Blog

A month in Montana

 

Covid-19 filtered through our lives, impacting our world in ways we could never imagine. I think many of us thought the turn of a new decade would bring new adventures, but instead everything came to a screeching halt. For a year and a half, we buckled down. For me, I stayed put in my little studio apartment. The walls seemingly tighter together every day. It’s fair to say I was starting to feel stuck. So my boyfriend Patrick and I decided to embark on a wild west adventure with our friends. (The thought was that we could socially distance and hike before some restrictions were lifted.) We wanted to explore a place none of us have ever imagined going, so why not Bozeman, Montana? We figured we might as well live there to get the full experience and ended up packing our bags for a 3-week trip to Big Sky country. 

By day, we sat around the dining table typing away and working remotely at our various jobs. Our mornings were sleepy and slow; an occasional walk around the local pond. Days were filled with work, and by night we were itching to get out to explore. 

The sun was our friend with its teenage tendency to avoid sleeping. We had daylight until 9:30pm. This gave us a handful of hours to set out and explore. Here were the highlights:

 

YELLOWSTONE

  • Lamar Valley is where the animals came out to relax. There were hundreds of bisons and so, so many bison babies. We spotted a bear thanks to a RV roadtrippin’ couple that let us use their telescope. A lone wolf was seen in the distance and our car almost rammed into 3+ deer.
  • Geysers, like “Old Faithful”, are a popular choice among Yellowstone tourists. Honestly it was pretty overrated and smelled like rotten eggs. This could be skipped, but hey there’s a very clean bathroom at the lodge by the spewing watering hole.
  • Grand Prismatic Spring: I mean, unreal. See pics below.
  • Swimming in a random beautiful river was probably my highlight of the whole trip. I could feel the current under my feet, the water was refreshing on that hot afternoon, and it was just absolute bliss.
  • Lava Lake hike (Patrick, Kevin, and Franny) did this high elevation hike that was 6 miles. It was the highlight of their trips and is highly recommended.

GRAND TETONS

  • Jenny Lake hike 
    • Hidden Falls 
    • These hikes were surrounded by the Grand Tetons in Wyoming. The rock structures were overwhelmingly vast. This hike was a bit more touristy and it was hard to take a pic without it looking like:

GLACIER PARK

  • We stayed in White Fish, about 40 minutes from Glacier Park. It is a snow resort town, a little boujee, but in the summer you can take a sled down a huge mountain slide. Patrick and Joe were able to race down quickly, I on the other hand went 1/2 mph, at times I was at a complete stop. Either way, the ride back up the mountain on the ski lift was very pretty. 
  • St. Mary Lake 
    • Beautiful! The hike wrapped around two large lakes with a dense forested trail. There wasn’t much elevation on this one, so it was fairly easy. You can choose how long you wanted to go, we went for a 6 mile loop. 
    • All we wanted was to see a bear. After a week and a half of no sightings, it was becoming a chanted desire every time we entered a forested area. Someone would say, “this is bear country,” and our eyes would search listlessly. Then it happened. A park ranger car turned on its emergency lights right in front of us. She hopped out of her truck with a loaded gun and proceeded to shoot a grizzly bear in a field to our right. Rest assured it was a tranquilizer gun to help relocate this possibly aggressive bear. I felt pretty sad for the poor guy, but the moment was exhilarating to say in the least.  


BOZEMAN

  • Bozeman Hot Springs 
    • Open until 11pm, go late at night. Ignore the indoor pools, they looked kind of nasty. Outside though, there were 3 pools of different temperatures that you could soak in. Watch the big sky’s light dissolve. 
  • The Molly Brown Bar: we played Trivia on Wednesdays and practiced our pool game.
  •  Food:
    • Dave’s Sushi
      • We had Patrick’s birthday dinner here, very fresh and tasty.
    • Wild Crumb (Bakery)
    • Pickle Barrel (Sandwiches)

Feeling incredibly thankful to have this beautiful adventure born from an unimaginable situation. Grateful for the good friends that made our trip so special. xo Claire