Montana

We were heading further north leaving southwest Idaho to meet with fellow RVers. On the way, we found a great place to park a few days at Clark Canyon Reservoir. These were rolling hills and high desert chaparral. The water was low for this time of year. Possibly a reflection on the lack of water this area has had over the last few years. We had friendly neighbors who soon invited Mary for a ride on their horse. One of their boys was happy to show off some of the nice fish that were still being caught in the reservoir. Being summer, we got to enjoy a storm which brought some interesting views late in the afternoon.

We moved on through the back roads to see the countryside up close. The route took us over good gravel roads as we wound our way further north to rendezvous with more RVers who were gathering at Mussingbrod Lake to hunt Morel mushrooms. We had never done this sort of thing before and we were excited to learn about the fine art of hunting mushrooms. We were met by hosts Pat & Trish and Gary and Laura who were co-hosts. They took us under their wing and taught us what to look for and where to look. We didn't realize how rare and tasty these mushrooms are. We sure enjoyed eating these tasty mushrooms especially along with great new friends.

    A moose was spotted nearby to the campsite.

We decided to move to a more secluded area for a few days where Mary learned to shoot her new rifle.   Gary & Laura stopped by on their way home and invited us to join them and several other RV friends to their Ranch near Hamilton. A few days later we arrived to find another mini get together at their private ranch in the foothills. What a back yard! This is one of  the few times I came across a white tail deer instead of the more common western mule deer. We sure enjoyed the spectacular vistas and wildlife.  Larry & Debbie were another younger couple we met there and became friends with. Larry and I experimented with a small wind generator and tweaked some of my solar stuff. Larry is a part-time installer and helped me improve our setup. We hooked into the existing system without difficulty and I liked the wind generator just fine. But, after testing for a week or so I came to the conclusion that I was not ready to invest in this addition to our system yet. The idea of a small wind generator is good but it has limits and a greater "hassle factor" than solar panels do. It will be a good addition to our system eventually but is marginally effective in maintaining the system as we had set it up. Unless one can create a mount that is isolated from the RV body, portable and one person can put up, I feel it is too much trouble for an RVer that moves more than once a month. It would be a good back up as long as one was parked where some wind was available most of the time. Wind generators need to be as high as possible to face into the prevailing winds without trees or mountains creating too much turbulence to be effective. It is still a project that I will tackle at a later date as technology improves and efficiency and costs come down.

 We were parked next to Gary & Lora's corral and became friends with the horses and their new mule, Buttercup. She is quite a character and loves to play. Mary got the opportunity to ride and enjoyed learning about horses and ranching.

Of course, Gary had to take us on a ATV trip up into the mountains overlooking their home. There are plenty of trout in the streams and wild game is plentiful. 

          We sure enjoyed our visit to Montana and intend to come back and explore again.