Day One: May 19-20th 2013

Ben and I spent the night in Calgary, at our friend Andrew and Rebecca’s. We decided it would make more sense to get a head start on the day and leave from with big smoke. We had a nice evening with friends and their adorable dog, Mavic. I ended up having the most severe allergies throughout the night, and into the morning. I ended up taking a double dose of Benadryl … which of course made me fall asleep for most of the drive on today. I woke up just before we crossed over the boarder into the USA at Sweetgrass boarder crossing.

I think, for the first time in my life, the USA customs officials didn’t give a fuss. The first thing the customs guy said to us was ‘Ya’ll headed to Utah?!’. We laughed. I thought for sure, that with our jam-packed truck and cooler full of booze and vegetables, we would get searched. It was too easy.

We spent most of the day driving. We decided we would take the I-15 to the 69. We wanted to take a more scenic route, and get away from the masses. It ended up being a very beautiful drive. We were engrossed in our CBC podcasts and pleased with the beautiful landscapes. We made our way through Montana with Yellowstone National Park as our destination for the night. I struggled with my stupid allergies for most of the day, feeling extremely stuffed up and frustrated. After going through a shit tonne of tissue, my nose was too sore to blow anymore. As we meandered in and out of local mountains ranges, I started to forget I was so uncomfortable, and was able to enjoy the beautiful landscapes.

I obviously brought my camera, and honestly, it felt good shooting again.

We have a budget we are trying to stick to. So far so good, as we only spent $17 on food and $100 on fuel. We splurged a bit, and spent about $180 on camping items. Other than that, we are being pretty strict.

Making really good time, we decided to get a little off course and check out Big Sky, Montana. It was very familiar to us, as we both have lived in mountain resort towns for much of the last 10 years.  Ben and I both agreed that we could probably spend some time in Big Sky, maybe a month or so, just skiing and exploring in the winter.

Around 8pm, we decided to find somewhere to camp.  We found a little campsite on a lake, Rainbow Campsite it was called. It was close to the Earthquake epicenter, which was very interesting (part of the reason we decided to visit Yellowstone area… nerds!).

We passed out in the tent watching Bad Boys and enjoyed a peaceful nights rest.

Tomorrow, we drive!

R&B