Lewis and Clark was a gay parody of Superman right?

Montana makes such a big deal about Lewis and Clark having gone through the state. There are so many signs and markers and info about them everywhere. I bet they had one hell of a time getting through this incredibly large area.

I enjoy manipulated trees even though I don't understand why they have to be trimmed.

So you've seen piles of broken palettes or ones in dumpsters. Some of the trees that are cut go to make more! This world needs to get its head out of its ass. The color is nice though.

The trip to Yellowstone had only a backtrack available for travel. Winter makes roads impassable, and I always want to take new routes to see new landscapes.

The weather was a little different.

Snow moving up and over peaks never gets old.

The plains extend all the way through Montana and are very heavily grazed.

The land changes pretty rapidly and varies from sides of the road.

Trees pretty much vanished. Rolling hills with mountains in the background continued the whole way through the state.

Montana pride!

Look at that Stealth Fighter above the mountain. Well it's a bird.

A large iced over lake had ice fishermen shacks all over. A little flow to the lake created a fissure with large ice blocks gathered up.

These hills kept catching my attention. They are so beautifully snow covered.

There is absolutely no way to keep my widows clean. The roads are filthy, every car that passes shoots up salty water, and I have no wiper fluid. Someone before I had the Sunfire put water in the wiper fluid reservoir and let it freeze, this cracks the plastic and doesn't let it hold fluid.

The light on the bare grass were great.

The darkness of clouds make mountains almost black at times.

The mountains were always in the background and ripped through the clouds.

As soon as I crossed into Idaho trees started to show themselves. A really low cloud intrigued me ahead. The elevation was rather high, but the cloud looked like it straddled the ground.

And then I was IN the cloud.

It was really cool. The atmosphere covered everything a hundred feet away from wherever I moved. It was neat to be able to see everything around me.

The distances that were present created a lot of variety.

Even though the clouds did not cover the entire sky in Montana, when I got out of the cloud itself the sky looked so much more saturated.

I've seen all the low lying clouds hugging the mountains, and now I've been in one.

The valley rose again and I entered another cloud.

What I am guessing are wind screens vibrated against each other when they crossed one another. Since Kansas there have been wind and snow screens along the roadside.

After a while I was on top of a plateau. It was so flat and covered in potato farms. I was as high as the mountains so they even disappeared.

Hay, what did you get me for Christmas? So I was notified that Christmas is a week away. So far I have been dealing with my breakup and breakdown since before Halloween. I'm glad I've come this far and have seen so much beauty in the world. I hope that everyone that is reading is given a kick in the butt to see what beauty this world has to offer.

In the mood for a Bison Burger.

Montana is pretty large. What has been happening with my day to day is that when I start my day in a new place the landscape, when I get nearer to a national park the preceding landscape looks ugly in comparison.

Montana has many farms along the roadside so there was a spoil to most of the land.

The sun was finally out and I was chasing the storms that were overhead last night.

the clouds moved over the land like airships.

They call Montana big sky country for a reason.

The sun hitting the clouds, and the clouds maneuvering over the mountains created tremendous light changes.

Northern slopes were quite snowy, and southern exposures were clear. The mountains still maintained an indigo hue.

This one mountain was like a portrait painting with eyes that always looked straight at you. It was always in my view.

The clouds looked amazing. I am glad that I have come across all weather types.

Like other national parks, Yellowstone National Park has many roads closed. I was only able to use the northern entrance and one road going west to east. I was bummed a bit. If you have not been clicking and enlarging the images you will definitely loose out on this image.

Mammoth Hot Springs were active and steamy. Of course I to see the normal sights, especially the pools of water with different colored organisms.

The top of the springs had some color, but not as dramatic as the pools. The color was dimmed by the extreme temperature difference between the air and water.

Minerals in the water created all sorts of shapes in the water. The web patterns here happen when plant stems drop in the water and get covered with minerals and organisms.

The valley view was amazing.

Only you can prevent forest fires. Asshole bear. Fire is normal for wild areas. It sucks when areas are set on fire on purpose or by accident, but it is a good thing for an area. The hillside looked as if it was full of matchsticks.

The huge stands of trees went in every direction on the ground.

We killed almost 60 MILLION bison. Sixty million. They are so huge and lumbering. before all of these guys i saw a Wolf walking along the shoulder. It startled me coming around a curve, and frightened me because another car was going really freaking slow right next to him so I couldn't get into the other lane. My brakes frightened him and he looked scared and pissed.

There were so many areas with bison grazing.

The cloud cover got thicker as I went east towards the NE entrance of the park. The NE entrance was closed so I had to come back this way eventually.

Such a large sky encompassed by the mountains.

The front that i was edging closer to looked foreboding.

This was the epitome of what the day was like.

Look at the front creating the dark.

I never look forward to going west in the evening because of the sunset right in my face. The mountains hid it from me.

I got to the other end of the park and was closing in on the dark clouds. The light took a turn.

It took a turn for beauty. The foreground was lit up like christmas and the background was dark as it could be.

It was a spectacular sight.

The colors just popped against each other and everything.

The clouds overhead consumed the entire landscape.

The air above the mountains rose and dimmed the peaks. A cloudy roll.

Heading back towards the entrance I was relieved that the light was completely different.

The dark light was only sheared by small amounts of sun.

I got to one area where bison had been before and this time they had moved. I had to stop. I rolled up slowly not wanting to scare them, but to let them know that I wanted to get through.

I loved that I got really close. I edged forward and in doing so they turned and looked at me. They just stood there for a minute trying to either intimidate me or size my car up. I laughed so much since they did not budge and just stared.

The herd was just grazing about minding their own business. Sometimes one looked up at me and just went back to eating.

After a few minutes the guys on the road scampered off right next to my car. I was not zoomed in. That is ones back, and he was just that close.

The darkness fell and blues fell on everything.

A lot of things remind me of people I know. I bet Tre is not hard to shop for, even if you didn't know his interests (PBR and spray paint). I am having a hard time dealing with my ego and survival instinct trying to overcome what I am trying to accomplish here. The safety and knowledge of Indianapolis seems like an option to my mind, but I know it's not.

I loaded up on non-perishable food before I left and all that is left are club crackers so I went grocery shopping. So I got the essentials. I try to avoid national chain restaurants as much as possible and frequent locally owned places, but it's not easy. The highway advertises chains, food signs point to chains, and not knowing an area I won't see a places sign until I have already passed. It's kind of nice having such a small stomach now though, but I'm tired of craving the damn food I'm used to eating, so I went for it.