Stalagmites, Stalagtites and One Cool Cavern

Wednesday 9/14/11

Cool morning and out of propane.  Fortunately there was propane right there at our campground.  Spent the morning in a Bozeman café having coffee, breakfast and catching up on inserting pictures into the blog.  Still haven’t figured it out totally.  Probably doing it the wrong way, the long way.  Maybe better for you all- less pictures.  And our photography doesn’t do justice to the sights we see.

Another beautiful day driving along the Gallatin and Jefferson Rivers.  Just southwest of Three Forks, Montana we went to the Lewis & Clark Caverns.  Tom Williams and Bert Pannell first peered into the caverns on a winter day in 1892. They’d been hunting and saw what looked like a column of smoke rising from a hillside. They labored up the mountain to investigate and learned that it wasn’t smoke at all: It was steam, the steady exhalation of living, breathing caves. The warm air was pushed from the mountain’s lungs only to become ice in the cold air, transformed into crystals so tiny they floated skyward and evaporated in the sun.

We hiked up a winding path for about ¾ mi. past rock formations filled with fossils and saw an actual sea shell dating back 300 millions years.   At the small 3 ft. high mouth of the cave the State Park Ranger gave us some history and information then led us through an hour and a half tour pointing out the many unique formations, calling them by cute names.  There were about 600 steps winding around narrow pathways through the dark cavern, bumping our heads. By the time we got to the bottom we had dropped 500 ft.  I must say the next morning I could feel it in my thighs.  I should do that more often! 

Check out how small the opening is!!

We arrived at Diane and Bruce Seiler’s outside of Helena  about 6:30 PM.  Wow, what a spectacular property.  About a mile or so up a dirt road, their beautiful house sits on top of a mountain overlooking Helena in one direction and the Continental Divide on the other.  Diane and I knew each other from our former design days (way back when we first started working- Deborah Meyer Assoc.) and of course her house is just perfectly gorgeous.  So Jeff and I will have a few nights in luxury!  What a fun night catching up over a great dinner.  Lots of remembrances and laughs and even figured out that we have some acquaintances we never knew about.  So much fun.  Bruce too lived near us in Philly, a former Secret Service agent, is a renowned gunsmith and former national long rifle champion.  He’s also is an antique car/truck restorer and dealer, manufactures new weaponry and has new 4,000+ sq. foot workshop that most guys would die to have.

Bruce is also on the campaign committee for the prominent, conservative Republican candidate for 2012 Montana Governorship, who Jeff met at his lovely home.  http://www.neil2012.com/

There are beautiful pelts hanging around their house, including a 600 lb. elk in their stairwell which both Bruce and Diane took down.  Diane said she would never do that again.  But you can do that kind of thing out in the wild hills of Montana.

Boy did we sleep well in our beautiful guest suite, with a brass bed and western antiques.