Big Sky!

We made it to Montana last night. We spent the night in a campground--from where I am writing this post now--called Indian Creek Campground in Deer Lodge MT. This is the simplest campground you can imagine and the kids are having a blast. There is no pool (you wouldn't need one--it is damn near freezing at night!) no playground, but what there is, is open space...something they don't get at home! They have been literally running around all morning. They played a game they made up called sprinkler tag--it was hilarious. They big field has one of those agricultural type sprinkler systems where water just shoots out randomly. The object of the game was to run from the sprinkler and not get wet. Everyone was motivated to avoid the sprinkler because once your clothes get wet, it is pretty darned cold. The campground is at the base of a mountain range that is--hope you are sitting down--SNOW capped!! July 31 (Happy Birthday Kyle!!) and there is SNOW on the mountains across the interstate!

We are still about a full day's drive from Glacier NP. We are planning to do a pit stop today at a place called Flathead Lake. It is supposed to be very nice. I will report on it either tonight or tomorrow.

I got a question from my sister wondering what the kids had to do to earn their junior ranger badges at the national park. Here is the answer. Each park creates its own activity book that the kids need to complete. The activities include attending a park presentation, and writing about something they learned. They also have to go see a variety of things specific to each park--plants or animal observations. They have to learn about the geologic history of the park as well. So in Zion earlier this week they had to learn about how the canyons were created and how long it took for they erosion to happen etc... Lastly each kid gets a chance to talk to a park ranger and then they take an oath to protect the national parks, not litter and not harass or feed any wild animals they encounter.

It is almost noon, so we need to get on the road. The three pictures in today's post are some I took this morning.