Beautiful Flathead Lake
Today we leave Flathead Lake behind. We took a week’s break here to enjoy the beauty of this area and to give ourselves a rest. Now we are leaving for Glacier National Park, the crown of the continent.
We arrived at our campground in Rollins last Sunday, as usual, we had only reviews from other RVers to recommend the campground but it has turned out to be a lovely place to stay. Carved into the hill opposite the lake the sites are in tiers so each RV faces the lake. I loved my early mornings just looking out over the misty blue water as the sun came up.
We took a few road trips. Up 93 to Kalispell, then to Hungry Horse Dam on the first day. Kalispell is a small city that is growing rapidly. The Main Street and homes are beautifully kept! At the Visitor’s Center, I had a long chat with a lovely 90-year-old gentleman who had been a ranger at Glacier for over 30 years. A veteran of both WW II and Korea, he had many stories to tell about this region and his life.
Hungry Horse Dam is the 6 largest dam in the US and like so many was built during the 1930s. It impounds a lovely lake.
Tuesday Tom washed and waxed the RV. It was a mess from our travels and needed serious work. I dust and swept out the inside, clean some cupboards and did the laundry. A nice housekeeping day.
The Making of America Museum in Polson is not to be missed An eclectic collection of one man it spans the history of the Flathead Lake region. I cannot even begin to describe it so just look at the pictures.
We also stopped at Kerr Dam on the Flathead River, another 1930s project. It is located on the Flathead Reservation and many of the works belonged to those tribes. Beautiful views of the inbound lake and the river. I particularly like to sign warning of bears and mountain lions in the area.
While passing through Wyoming we saw several advertisements for rodeos and comment it would be fun to attend one. Well, this week we did. The Northwestern Montana Fair and Rodeo were being held in Kalispell. Thursday was old fogies day so we got in free and the rodeo was half price. The fair did not compare with the Stark County Fair, much smaller and few exhibits but were really enjoyed the rodeo. All of the traditional events, bull riding, calf roping, bronco riding and barrel racing, were present but my favorites were mutton busting (little kids riding sheep) and the Indian Relay Races. It is a little hard to describe the relays. They consisted of 8 teams, each team had 4 men, a rider, 2 to hold the horses and one to catch the incoming horse, and 3 horses. They ride bareback. The ride & horse take off at the signal ride once around the track, the rider jumps off of his horse and onto the next horse, then once more around the track and so on. It becomes quite chaotic, horses running off without their riders, riders fall off or unable to jump on their horse. If this makes you think it is just a fun exhibit, it is a very serious event for the participants. We had a great time.
For more information on the Indian Relays go to http://www.pbs.org/independentlens/films/indian-relay/
For our last day, we took a cruise around the lake on the Far West located in Lakeside. We had a beautiful day, blue skies and blue waters. You might notice a haze in some of the pictures. This is smoke from a forest fire further south.
August 21st, 2016