Lots of catch up, Part One

I caught you up on our repair last post, and wanted to mention a side benefit to our unexpected trip to Bozeman was the discovery of a picturesque small campground along the banks of the Gallatin River.  Could we stay there somehow?  

Also I left you with a little hint about a new hobby, and it's true, I am going to try fly tying  again.  Way back, I keep saying 30 years or so, and Jan keeps saying, try 40 years ago when we lived in Pennsylvania, I fly fished a lot and tied flies.  Could I dredge some of that up and do it again?  Would we have room for all the "stuff"?  Would it cost an arm and a leg?  These all were valid questions that I set out to try to answer.  Just north of Earthquake Lake on the Madison River is a famous fly shop and lodge called the Slide Inn owned and operated by a famous fly fishing guy named Kelly Galloup.  He is nationally recognized, has over 40 nationally recognized flies, has been guiding since he was 16, and has tons of excellent Utube videos about fishing technique and fly tying, and is friendly, informative, completely approachable, has a wealth of information, and best of all is a character and a half.  He is a blast to talk with, keeps you laughing, and just loads you up with incredible info. We stopped in to see about all my previous questions, and let it suffice, over 4 separate visits, lots of questions and answers, I picked up the basic tools needed to tie, and a starting quantity of material, and even had a chance to tie a few flies to get Kelly's critique before we left the area.  I am excited to be able to relearn this skill, and be able to tie most of Jan and my flies going forward.

My first experimentation

Okay, enough abut that, so what have we been up to?  First of all, as I mentioned when we arrived at Yellowstone Grizzly RV Park in West Yellowstone, we knew our friends Dave and Lingky were going to be there, and amazingly enough we ended up with a site right next to them.  What coincidence in such a huge RV park!  We met them last year and have kept in touch, so it was an absolute blast catching up with them.  Unfortunately Lingky had to leave us due to a family emergency, but we spent a lot of great time with Dave, and I should mention their two very well behaved dogs, Bella and Shelby.

Side by side

Dave and Lingky's amazing coach on the right

Shelby yucking it up:-)

Our time in West Yellowstone was definitely impacted by our repair, but we still were able to get into the park to fish a few times, ride up to Hebgen Lake, walk around town, the campground is right in town so it's an easy walk, and make several of my visits to the Slide Inn to see Kelly.

So our time to move on came quickly and it turned out coincidently Dave was leaving the same day.  Jan and I decided she would run up to Ennis to go to a grocery store and a super meat market, while I would leave with the motorhome and we would meet up later at a picnic area along the way.  Lucky, because we were going all of 16 miles, and I would need a break:-)  We were moving to Henry's Lake State Park, a picturesque campground that we had stayed in last year.  The weather forecast was for a windy, rainy day, and cold, so we hunkered in, made a pot roast, watched a movie, and I tied flies.  It was great!

Our site, not a bad view, huh?

After the storm, icing on the mountain tops

Beautiful!

But we were only there 2 nights after we had modified our schedule a bit to squeeze in a stay at the campground I mentioned on the Gallatin River called Moose Creek Flats Campground, in the Gallatin National Forest.  I should mention this is a boondock location, which we don't do a lot of, but enjoy as it keeps us on our toes, and lets us really enjoy the flexibility we have in our coach.  In case you don't know, boondocking means no hookups whatsoever, no electric, water, or sewer.  No problem as long as you plan for it, make sure the water tank is full, the waste tanks are empty, and you have plenty of fuel for the generator, we are totally self-sufficient.  It's a small campground with only a few sites, quiet, dark, and a 50' walk to the river, oh yeah!

Our site!

Looking at the river, oh boy!
We caught a few trout!

So it's always at the wrong time that something crazy happens, right?  We have Ram Boxes on our truck, openable storage compartments that are on the sides of the bed.  

This picture gives you an idea

We love them and we use them to hold towing stuff, picnic stuff, hiking stuff, well, you get the idea.  They are lockable and lock and unlock with the door locks.  Simple enough.  Well, I was pushing to release the box just as Jan was unlocking the truck and somehow we managed to get the button in the middle so we couldn't open the box!  I poked, pressed, locked, unlocked, did everything I could think of but couldn't get it open.  Now where we were as I showed you is gorgeous, but there is no cellphone service on either Verizon or AT&T.  So we drove 8 miles south to Big Sky to get phone coverage so I could call a dealer for advice and our go to for car advice son, Jason to see what to do.  Well, no one knew what to do other than stop at the dealer on our way through Bozeman and maybe they could drill it out, and order a new part.  As we were turning around to go back, we stumbled across this breathtaking little chapel just off the road.  How we had missed this before we couldn't say, but, all we can say is WOW, WOW, WOW.  It was dedicated in 1955 to a fallen family member from the 163rd Infantry Regiment lost in WW II.  

The incredible view from the road

The gorgeous and simple interior 

And this is the breathtaking view out the picture window!

It was so beautiful and moving it almost gave us the chills.  

Somehow, after we got back, and I took a pair of pliers and a small hammer to the Ram Box button, it finally popped out and all is good once again.

We enjoyed a wonderful evening, and hoped we would be able to return for more time in the future as it was so peaceful, beautiful, and there is just something about boondocking that is very appealing for a change.

So that's it for Part 1, I will finish this 2 part post in a few days.