(NOTE: FOR SOME REASON, BLOGGER WILL NOT UPLOAD MY PICTURES!! WILL TRY TO ADD THEM LATER)

Today we drove. A lot. To Bozeman, MT and the "C'mon Inn." Seriously, that's what it's called! 7.5+ hours in the car -- woo hoo!

We woke up EARLY and repacked the van again. We still haven't found the configuration of all our stuff that works the best going in and out of the hotel each night. There's just too much stuff, period.

We passed lots of fields of hay and livestock. The cutest thing is LB's reaction -- when he sees cows out the window he says, "Moo!" Horses -- "Neigh!" We saw herds of pronghorn and some beautiful palomino ponies.

Lunch was a picnic at the Little Bighorn Battlefield memorial, on the Crow Indian Reservation. There happened to be 30+ mph winds, and no set picnic area, so we ended up hunching down on the sidewalk behind a large hedge to eat. It was so windy we couldn't even use plates -- we just had to hold our sandwiches and hope for the best! (I'm really hoping I can eventually post my pic of this.) Despite being windy, it was very hot. How hot was it? It was SO hot that the bread on the one sandwich we had sitting out actually got TOASTED. Really! We were very glad to get into the air-conditioned visitor's center after our pavement picnic!

We spent a little time touring the museum. The kids liked seeing the actual indian and soldier clothing and personal items. The level of detailed beading and embroidery on the Indian garments was especially impressive. LB was just glad to run around. The dioramas of the battles were interesting -- I was surprised the girls weren't scared by the graphic nature of the battle scenes.

After the museum we drove through part of the battlefield and saw the scattered headstones where so many soldiers and Indians fell during "Custer's Last Stand."

Overall it was striking to see how poor everyone on the reservation seemed to be -- lots of ramshackle houses and very few signs of economic life. It was very dry and brown, though occasional farms with irrigation systems would have bright patches of green that were in sharp contrast to the surrounding land.

It is easy to see why they call Montana the "big sky state." It just seems to go on forever.

Hopefully I can add the pictures soon...