last trip there!  sheesh....

THAT is the back seat of the car....ha

Because Spring is already here and the time has changed (I think), it is always light when we leave now.  Last year it was always dark or right at sunrise.

Lake Coeur D' Alene (pronounced - Kur-de-lane).

We came upon this sleepy little mining town called Wallace.  Talk about a "throw back" into history.

There is this bridge that covers the Coeur D' Alene River.  We drove across to see what was happening.

Of course it was so early in the morning that nothing was happening.  But there were a lot of cool things sitting around the town that spoke of another time. This is a GMC bus that was invented somewhere around 1946-1949..

Now, to tell you the truth  I could not tell whether this was a space ship or an icecream cone...haha.  Sorry...ha

This is a shot of the town.  It should give you an idea of how tiny this place is......:-)

They still have quite a few historical buildings in place that they seem to take great care of although they may have a different use now. This building is currently being used as an art gallery.

This building is dated 1890 and the lower floor is currently being used as a cafe and smoke house.

Because it was only about 7:00am, I was not able to actually go inside to see what this was.  But the sign that seemed to be the original one said it was a printing company that has been there since 1906.

This building is currently being used for an insurance business.  Looks like it started to be a castle.

and this one is the Northern Pacific Railway Museum....:-).  It would have been cool to go inside, but we would have had to wait quite a while and still had a lot of road to cover.....:-(
 We drove around a bit more to take a few more pictures.  I like to step back in time like this.....:-)

We got back in the road and enjoyed the ever changing landscapes....these mountains were just south of LookOut Pass.....

Next thing you know.....we were in MONTANA!!  I had never been to Montana before.....:-)

The thing between some of these states in the West is that you can drive for miles and with the exception of a sign telling you otherwise, you wouldn't even know you had cross into another territory.  This is the St. Regis River. It flows along quite some time before it turns into a fork.

The further we went, the more I was aware of why Montana is called "Big Sky Country".....:-).  Very cool, indeed..

We had been up for quite some time and needed to grab a bite to eat.  I am not a fan of fast food breakfast, but found that the hotel food is usually worse in regard to the high salt content.....oh well.  off we went...

I think he is sleep walking! hahaha Notice the mouth poised for a loud snore....ha

We checked out mail, eat and hit the road again....Open road, open sky!

We drove through several hours of mountains and cliffs and winding roads. I wondered what it would have been like riding through here on Ms Vickey.  Besides chilly......burrrrrrrr....

the further we went, the more snow we started to see on the mountain tops.

The Absaroka Mountain Range.......cool - eh?

Now, I know it doesn't seem like it here, but it was about lunch time when we rolled through there.  Neither of us wanted salty food and knew we needed something to keep the "pipes" clear so to speak.  So, we chose a more nutritious snack....They were ok until I ate a bright red one...haha  Yikes!!!  My right closed in horror while my left one stared in shock....haha.  It was sour!

These weren't too bad I guess.  I have had sweeter, but hey, we were hungry and still had a lot of road to cover....

Whooo hoooo!  We're getting closer all the time, Ya'll! We are in the nosebleed section now! haha

and then the landscape changed and all of the "dinosaur poo" that we thought we left in New Mexico on our last trip to the states. Scootard and I agreed that some of these massive rock formations had to be from dinosaurs going to the potty....ha

oh well.....maybe not.  ha.  Blue skies smiling at me, nothing but blue skies do I see........la la la la la.....la de daaaaa....:-).  That was me singing.....:-).
 

It's hard to get it straight sometimes which mountains are which.  I often rely on my beloved to keep it straight for me.  He has an impeccable memory which seems to store vast amounts of stuff...haha.  So, I asked.  

These are called The Jim Bridger Mountains.....

We made a quick stop to the rest room and I snapped a pic of these flags....very cool.

But look what happened when I tried to get a long shot.......hahaha.  shakin my head, ya'll.

I noticed this plaque on the way back to the car.  I thought this was cool too being a Veteran myself.  Nice to know that some do really appreciate the sacrifices made and the lives lost to maintain our freedom.

 These are called The Crazy Mountains....ha.  Seriously! Who knew!

This was the last little town we passed.  Not much there.  No timber either, by the way.....:-)

and at long last, after dinner at a local restaurant, we made our way to our hotel for the evening.

It was a 12 hour day today with more road tomorrow.......

Stay tuned!  I'm going to bed.