Bill & Jan's Excellent Adventure: One Week Down, Two to Go

We have accomplished a lot in our first week here, but only one day fishing so far. After our first gorgeous evening here, we hit the road running.

We have an issue with the truck sounds like an exhaust leak, also confirmed by our son Jason while we were there, and being in the car business, he told us it was probably a broken exhaust manifold, a fairly common issue with our year Ram, and that we better get an appointment ASAP as things are extraordinarily busy. After not being able to get it repaired in either Bozeman or Missoula for months, we found a smaller dealer in the nearby town of Livingston, now nearby I mean, 78 miles away, or only 25 miles farther along than Bozeman. Up here in Montana we are told these are short distances similar to Texas, and we tend to believe it :-) So that chore is scheduled. Then we wanted to restock at Costco, go grocery shopping, stop at a pottery place where we have bought a lot of dishes, plates, coffee cups, etc, and since Jan's favorite mug got broken, and of course go to lunch at a favorite sushi place, Dave's. It had been over 2 years since we went there so we had high hopes it would still be good, and we can report it was great!

Ahi tuna tacos

That took most of the day, but it was needed, it is a gorgeous drive, and we came back to this.

The next day we had big plans as well, we had to wash the motorhome and the truck, to say they were dirty was an understatement, we have ended up driving in more rain this year than ever before! And no place to wash. Also we had another project we have been trying to get done since last year, painting the roof of the coach. Our roof is fiberglass and in great shape, although over time, and always out in the weather and the sun, it had faded a bit, become a bit chalky, and you could see fine little cracks in the surface. After researching on numerous forums, we decided to paint it with Rustoleum Marine Topside paint, lots of good reports on the results as well as the ease of application. So today was the day, lots of sun, low humidity, no rain in sight since we'd need 2 coats on different days. First the roof had to be cleaned very well and then it had to dry before painting.

The diesel mechanic is a jack of all trades:-)

Before washing

We took our time, had bite of lunch to allow the roof to completely dry and up we went for the first coat, working together, we cut in with a brush and rolled the paint on. It was pretty easy and applied well. The next day dawned bright and dry, so after the tiny bit of dew evaporated, on went the second coat, and we think it turned out beautiful! We highly recommend this solution, of course time will tell, but it sure looks great now.

Just so you know this pic was taken before it was completely done,
hence the spot on the lower right

We took the opportunity to look at our wiring for the brake light again, and after troubleshooting the truck, the connection between the truck and the motorhome, Jan crawled under and inspected the entire length of the wire, and found no other problems. It tested out okay, but we won't know for sure until we drive again.

Into town for a good lunch at a new to us place, Tavern 287.

Then I tied flies for a few hours.

Jan has been looking for a good place to donate some of our good used fishing gear, and found a good cause, Casting for Recovery, an organization for women with breast cancer using fly fishing as a form of therapy, and they have an office in Bozeman. We ran back up to give them what we had accumulated, then out to lunch at another new spot, Cafe Zydeco.

The seafood gumbo and the crawfish "Cajun Taco" were the bomb,
the oysters not so much, but 2 out of 3 ain't bad:-)

So finally our day of fishing arrived! Even though the reports in the area were saying things were slow, we were psyched. A gorgeous day, a beautiful river, and not one even bite all morning long:-(

So back for a quick lunch, then made some coffee and decided to run south, about 50 miles to the upper Madison and see what was what there. We didn't see a whole lot of activity, quite a few drift boats on the river, but not the usual amount of fishermen. And the ones we did talk to said, things were slow...... Since we were close to Quake Lake we went over for coffee.

But we are undaunted, we'll find the right combination, and in fact we are headed out in just a few minutes to give it another whirl after it warms up just a bit, it's 41 now:-) In the meantime we have to put up with this view from our site for HH. We'll manage somehow.