MONTANA BOUND!!

Sept. 12,
We left Clarkston Wash. heading for Montana!
The hwy was beautiful and we followed the Clearwater River and still the Lewis and Clark Trail. This was also the route the Nez Pierce Indians took to escape the US Calvary toward Canada. We were not nice to this Indian tribe who took such good care to help Lewis and Clark when they were in need of food-shelter and supplies-it makes one feel really bad how they were treated by "us"
We arrived at Anglers Roost,Hamilton Montana by late afternoon. The Bitterroot Valley is just awesome! Our camp is beautiful-we are just so close to the Bitterroot-after so long thinking about and wishing we were here-to finally "be" here is great!
We took a hike along the river-Ginger only took about two second to get in the cool water.
the next day we took a little tour of the town of Hamilton-we are impressed! the historic downtown area is nice-we shopped at a true old fasioned dept. store. we bought hiking boots-yes,Mum, I have hiking boots! we found great water-proof jackets and other necessities-went back to camp and bought worms. it was a full afternoon! Later that day we tried our luck on the river-we had a good time-but no fish for us! Fortunately I had taken something frome our freezer-so we did have dinner. the next day we had a great visit with Darrel's Dad-Dave. He was a true Montana gentleman-and gave us lots of info on the area-oh, and a story about Darrel and a certain horse-maybe you need to ask Darrel about that one! Anyway, it was a pleasure to meet Dave, and we hope to see him again one spring!
the next couple of days were spent just enjoying the area-and hiking up and down the river looking for the elusive trout. We really did not care that much about catching one-the trying is the best part. Ginger had a blast trying to catch the worms on our poles. We went one day to see the Daly mansion-Daly was the man who founded Hamilton. He made his fortune in Copper. we did not have time to go do the tour-but there are some great pics of the home on our FLICKR site. the grounds and flowers were really pretty! Fall has turned the maple trees here a flaming gold and red-I love it!
We will look forward to another visit to Hamilton-by far our favorite town and area so far!

Tuesday,Sept. 16
We head for Kalispell,Montana
Mike and have eagerly awaited getting to this area of the Flathead valley. the trip here was again a pretty one! all of a sudden we come around a corner-and there is this huge-beautiful alke-Flathead Lake. It is awesome! we go thru the town of Bigfork
and I want to move here right now1 great homes right on the lake on one side-great homes with beautiful orchards on the other-I could not choose-so we keep going. I told Mike that since he would not stop in Hamilton and buy me a buffalo robe(they were for sale by the side of the road-right next to the post office we stopped at to mail Kris'b.day card) that he really owed me either a home on Flathead lake or an orchard. We are still in the middle of that discussion!
We arrive at our camp-again really nice-the Flathead river is just behind our house-it is rushing pretty fast-and we can hear it when we are outside. The camp is pretty empty and is like having a huge backyard to ourselves-nice!
Sept. 17
today we are taking a tour of the Conrad Mansion.Charles Conrad founded the town of Kalispell. He made his fortune in the shipping business-the family story is really interesting if anyone is interested-check it out on google!
the home was fantastic-many luxuries and inovations not heard of in those years.
we toured 28 rooms that were pretty much original to when the family was living there. The home, furnishings,even toys and clothing and linens were all like new-the family really seemed to appreciate and value all they had-which was a lot!!
we had a great tour guide-Cindy,she made it fun and knew so much about the family and ythe property too. My Aunt Jan had told Mike and I about the house-she had toured it just a week or so ahead of us on her trip to see some friends in Whitefish.
This tour is a must do if any of you out there are in Kalispell!

Sept. 18,
today we drove to Glacier National Park. We packed our warm clothes in a daypack-and yes, our new hiking boots! The park is pretty close to Kalispell, and a beautiful drive. When we got to the park entrance-we were told that a good portion of the park was closed-due to road-paving. We went to McDonald lodge first-beautiful! we had a great lunch at the lodge overlooking the huge lake. the lodge is fantastic-we will be back here also. after lunch we took a hike part way up to Avalanche Lake. it is a four mile-each way trip, and we had to leave Ginger at home-so we went as far as we could before turning around to go back home. Really beautiful park-and one could just take a week at least and just hike the trails. Next visit we will make sure the rest of ther park will be open! We had a great day-and Ginger was quite happy to see us return. I came in the house to download the pics from the camera-Mike called me out again- seems the family of deer that we saw a little of the night before were back-and so we went out with an apple for them-we don't have bunnies here-so it was fun to try and feed something! The deer let me take some pics of them-one of them did check out the apple-but were a little to nervous to stick around. I bet they will come back later for the apple!
we will be staying home tomorrow to get some things done around here-then fishing on Flathead lake on Sat. Sunday we will be heading out for a new home on our way to Yellowstone Park.Please remember to go to the FLICKR site for all of the great pictures we have posted! go to flickr.com/photos/mikejangin/ if you can enlarge the pics it is better!! all for now-over and out!