Tuesday, September 12, 2017

Day 5 - Shotguns & Meth: Welcome to School!

Day 5
Miles City, MY - Bozeman, MT
250 Miles
Time in Transit - A Few Measly Hours
View From Hotel - I-90 Highway


Because I forgot to post it yesterday, here is the view from last night's hotel. 


We work up early and got some breakfast. Kerri still refused to let me sample the bologna etc. that was provided by the hotel, so I had some fruit and yogurt instead.

Disappointing, but into every life some yogurt must drip.

On the plus side, I did notice that in addition to the bologna, we were provided with the cleanest, freshest most sanitary remote control in the world.

Garden fresh. Kerri still would not let me lick it.

We abandoned the bologna and hopped into Towanda for a short trip to Bozeman, Alex's new home.

Along the way, the world flattened out, then got bumpy again, then got very, very smoky.

Years ago, some intrepid pioneer heading westward say, "Enough. We're stopping here."


We stopped for lunch at a small information center about an hour outside of Bozeman. There was an older man and an older woman sitting in rocking chairs outside. We sat in the shade of the parking lot and ate our lunches from the back of the van.

After we ate, we zipped inside for a quick bathroom trip before heading off. We entered the building just as the older man exited the bathroom. Tori went in first and came out a few minutes later, white-faced.

"That dude wrecked the place," she whispered.

I entered cautiously and, indeed, the smell was something tangible.

"Wow," I thought. "That dude should probably seek medical attention."

I was growing dizzy from holding my breath, when I walked to the sink to wash my hands. A small, hand-written sign over the sink said, "The smell is from the high sulfur content in the water."

I'll admit that a small part of me was disappointed, but most of me was glad that I wasn't going to have to burn my clothes to get rid of clinging old man poop-particles.

We suggested that Alex start saving money for bottled water as we hopped back in the van and headed to Bozeman.

Our first stop was MSU and Alex's dorm.

We parked and walked around the quiet campus, checking things out.

Alex in front of his dorm. If you Google the name of his dorm, the first few articles are about the kids who got arrested for cooking & selling meth in their room last year. It was really stupid of them because the college has a clearly stated policy prohibiting students from running businesses out of dorm rooms.

Campus selfie!

Awwwwww, obligatory "My kids are awesome" picture. 

Alex found this shotgun shell on the sidewalk outside his dorm.


Hmmmm.

Maybe the meth kids have branched out?

After failing to find any more shotgun shells or any meth at all, we headed to the hotel, just a few miles away.

It was a nice place and Corey, the front desk guy, greeted us effusively and handed us a bag of MSU swag since Alex was a new student.

We settled in for a 4 night stay in Bozeman. We did some laundry, hung around in the pool for a while, and got some excellent local burgers from a place called The Garage, which, oddly enough, is located in an old garage.

When we got back to the hotel, we asked our new best friend, Corey about heading to Yellowstone to watch the eclipse tomorrow. We had seen horror stories on the news of people stuck in traffic for 24+ hours.

The entrance to Yellowstone is only an hour and a half from Bozeman, but Corey suggested that we leave by 5 a.m. to make sure that we didn't miss the eclipse of there was a lot of traffic.

"Corey knows best," we agreed.
"4:00 a.m. sucks," we agreed.

Glumly, we set the alarm for 4:00 a.m. and went to bed early.

Tomorrow, the eclipse in Yellowstone.


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