Thursday - the quest for 9,000 feet

It's really crazy who you meet, and where. Truly, this is a small small world. We went upstairs for breakfast at the B&B on Thursday, and chatted with the other four guests staying there. All four were from La Plata, Maryland, which is south of DC and about 3 hours away from us. Turns out all four are horse people, which we discovered when I told them I worked for the Horse Breeders. Then they were telling us about their trip, and said they had been to Wyoming for the Big Horn Endurance Ride to crew for a friend of theirs. I think they were a bit shocked when I said "oh, right - I forgot Big Horn was last weekend!" Most people don't know what endurance even IS, much less know anything about the Big Horn endurance ride, which is a 100 mile ride in the Wyoming mountains, not terribly far from Yellowstone. So it turns out that these nice folks are endurance riders, and managed the Old Dominion endurance ride in Virginia, which I have both ridden at (only 25 miles, but still) and have volunteered at. I told them I managed the Foxcatcher ride at Fair Hill, and ran the NAEC in 2005. And THEY volunteered for me, at that big ride. So, of course, we talked endurance for an hour. Poor John... They were nice folks. They were leaving that morning, driving back to Salt Lake City and flying from there back to Maryland. I'm sure I'll run in to them again. But what's the chance, really, of meeting these endurance people in a tiny B&B in the itty bitty town of Gardiner, Montana? So weird.

The view out our window from the Headwaters B&B. Lovely place, right on the Yellowstone River. Fabulous fly fishing, apparently.

Our B&B. We stayed downstairs, ate breakfast upstairs right behind those huge windows - great view during a fantastic breakfast of quiche and fruit and bacon

Wearing Virginia Tech gear makes you find friends quickly, as well. I think I was wearing the Hokie shirt on Thursday, and John wore a VT hat all week, and a VT shirt on occasion. We got lots of people saying "Go Hokies" and asking if we were from Virginia. The nice folks we met at the laundromat on Thursday morning were from Northern Virginia, were fellow Hokies, and knew about where we lived - their kid had played baseball in Cal Ripkin's stadium right down the road from us. It's a small little world!

We finally got ourselves out of town around noon, and headed for a meeting point with the Halls for one more day. Made a few stops along the way, for photos of the arch:

Roosevelt Arch, dedicated by Teddy Roosevelt himself in 1903.

"For the Benefit and Enjoyment of the People"

Here's the tiny town of Gardiner. This is about it. No, really. Pretty big, eh? We were cracking up, as the street called Main Street is a little gravel road...

And we had to do the traditional, touristy pictures with the sign in to Yellowstone. Along with about 8 others cars full of people. Which is fine - someone can take a photo for you!

We met the Halls at 2:00 at the tiny little junction of Tower-Roosevelt. Not nearly as hopping as Mammoth was the day before. But we found the crowds again soon enough, at Tower Falls:

Tower Falls. We wandered down the trail to see them from below, as well.

The Yellowstone River (which eventually flows north to go through Gardiner, past our B&B, meet up with the Missouri River, then join the mighty Mississippi River for a trip down to the Gulf Coast)

We were caught in a "bear jam". This little black bear (kind of in the trees, to the left of the ranger in the orange vest) was near a picnic area, scoping out the food. He got chased away by the rangers.

After the bear jam we headed down some windy, pretty roads to Mt. Washburn. We drove up the road to the parking lot and checked out the map to see how far it was to the top of the mountain. 3 miles? One way? No, thanks. We'll pass. It's already 4:00. We'd never make it back before dark. Yeah. That's a good excuse! :-) We did hike a few hundred yards up the trail, though, to get a little better view of the surrounding mountains. Gorgeous!

The view from part way up Mt. Washburn

WAY up there, three miles away, all uphill, is the top of the mountain and a little observation tower (where apparently a ranger lives 24/7).

All the girls. We had a great time with the Halls - so glad they were able to come down from Canmore!

John has the wrist watch GPS with him and decides to hike up far enough to say he got to 9,000 feet. So off he goes. Alone. No, no - we're not joining him in his 9,000 foot quest! Gracie, though, ever the adventurer, caught up with John and joined him for his quest.

And Gracie RAN back down the hill after getting to 9,000 feet (which took longer than John expected). That's Gracie in the purple shirt, far bottom right. John's top left, all alone again.

No ice cream after this little excursion, because we had a huge fantastic dinner of steak and veggies and amazing mashed potatoes (Kath taught me how to mash potatoes ages ago in Sweet Briar - she makes great ones!) at Camp Hall. This would be our last time seeing them - we were getting up early on Friday morning and heading east to find some wildlife, and the Halls were starting their journey back to Canada. So we said our good-bye's that night. Hopefully it'll be less than 2 years before we see them all again. Come visit in Maryland, Kathy!! We miss you guys.