So Wyoming and Montana... not better than South Dakota, in case you were wondering. I90 just goes on and one... forever. I'm sure the drought doesn't help matters, but it's just so brown.
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| Mountainside of dead Ponderosas. |
Not much to report today. We left Spokane RV Park and took the windy road through Black Hills National Forest on our way back to the highway to nowhere. One thing I forgot to mention yesterday that was even more apparent today. The devastation to the forest from the Mountain Pine Beetle. It's just terrible. I had read articles about it, heard a story on NPR that focused on this particular issue as an example of what climate change is doing to this plant. But to see it in person... Acres and acres of brown, dead Ponderosa Pines. Whole sides of mountains, brown instead of green, or totally barren. It's hard to imagine how this area will ever recover. It just seems to be spreading everywhere. I wonder what the Black Hills will look like in 10 years.
We are spending the night in a KOA in Hardin, Montana. Dry, flat, depressed. The people are very nice though. And we picked up dinner at Taco John's, a restaurant we have been seeing since Minnesota that we were curious about. It's pretty similar to Taco Bell, I guess, but they serve western tater tots as a side. Weird, but kind of tasty.
Tomorrow ... Yellowstone!!!
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| View from the campground |
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| Montana state line |
Yeah, I was starting to panic through eastern Montana, even though I knew what to expect. I was very relieved when we got farther in and started to see actual towns and scenery.
ReplyDeleteOne of our neighbors was saying that the pine forests here were so thick that no food could grow for animals. He thinks that the pine beetle problem will naturally fix that over a period of time. For now, combined with the drought, it is a real problem. Fire is my biggest worry.