Travel Notes: Yellowstone National Park » Bozeman, MT

2009-07-19: I emerged from the storms that were raging through Yellowstone and found myself in Montana. The air temperature had fallen dramatically. The fragrance of pine was thick in the air left damp by the passing thunderstorms. Montana's valleys, in many places, reached as high as much of Yellowstone, but their slopes were considerably more gradual. Some of the valleys I passed through were narrow and likely dark most of the time. The beautiful Gallatin River ran alongside the road much of the way. This part of Montana is an epic place. Within Yellowstone, one often travels up close along massive walls of rock, high, dense, forests, or winding river canyons. This is impressive, of course, but in many places a bigger, wider, macroscopic overview isn't always easy to get. In Montana, one can see alpine meadows lying at the feet of mountains, and behind those mountains, more mountains, and behind those, a wide open sky. The state is sometimes nicknamed Big Sky Country, and appropriately so.

Bozeman's downtown area was quiet when I arrived on a Sunday evening. It was a pleasant place, but the big-box retail strips on he edge of town hinted that it was not long before Bozeman was assimilated into the American corporate hegemony.

I stayed there for the night, and loosely planned the next part of my journey.