Thursday, June 30

Forgot that yesterday I finally got to use one of the Holiday gas cards my co-workers gave me for retirement. Sure felt good ...


The day dawned a bit better. Not warm, but certainly not raining or hailing or tossing lightning at us. We decided to visit the state capitol building. It was worth visiting. There was no one around so we just walked in and wandered. It's beautiful, old wood, stained glass and marble.


From there we headed to Butte ... to the Harley shop, of course. Needed that Harley shirt. I'd been through there last year and they didn't have any dip dots or dealer pins. This year they did. Yay! Got them, and a couple of other things, too. It was an excellent stop.


We got on our rides and headed west to Drummond. At that point we went south on Highway 1 to Anaconda. It's a beautiful road and enjoyable. There are old train tracks, a river and the day was cool to cooler. Birdie had to put on her heated vest. It was 62 degrees and then we went higher to the 6,400 foot elevation. We'd be in the sun, go around a curve and hit a wall of clouds, then around another and into the sun again. It was a mixture of weather, but no rain. Nice. There was off and on wind, though ... seems like it's everywhere.


I saw a coyote and in the very next pasture there was a herd of sheep with a watch llama standing at attention. He knew there was something that wasn't right.


Then going around a corner just off to the side of the road down in the ditch there was a doe in all the grass. She was a gorgeous sight. I never tire of seeing them.

Got back onto I-90 and stopped to get gas near Butte before heading back to Belgrade to meet up with my friend and spend the night. As we did, I turned to Birdie and said a good steak sure would taste good, and we're in Montana. Where better to have a steak? I'm a chicken and seafood girl, but sometimes MEAT just seems like the thing to do.


Jan took us to a place near I-90 about 12 miles from her place, called the Oasis. The steaks were mouthwatering and delicious ... relish tray, salad, bread, baked potato AND a chocolate sundae. It just doesn't get much better than that.

Back to the house and to bed. BUT before I do, I have to finish a story I started on Tuesday, June 28, about the elk. I thought I might be hallucinating. I had told Birdie we had to stop on the way back, and we did. We walked across the four lanes and there it was ... standing on the other side of the fence in a pond. The most beautiful elk ... made of barbed wire with what appeared to be marbles for eyes. Fools. Lol ... A couple stopped to ask if we were okay. Yep, just stopped to see this thing. The guy said a lot of people shoot it in the fall during hunting season. We had a great laugh about that.


All for now.