Give Me An ‘M’
Today was a quieter sort of day, with my driving limited to turning my car around in the parking lot. It is the least driving I’ve done in a day since I left Vegas, so I was really really pleased with that!
This morning I went to Missoula Valley Church. They were a friendly bunch, I had a nice chat with an older guy called Glenn, who rather unhelpfully extolled the virtues of Yellowstone over Glacier.. when he realised I had already been to the former and was about to visit the latter, he stopped and said, ‘Ah, I guess you probably don’t want to drive back down to Yellowstone.’
‘No,’ was my out-loud answer. ‘Go back to Wyoming? You must be joking!’ was my in-quiet answer.
After church Toby (my host) and I went for lunch and then for a walk up to the giant M on the mountain-side overlooking the city. It was very hot, totally exposed, and a beautiful day so direct sunlight the whole six miles. Goodness knows how hot it was, but it was worth it.
Even despite the smoke hanging over the city from the fires in the distance, it was a beautiful overlook. And the giant M was really quite, well, big.
Afterwards we took the short (and immensely steep) path back down, to the University of Montana campus, whereupon I copied the view of the pictures postcards. Or at least, I tried to, getting the grizzly bear (the town mascot), the main university building and the M on the hill in the same shot, while trying to avoid the van, person on the phone walking up and down, estate car and random person walking around doing nothing.
I almost succeeded.
Toby and I also went to a camping store to look for ropes and pegs to help me secure my tent. We spent a long time (sorry, Toby) looking at the tents, and assessing whether my tent could, in fact, be tethered properly, in such a way that it would not collapse in gusts of wind.
We decided it couldn’t, and anyway they didn’t have enough rope (!) so I ended up buying a new, sturdier tent, one that to be honest will survive British weather much better than the other one. I will attempt to take the old one back to Target, as I only used it twice, and it was utterly useless in the wind.
At least I am confident the new one will be ok in the wind. They had it made up in the store, and it it considerably more sturdy than my other one. It is called an Alps Mountaineering Lynx tent, so it can’t be that bad, surely? As I discovered when we got back, it has excellent reviews, so I’m hoping this one does the trick.
Note to self: don’t buy camping equipment from a supermarket. I wouldn’t in the UK after all!