The brink of winter

I know it has been too long since I last blogged, but we have just been forging ahead. Keith with classes in full swing and me working a little and hiking as much as the weather will allow. Which is not much. Here are a few things we have been working on before the snows hit even harder. Painting trim, building new kitchen walls, and Lucy does a great job of gazing toward the East Ridge mountains longingly.

We a had warm weekend a the weekend before last (50s!). And since then we have had cold and snow. What else should I expect? It's October for crying out loud. The middle of winter in Butte!

Here are a few around town views (in Walkerville, a small enclave that is the north part of Butte). The metal scaffolding looking things are headframes and they dot the Butte landscape. Headframes were the old way down into the mines, before they started strip mining here. Each headframe had an elevator that carried the miners down into the pit at the beginning of each shift and up from the mine at the end. If you saw Butte, America last week on PBS there was a lot of footage about the mines and headframes. They still stand as a testimony to Butte heritage. Butte's history is a lot more interesting than its apparent future. I keep asking people in town, "What is the future of this town?" and the response is usually a hope tied up in a company coming here to provide jobs or renew the economy. Butte is such an interesting place and I often feel like I am at pep rally for the Titanic. I don't mean that harshly, and I realize that this is a special place to the 35,000 or so people who call Butte home. Anyhow, come to your own conclusions. No matter what this is an interesting place like no where I have been before.

Butte landscapes.

Keith succumbs to the cold. Lucy tries to help.

Snow, snow, snowier

The snow is deep at 8,000 feet. See how Lucy's legs are all the way covered in the the snow!
These pictures are from Sunday's hike 1 hour northwest of Butte.We were hiking up to Barker Lake and an hour into our hike our sneakers were soaked and we realized we were too poorly prepared to make the hike in what was becoming 12 + inches of perfect powder snow.

Tonight the temps are forecasted to be 17 degrees F! While I ran today in the wind and snow, I counted the months until warmer weather: 8 months. It snowed last May when Keith was finishing finals. I also counted the days until I get to savor the NC mountains: 74 days.

Let me remind you what it looked like just last weekend when I wore shorts to go hiking north of Butte near Moulton reservoir.

So, what has Keith been doing besides playing with me in the snow and trails of SW Montana? He had an interview a few weeks ago for a summer internship. We should find out this week what we will be doing next summer. A lot of Tech students are feeling uneasy only because there are few internships for a burgeoning Petro Engineer class. MTech enrolled an additional 500 students this fall, which doesn't sound large, but it is a 50% growth compared to last semester. Makes you wonder what the world will do with all the new engineers coming out of their programs in the next 1-2 years.

I am currently hunkering down for the winter. We need some good Southern food, so Chicken-n-Dumplings are on the teal stove and we will get wrapped up in our warm jackets for a nice winter's evening. Stay warm.

The Good, The Bad, The Ugly

Our first visitors, after a long hike at Moulton Reservoir.

This weekend's short fall. This morning's snow fall.
Snow. Yesterday it was 70 degrees. Today we have snow. Please feel sorry for me; it would make me feel so much better.

Well, it has been too long since I last blogged. Keith's parents have come and gone--so nice to see familiar faces in a foreign land. And apparently summer and fall have come and gone. I guess Montana has two seasons: summer and winter. So now it is winter. I will put up the sandals and shorts I wore just yesterday and trade them out for my parka and snow boots. Poor Lucy may need boots too.

Mining headframe and Cabbage Town, metal housing for the poor of Butte in the mining days.

William Clark's former home, now the Copper King Mansion B&B.

The streets of Butte, red building is Jewish synagogue.

We took a Butte Historical Trolley Tour with Bob & Barbara and learned a lot about the rough and tumble history of Butte. Lots of brothels (like I mentioned before, the last one closed in the 1980s), murders (labor organizers), gambling, drinking, and poverty and wealth. Marcus Daly, F. Augustus Heinze, and William Andrew Clark, the industrialists called the Copper Kings who made Butte thrive were the wealthy. The poor were the miners, timber men, and laborers who came from Finland, Scandinavia, Ireland, China, Serbia, etc. to build this town and make it the largest town between Minneapolis and Seattle for much of it history. A town of over 100,000 at the turn of the 20th century today is one-third the size. Vacant buildings and abandoned mines dot the landscape.

I don't know what will happen to Butte. I have such mixed feelings. On the one hand the scenery just outside of town is breathtaking. But the town itself is cracking at the seams. There is a huge meth problem here and Butte has the highest fatality rate for drunken driving in the state. Just last weekend a drunk driver from Butte killed an advocate for domestic violence Missoula lawyer who was driving home. He rear-ended her on the interstate going the same direction. Her car flipped several times and she was killed at the scene. The driver walked away unharmed. I have a small understanding of why many Montanans have a disdain for Butte-tans (?). They seem lawless, rough and a little out of control. But the few people we have met are salt of the earth, kind, giving, and helpful. All in all its interesting and wild.

More views of Butte:

The infamous Berkley Pit, the most toxic lake in the world with a pH of 2.5.

From Wikipedia: The Berkeley Pit is a former open pit copper mine located in Butte, Montana, USA. It is one mile long by half a mile wide with an approximate depth of 1,780 feet (540 m). It is filled to a depth of about 900 feet (270 m) with water that is heavily acidic (2.5 pH level). The pit is laden with heavy metals and dangerous chemicals, including arsenic, cadmium, zinc, and sulfuric acid.

Restaurant scene of Butte: Liquor to Go!


Moulton Lake Reservoir area north of Butte.

Butte Thoughts

Arnica growing in the Lime Kilns area south of Butte.

Butte...a special place. The lovely Highland Mountains to our south and the urban sprawl of uptown Butte to our north. What a juxtaposition. Here is what I love about Butte so far:

Pekin Noodle Parlor in Downtown Butte.

No chain restaurants! Seriously, this is a independent thinker's and eater's town. The one aberration is the single McDonalds in the "flats." Instead we have Pekin Parlor, which is a second story Chinese restaurant. Each table is in a 4 foot x 5 foot "closet" that used to room miners between shifts. Or Muzz & Stan's Freeway Diner, which advertises Liquor to Go! Or Lydia's, a straight from 1960s red velvet supper club that offers ravioli, sweet potato salad, spaghetti, green salad, and more with your steak order. (Not a choice, but all the sides are included and come on a gigantic round wheely type tray.)

View of the Highland Mtns.

The mountains, so close and so wild. The Highlands just to our south may have snow until July every year. I hiked in an area called Lime Kilns that crosses the Continental Divide Trail (the longest trail in the U.S.). We saw many elk prints and grassy balds. The views were amazing. And just 30 minutes from my house! By the way, Keith and I saw a moose and her calf on Saturday wandering aimlessly through a neighborhood near where we hiked last Saturday. Our first close encounter of the animal kind!


Finally, what I love about Butte:

History. Butte's history is gritty, rough and the people here are real and down to earth because of that history. This was a town of gambling, prostitution (the last brothel was closed in 1988!), hard drinking, unions, and long winters. I say was, but in a way Butte still is this town. The urban center (on the hill) is not too different from inner city Pittsburgh or Detroit. And with just nearly 34,000 residents, Butte is the 4th largest city in the state. The gritty exterior houses some of the most interesting jewels, just a scratch below the surface. There is Front Street Grocery, which carries the best in gourmet non-perishables and wine and rivals The Fresh Market or Byerly's in selection (I'm not joking here). Judging a book by its cover would make me miss out on all the interesting and lovely parts of town. My favorite new fabric store is in a falling down grey house. I almost didn't go in because it looked so derelict from the outside. But inside was an amazing selection of fabrics. I could go on and on. But I won't.

IF YOU ARE INTERESTING IN LEARNING MORE ABOUT BUTTE:

PBS' show Independent Lens is showing the documentary Butte, America, which highlights the dusty, hard living and historical town that was once the largest copper mining city in America. I believe the premiere is October 20th, but check your local listings.

Views of the Highland Mountains: Lime Kilns trail that includes a small section of the Continental Divide Trail.

Poor Lucy after our Lime Kilns hike. She got into a fight with a stick in the woods. Dog heaven.

Keith with Rick Bass, a wonderful fiction and nonfiction writer who lives most of the year in the Yaak Valley of N.W. Montana (of Ted Kazinski fame). We met him last week at a reading at the University of Western Montana in Dillon and picked up his book Why I Came West. He is a former geologist who worked in the oil fields in Mississippi. The Yaak Valley is 4000 feet below Butte (Butte is about 5200 elevation and the Yaak is 1200) and interestingly enough a warm, rainforest area of MT on the Canadian border.

Rainbows and hot biscuits

Last week right before dinner, it started raining at Our Lady of the Rockies, which as I mentioned before you can see from our kitchen window. When I hike up the Maude S. trail, 1 mile from my house, Our Lady is just across the ridge. So needless to say, Our Lady is not far. The rain never made it down into the valley, which is how it seems to go in the high desert.

Instead we had a lovely rainbow to remind us that good and beautiful things can happen even when it seems dry here and dark everywhere else.

I have spent the last week hiking new trails, painting our pink trim brown, and messing around in the kitchen (I have to not look at the kitchen carpeting because it is an appetite killer for sure.) I have been running lots of different routes, missing my Hamburg climb, but the "urban" streets of Butte do offer a lot of different views and viewpoints. I did run the old railroad track that hovers to the east of town, but my neighbor said I should get bear mace before I do that again. It is very remote. I think I will get some this week. Oh, and this bear mace would be for the mountain lions, which are more common around here.

So Keith is settling into classes, and honestly it is tough. He gets discouraged and then encouraged and then discouraged. But we both agree that we are here to learn and grow and certainly doing the same old thing, while it may have its appeal, doesn't do much in the learning and growing arena.

I have been trying to get a grip on high altitude baking, which as it turns out does call for some tweaking. Water boils in no time here (200 degrees fahrenheit boiling point) and bread bakes in two-thirds the time. Keith and I keep saying we feel like we are in a foreign country and at least the differences do make the distance seem a little farther from "home."

Do I sound melancholy? I think Sundays do that to me anyhow. We do feel blessed and happy, despite my tone.

Today we hiked at Homestake Meadows. Just south of us by 5 miles. Lovely, grassy and full of deer and elk tracks. Oh, and wild sagebrush, too.

My neighbor has been taking me out hiking, twice last week. We did a 6-mile loop called Beaver Ponds and the 4-mile loop at Homestake.

I don't think I could ask for a better tourguide. She is a mother of two 20+ year old boys, an avid biker (she frequently does 50 milers just for fun, and has done many 24 hour rides) and exerciser. I am in heaven. We are heading out tomorrow for a Continental Divide Hike (longest US trail). Generally we hike for 1 1/2 to 2 hours and then she rides for 3 more hours. Crazy.

I promise something more interesting later this week. We were headed to the rodeo in Dillon (Montana's best weekend event!) But Keith has studying to do and I have all that pink trim to paint.

The View from Here

So thanks to everyone who responded so enthusiastically to my first attempt at blogging. So here is more:This morning I got up early and headed down our street to the base of the mountain that sits just east of us. There is an old railroad track and a trail called the Maude S. Old mining areas were named after wives, lovers, home towns, etc, which is ostensibly how the Maude S. was named. Anyhow...the trail is lined with purple thistle, sage brush, wheat grass (I am making up that name) and once you get to the top you can see a little and distant peek into the Berkeley Pit (the Superfund site with the tainted water from the strip mining), the town of Butte to the Pit's south, and Our Lady of the Rockies (ourladyoftherockies.com), which is worth looking up.

So my point in telling you all of this useless info is to explain the lure of the trail (it is beautiful) and its downside: namely wild animals of varying aggressiveness. I haven't seen any yet, but people keep dropping slightly terrifying statements. Like, "Did you see the moose up there?", or "Watch out for the elk." (Does this mean that I should look for elk or avoid them?--and how do you avoid them? I mean what exactly am I to do when I see elk or moose?) Recently a fellow Butte person (Buttant? Buttian?) gave me the once over and mentioned my diminutiveness and the threat of mountain lions to someone my size. Excuse me. I am small enough that I look like a tempting morsel for mountain lions on the prowl!

Yesterday's Montana Standard included advice for how to dress whilst hiking during bear hunting season. BEAR HUNTING season! So now I also have to watch out for the hunters and the bears?! These bits of information are a little upsetting.

Anyhow, I still plan to hike the Maude S. and the other trails around here. I see other lone women and men hikers, so I will go with the flow for now. Running into something might be an exciting adventure, or a brush with death, or death itself......I promised myself that I was going to live in Montana and actually have some Montana experiences. Let's hope that doesn't include wild animals, but I can't stay inside when the mountain just to my east is beckoning.

By the way, the local paper is having a "Manliest Beard" contest. The contest poster asks: "Do you have any skills when it comes to growing the most manly beard?" I need to ask Keith if he is thinking of entering.

Butte-iful

At the rest stop between Glendive and Billings, MT.

Hello friends and family!

We are finally settling into Montana. Here is just a snippet of things we are doing and what we have accomplished:

View of Butte, MT.

It's a long road from North Carolina to Montana, not only literally, but also figuratively. We have been feeling like foreigners in a foreign land. Not because the good citizens of Montana haven't been exceptionally kind and nice, but because words are different and so many ways are different. We are slowly understanding new words like "pop" for soda, jo jos for potatoes (huh?), youse for you.

We arrived two weeks ago (August 11th) after a long, long journey with two cars and a dog. All of our belongings somewhere in a tractor trailer between Billings and Butte rested on the hot side of some road somewhere. By the 13th of August, we had put an offer on a house "in the flats," meaning not "on the hill," meaning on the south side of Butte, rather than the hill on the north side by MTech. We closed on the 21st and moved in the same day.

Our new house! Pink trim and all. 1966 Kitchen! Awesome. Blue (and messy) Bath.

Our living room with our Stuff! Isn't it nice to be home again?

Few notes to add: Amazingly (to me anyway), cornmeal is hard to come by in these parts. Of course, grits don't even make the shelf at the grocery.

Keith dropped a fridge magnet as we were unloading things, when he picked it up the soil was so metallic that it stuck to the backside of the magnet. (Remember the little boards that had faces you could add hair and beards to with the magnetic stick, the soil looked just like those hairs.) There's copper in these hills.