Montana, Maggie & grizzly bears, USA

Justin gave us a lift from Canada, over the border to Shelby, Montana, so we could continue our travels. Shelby was a quaint town in the middle of the prairie, and we got a decent dinner despite the criticism of US immigration staff at the border - they were super friendly and competed with one another to give us advice on where to eat (out of town, apparently). Best thing is they fixed up our entry 'stamp' so we can stay in the USA until our pre-booked flight in December.
We caught a free community service bus to the town of Great Falls - nothing to say except: Weird town 😬; not going back.

Drove our rental car through some pretty scenery to reach Maggie, in Bozeman 😀, who I know from PhD comradeship in Perth. So great to see Maggie 🌞. She kindly hosted us, cooked for us, gave us advice, and loaned us some gear for our Yellowstone trip, and let us stay again while she's away - we're so grateful.

Before entering Yellowstone, we camped a night and drove super early to a not-so-secret place to see grizzly bears 🐻 😀, and success! With the aid of Maggie's telescope we saw 2 mama bears, each with 2 cubs. They were hundreds of metres away so not scary 😬. It was awesome to see them running across the grassland and digging up roots to eat. Also our first taste of real cold - near zero temps, so we got out the layers and coped 😊. There was also a huge herd of elk further in the distance, and some antelope wandered by too, and we heard coyotes howling. Amazing experience 🤩; we felt very lucky.Meer informatie