Day 16: Missoula to Dillon, MT
We headed south from Missoula today and said goodby to our family folks. We traveled together south on US 93, taking in Travelers Rest and Bitterroot Brewery in Hamilton. On the subject of beer, as we visited many breweries, etc., we have been buying a six pack here and there of various local beers. We still have a few from Minnesota.
We drove south to Travelers Rest, a spot where Lewis & Clark stopped both ways on their journey. This is a flat wooded natural camping area on Lolo Creek that native Americans had camped at for years before. This area is full of references & places that their Corps of Discovery had been.
This being July 2nd, fireworks stands were in full swing. I will share some of the more interesting ones.
90% (my estimate) of the fireworks stands in Montana are staffed by women. And I stopped at quite a few. After I realized this, I mentioned that to the women working in them and they had no clue that women were the ones running the fireworks stands of Montana.
Typical western Montana scene. Barely north of Idaho on US 93.
We visited Idaho today (just barely) and I now have been in all 50 states. I went a few feet in to ID to take this photo and then drove 1 mile over a little piece of Idaho. This made 49 for MB. She’ll get Wyoming later in this trip.
The Big Hole National Battlefield. Nez Perce Indians and the US Army had a battle here. The Nez Perce had refused to stay on a reservation and were fleeing back to open range. The visitor center has an excellent display with a view of the battlefield.
On down the road we went to the Bannack ghost town. It’s a small intact gold rush town on several blocks of a straight street. It is a state park, open until 8pm, but we got their after 5 so missed out on the town info. We left fairly quickly anyway as one of those afternoon mountain thunder storms was making an appearance. This is a schoolhouse.
Inside of one of the ghost town homes. The town was started in 1862, but it wasn’t clear what the age was of each of the buildings.
Dillon, MT. The artwork on the front was done by a young man working inside (along with 2 women!)
Dillon, MT
Downtown Dillon, MT. We had a difficult time finding an open restaurant. Many places were closed. Finally we broke our rule of not eating Mexican food outside of Texas, but it turned out to be ok.