Day Fourteen: Glacier NP to Gardiner, MT

Highlights from Monday, 4 Aug:

• Still not sleeping well. It's freezing, and even my mummy bag doesn't seem to be insulating me very well. I've tried relocating my sleeping bag and letting Christina sleep on both her and Kiersten's pads, but the ground is still poking us. Neither of us does very well this evening.
• I get up around 7. There's FROST everywhere in the middle of August! I get the fire going again just to warm myself up. It's a miserable morning and it feels more like November than mid-summer.
• Christina gets up (with my prodding--I can't blame her) and we get breakfast going. It's scrambled eggs today, and they also work out quite well on the cast iron skillet. Kiersten gets her oatmeal cereal, and after breakfast, she happily plays while we pack up.
• Getting the tent back into its box is not as easy as taking it out.
• The first half of this LONG drive isn't too bad. The speed limit goes up to 70 in some parts, so we're happily crusing along for a few hours. When we get to Helena, we slow down significantly. First, we stop at Target (we love Target!) and collect some camping supplies that we'd wished we had for Glacier. This includes an air mattress, since we can't bring ourselves to sleep on a lumpy ground again. Next, I look at a camping store for thermal socks, while Christina gets food at Albertson's. Her venture is more successful than mine, but I do manage to get some more starter logs.
• We then put Kiersten down for her nap. It's now 3 p.m. and she's desperate for sleep. Normally, we'd make her ride out the rest of the day so she'd be tired enough to go to bed, but our shopping venture has worn her out. This keeps us occupied until around 3:30.
• We stop for gas ($44.00 here--doing much better) and then crawl through Helena's traffic. We spot a Wal-Mart, and I run inside to see if they have thermal socks. They don't, but I do get Christina a pile of chewing gum, and a neato Darth Vader toy for myself. (They didn't have anything I wanted in Edmonton....) Of course, it's now 5 p.m., and Kiersten has woken up in a cranky mood.
• We continue to speed along, God bless Montana's high speed limits. We stop in Bozeman for a quick dinner before pressing. Sometime after 7, we make it to Gardiner, and we can see Yellowstone's northern gate in the distance. We're staying at the Yellowstone Village Inn, a quaint little lodge on the edge of town. It looks a little dated, but the facility has everything we need. It also appears to be a family establishment, as the owner has her two school-age girls working the front with her. Kiersten readily conks out, and we set out to repack the car once again....

Results: Too long of a drive, with too much obsession over "we also need this" for camping. However, we made it, and the lodging is VERY welcome after two nights of cold camping. Grade: C-.

Total Distance Traveled: 3,181 miles.