Flat Tires and Hot Rods

The temperature still has not broken, and to be honest Allison and I are suffering in the Rover which officially has a name: Nellie. That name comes to us by suggestion of our good friend Pedr, and references a very funny story from my friend John Tobiaz. (Not going to tell that story at this time, as it takes about 15 minutes, but if you wish to hear it I will be glad to relay over a few beers.)

We have made it to just about 20 minutes west of Glacier National Park and have stopped to do some laundry. The drive over is gorgeous:


From the passenger seat of Nellie driving through West of Glacier.


Outside of Kalispell, MT, which is the kind of place I need to drag Allison away from. If I were to take my eyes off her for a second she could very likely call Brandt, have him sell everything, and set up shop right out here in the Big Sky Country. I don't know if I would stop her if she did, and it is only the heat that is preventing us from never coming back east. Too pretty here.

Of course, it wasn't easy getting here as we got a nice little nail in our tire on the way over the mountains West of Troy, MT and had to limp into town on the spare. The spare, to be clear, might be one of the original tyres (British spelling) and surprised the hell out of me when it held the weight of the truck. Of course, we pulled into Troy, MT at 6:00 and realized we had switched back to Mountain Time, making it 7:00. Now, I don't want to go into too much detail here, but let's just say, the good people of Montana are God fearin' folk and close up promptly at 5:00 on Saturday evenings with no intentions of opening on the Lord's Day. We were thusly informed by the nice young man at the liquor store - which, I swear to God, sold guns right out of the same case they keep the hard booze in - and proceeded down the road to the small hamlet of Libby, MT where we discovered a full on Hot Rod car show in full effect. This turned out to be a God send as one of the local car club guys called his son-in-law's brother and arranged to have the local tire shop opened on Sunday. Open on SUNDAY people!!! I can't tell you what a big deal this is in Libby, MT.


Well, thanks to Brian at the tire shop for getting us all fixed up, and charging us $75 to replace the tube in my tyre. yes, that's right, our tyres have TUBES! I don't know if that is a good thing or not, but welcome the opinions of all. Apparently it was a major hardship for Brian to help some newlyweds out on the Day of Rest, but he had no trouble taking my cash. Anyway, we are back on track and should be in Glacier National Park this evening. Hope all is well with everyone back home, as well as those we have met on the way.