Virginia and Nevada Citys

Virginia is a living ghost town, and a really fun place to spend a night. The top is a picture of the inside of a building they are restoring. It is amazing that they can preserve these buildings as well as they do. The other two pictures are of recreated scenes from the period, a parlor and a barber. The graves are of five men that were hung in the town by the Vigilantes. A group of men that set out to kill all the criminal in Montana. They did cut back on crime, however they murdered a lot of innocent people. This is a real dark part of Montanan history.

Virgina City is true ghost town in Montana. The houses and buildings have been collected from all over to create a museum of the mining boom days. I am not sure what the fish is about, but it reminds me of something you would see on display in the streets of Portland OR.

Cold Camping

The rivers were raging and the lakes we camped by were frozen. Not only did we have our zero degree sleeping bags, but we brought the big down comforter in the tent just to stay warm at night. One night it rained unexpectedly and we had made the amature mistake of putting a tarp under the tent. We got soaked. The next day we had to get a motel room just to dry things out.

Old Faithfull

Old Faithfull is on the list with the Panama Canal of most boring tourist attractions that you have to go to if your there.

West Yellowstone/ Yellowstone

West Yellowstone and Yellowstone. Where the deer and the buffalo roam free, but the fish don't bite.

Montana

I know it has been a while since the last post, but it has been a hectic few weeks of travel. Alaska did not workout, we had a problem at the border and Canada would not let us in. We decided by the time we could get it resolved it would be too late to make it for the season in Alaska. So we turned right and headed to Montana. It has been a great experience, seen amazing things and met some great people. We are headed to Yellowstone and Jackson Hole for the summer. When I get a better connection I will upload some great photos, and let you all know where we are.

Reef Bay

I am sorry about the lack of updates, but the Internet services that we were using have all stopped working. In the last few weeks we have hiked the petroglyph trail on St John and the Brown Bay trail, also on St John. At the end of the Petroglyph trail there is a well preserved sugar mill. It still has an old steam engine from the last attempt to run the mill, but with the abolishment of slavery the sugar production on the island was already on its way out. Yes my favorite part of the Reef Bay sugar mill is the bats, lots of bats. The Brown Bay plantation is not kept up and completely grown over. On the hike down we came across a group of Ferrel donkeys, I still have not seen the allusive land crab, but the donkeys were cool. The plantation is hard to see under all the vines and brush giving it an eyree feeling, especially the room that had animal bones lied out like some black magic ritual. Unfortunately we forgot the camera on the Brown Bay hike, but we did have the most tasty burgers we have had since we left at Skinny Legs. This is my new favorite place, but it really is at the end of the earth.

For all of you that do know our last day of work is the 2nd of May. We will be leaving to Jost Van Dyke and the Virgin Gorda for my birthday and then a few days on St John. After that we have a flight home with a 10 hour layover in Vegas, but do not worry we will not be getting married in the Little Chapel of Love. Finally we will land in Salt Lake on mothers day. We can not wait to see you all for a week before we start our next journey to Alaska.

Congrats to Richard and Nichole on 15 years, happy anniversary.