We left Missoula bright and early at 6am. So I got to see the sunrise, which doesn’t happen often and that meant we got some serious miles in so we’re down to six hours of driving tomorrow. We did make a few stops.
First stop was Prairie Dog Town in Greycliff MT. It is a super easy break from I90. It was a – minute break stretching our legs and catching serious wind and worth every minute. Plus I’ve never seen a prairie dog. Cute from a distance rodenty up close.
We stopped for a quick jump up a bunch of stairs at Pompey’s Pillar just outside of Billings Montana. Clark (of Lewis and Clark fame) has signed the giant rock or pillar on this site. The site is close to the highway but does include a lot of steps – the structure is 120 feet high in the middle of a field. It’s cool to think of the signature being preserved. Clark named the structure after Sacagawea’s son. Incredible too to see a rendition of the canoes they used to travel (carved into Yellowstone trees). I can’t begin to imagine taking one of those into a river or having to be in sync with the number of people they probably had in the canoe.
This site is close to the site of Little Big Horn (aka Custer’s Las Stand). It’s hard to know where the lines between exploration and colonization begin, end and blur. Historically, this was part of the Louisiana Purchase but made part of the Crow Indian Reservation in the 1800s. It’s no longer part of the reservation but Crow tribal members have first right to homestead the land.
We ended up at Bismark for the night. It’s the capitol of North Dakota. SO far have only seen it at night but seems pretty hopping.
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