Day One

As I sit here writing this entry for day one I am in Great Falls Montana it is almost 10:00pm on day two. The last two days have been a marathon of things to do. The actual trips, and copious amounts of pictures tell the true story of how much "touring" we have been doing. This blog is just a few highlights.

It was a relatively short ride to the sprawling metropolis of Pocatello Idaho. I had better not make fun because this is the probably the largest "city" on the entire trip. We went to a replica of Fort Hall. This is not the original place, but this is about how it looked. The original site sits on private sacred indian land (more on that later).

Some things to notice. This little beast is pointed at the doorway. Any guesses...

The Cannon was there to blast anyone who busted through the front door. They wouldn't even have wasted a tiny iron cannon ball, they kept it loaded with gravel from the ground which was more effective (shotgun style) anyway. Here it is again covering the entryway.



Inside the County Museum next door to the relica of Fort Hall I came across this dentist office exhibit. Notice the blood-red color in the spit bowl. That was in case the patient got woozy at the site of blood they would not be able to see it in the bowl. Pretty smart, eh?

After the replica we went onto the Shoshone-Bannock Indian reservation. This flag illustrates the feelings of many of the Indians. It's pretty thats for sure, but I'm not sure how I feel about it. By the way the Eagle represents the Shoshone Bannock tribe.

We spent some time listening to "the truth." Then the very kind indians took us down into the river bottoms to see the original site of Fort Hall. You can't see anything there except a few overgrown corner stones right next to the Snake River.

Our tour was hosted by Randy L. Teton. You might know her. She was the actual model for the Sacagawea dollar coin that came out in 2000. She did the modeling in the mid 90s. She was very kind, but once again wanted to tell us "the truth." If you are wondering about the baby hung over her soulder on the coin, it was a doll that just happened to be lying around in the photographer's studio.

After that we got on the bus and drove to Dillon Montana.