Montana Really Big Sky Country!

We were packed up and leaving Drumheller by 0830 this morning.  No sleeping for this girl as Ray likes to be on the road early and hopefully stop for the day early as well.  We drove down to Medicine Hat where on the highway there is a sign welcoming you to Medicine Hat and directly under the sign is another sign saying "Gas Capital of the Prairies".  So that sign got me to thinking what exactly were they growing in the endless fields that we passed?  Beans?  Looked like wheat to me!!!  Oh maybe they meant gas as in petroleum?  Speaking of gas,,,, as we were coming into Medicine Hat, I asked Ray if we should gas up the truck.  He said no, we had a quarter of a tank which would likely get us to Wild Horse which is the crossing into Montana.

We passed through Medicine Hat and continued south towards the border.  Hwy 41 heading south appeared to be a secondary highway as it was a two lane road with no shoulders whatsoever.  There was very little traffic on this road.  Well for the first 20 miles or so we saw a number of vehicles heading north.  A few times I nonchalantly leaned over to check the status of our fuel tank and from my point of view on the passenger side it appeared to be on "E" which we all know means empty.  I started to periodically check my cell service to make sure that we had service which incidentally we did not.  There was less and less vehicle traffic which I felt meant there was less and less population that we might run into in case we did run out of gas.  I did not know that Ray was driving along sweating bricks because from his view the gauge did say "E"......  We saw a turn off for a small town called Elkwater and also a sign for fuel and camping.  That was about the time that Ray told me he was starting to get  bit worried!  Anyway we did fuel up at this very quaint little gas station/restaurant.  While Ray was gassing up I checked out the bakery in the restaurant and bought a piece of strawberry rhubarb pie for Ray and a cinnamon bun for me.  Hope they are as tasty as they smelled in the bakery!

Crossing the border into Montana, we had no line up,,, I guess on Saturday they have no rush for the Canadians to go down to shop in Havre?  In fact it took the guard a few minutes to appear.  I think he was sleeping and had to quickly slosh mouthwash into his mouth so he did not kill Ray with his monkey breath!  Anyway we had no problems whatsoever with crossing the border into Montana.  Montana's licence plates say "Big Sky Country" and that it is!  Yellow and brown fields run for miles and miles as far as you can see.  The road winds like ribbon through the fields and the sky is so blue!  It really is beautiful.  The ride down to Havre was quite lonely as there was no other vehicles on the road.  I would hate to think what it would be like travelling in the middle of the winter!  Glad we do not have to find that out.

We are parked in a very nice little spot called Edgewater Inn and RV Park in Malta Montana, except for the *&&%$#** trains!!!  Off to have a couple of well deserved cold ones.  Ray is ecstatic as we are getting between 16 and 17 miles per gallon!  Buy for now,,,,Lori and Ray