Day One

The alarm went off at 4:08 am and the song Crazy by Gnarls Barkley was playing...I found that rather appropriate. After getting the last few things in the truck, taking some pictures and a tearful goodbye to my mom we were on the road by 5:20 am...only 20 minutes behind schedule but less than the hour we are usually behind on these road trips. We made it in to Cheyenne by 7:00am we were making good time and things were going well. The plan was to make it to Missoula, MT 7:00 PM going roughly 950 miles, or about 13 hours including drive time and stops. There are some beautiful sights in Wyoming...Yellowstone and the Grand Tetons to name a few...but we would not be seeing any of that. If you have ever had the pleasure of taking I25 across Wyoming you know it is boring as hell (not Nebraska or Kansas boring but boring nonetheless) and it is windy. It does not seem to matter where we go...if we are on a road trip there is going to be wind and lots of it. Once out of Cheyenne those winds started up. It would not have been so bad had it been a tail wind...but instead we were faced with 65 mph cross winds. I had the wheel cranked so hard against it that if the wind would have suddenly stopped we would have gone careening into off the road and into a ditch. We stopped for lunch in Sheridan, about 20 miles from the Montana border, at noon. I can't remember the name of the place were we had lunch...but I do remember the name of the loud little kid at the table next to us...it was Tyler. Dear Tyler's parents, telling Tyler to shush 50 million times is obviously not working maybe you should try something else, or take him to a McDonalds playplace next time. After lunch we crossed over into Big Sky Country...and I have to tell you that the sky does seem bigger in Montana. Driving through this part of Montana was a lot like Wyoming with the exception of more hills and snow. We were a bit ahead of schedule so we decided to be a little touristy and stopped to do the tour at the Little Bighorn Battlefield. It was getting colder and windier so we tried to be quick about it. Boyfriend had been there before and was able to give a very informative your yet abbreviated tour. I got the gist that maybe Custer was not all that hot of a General and had he kept his troops together that the out come would have been very different. I was also sad to learn that all but a horse named Comanche died in the battle. In checking the weather before leaving that morning we knew that there was a 30% chance of snow...and we ran into that snow just outside of Billings. We went from cloudy skies and clear roads to whiteout conditions and icy roads in a matter of minutes. We drove in and out of snow for the next 6 hours. Every once in a while we would get lucky and get about 20 miles of dry roads but it did not help to make up time. Once in Butte the skies cleared and the roads appeared to dry up. it was 9:00 PM we were about 120 miles outside of Missoula, hours behind schedule and tired. My foot became very heavy and I drove those winding mountain roads as fast as I could...regardless of the protests coming from the passenger seat. We pulled into Missoula at about 10:15 PM...3 hours behind schedule. Here's to hoping that the last 400 miles are a little easier.