LET THE SIGHTSEEING BEGIN

May 21 - 22

Time does fly out here when I am having fun!! And I've done a lot of fun things this week. Thursday was a beautiful day, and on my "list of things to do" while I am here, I found a list of the "10 Perfect Views" that you must see when you are in Montana from a travel magazine. So I figured today was perfect to check one of those off the list. I am going to Kootenai Falls (that's pronounced Koot-nee), which is in the Kootenai National Forest on the Kootenai Indian Reservation.

It is northwest of Libby, MT, which is apparently famous for the asbestos that plagues the town. They have people who have "asbestosis" and have recently lost a law suit against W.R. Grace & Co. -- the company was acquitted of knowingly poisoning scores of people in town. I was told the town even had asbestos mixed into the dirt on their high school track -- they took it out of the school and didn't realize they shouldn't mix it in the soil. The other thing unique about Libby, MT is the metal eagles which are everywhere in the city -- from smaller to the very largest must have a 20 foot wing span -- it is huge. Apparently Libby is called the City of Eagles. And there is a local artist who does metal sculptures of Eagles, and you can find them all around town. Some are owned by the City, and others he puts on display. They are quite beautiful as you can see from the picture.

The drive to Libby and the Falls was just beautiful -- through the valleys with mountains all around. It was about a 2 hour drive to Libby and the falls, but well worth it. The Kootenai Falls are said to be the largest free-flowing waterfall in the Northwest. The river was also the setting for the movie with Meryl Streep and Kevin Bacon in "The River Wild". And the falls are truly the most beautiful waterfall I have seen in Montana -- and I've seen a bunch in Yellowstone and Glacier National Parks. And unlike most of the rivers here which are brown, this river was a blue green color -- rather unusual. According to the travel description, the river goes through the China Rapids and then over the falls, lowering itself 90 feet in less than a mile. The falls drop 30 feet over a wide band of rocks. So it isn't just one waterfall, it's a bunch of them across this very broad part of the river.

When I down loaded the pictures, I kept thinking they didn't look nearly as beautiful or as large on the pictures as they did in person. Luckily there was another man on the falls at the same time as me, and he walked to a point on the rocks right at the falls. Having him in the right side of the pictures really adds perspective, and you get the feel for how large and powerful these falls are.




Then down the river there is a "swinging bridge" that crosses the river gorge. Now that was an experience to walk across the bridge. You can see from the construction, the heavy cables, the screening on the bridge that you aren't going to fall. But when you walk the bridge goes up and down, and I thought I could look at the river and walk. But everytime I tried that, I felt like I was going to fall -- had to keep my eyes on the board walk in front of me. But it was fun. Only 5 people at a time can be on the bridge. When I walked back across, there was a lady standing there whose husband had walked across. She said she knew her limits and was instead taking pictures of him.

Friday was more of a working, normal day. But I did want to see the new movie "Terminator Salvation", which actually was pretty good (I know, you have to like this kind of movie). I also had some more mundane tasks to do like pick up some groceries and get the truck washed. I had a lot of dead bugs from Georgia, Tennesse, and Nebraska stuck all over the truck. So we gave them a little burial service and washed them off my vehicle.