Feeling refreshed after a good night's kip, we set off on today's trip. It was a big old loop, taking in a variety of awesome sights. First off were the ghost towns of Nevada City and Virginia City. These old mining towns are a fascinating juxtaposition of old and new, and seem to be real tourist traps. Horse drawn carriages were taking families down the streets and alleys of old mining towns in the baking heat.
Too busy operating to take photos at the time, but here are the ghost towns from the ground at least!
We then filmed canoeing, a bald eagle, a rodeo and white water rafting! It was an action packed day, with some fantastic close up shots. I've now got the urge to spend my week off after this travelling into the wilderness!
And I may have found the perfect companion:
This isn't the actual one I saw for sale. This is much nicer. The one I saw was broken, missing a front bumper, rusty and every panel was dented. BUT, it was only $1,000 (so $500 after some harsh negotiation), and it has awesome roof mounted floodlights!
Hmmm. After last time, perhaps not.
Although, I have discovered a rather awesome piece of kit, which I feel I may have to invest in, regardless of whether or not I go exploring the great outdoors. It's called a DeLorme, inReach, and it's a satellite GPS device with two awesome features. 1) At the push of a button, it sends an SOS signal, via satellite, sending your lat/long/elevation 2) You can send/receive text messages by pairing it with your iPad. How cool is that?! It's not even that expensive. Think I'll get one!
After the morning's flying, we landed at Ennis Airport. Simon dared me to go out with some white paint and draw a P on the runway in front of the airport's name. Fortunately, I am not a hooligan, and declined. Nor did I have any white paint come to think of it. Ennis Airport is a fascinating place. The FBO (fixed-based operator) is normally a large building, with staff, a pilots lounge, wifi, showers, vending machines, coffee. At Ennis, it was literally a shack. One room. Despite this, it had wifi and a fridge stocked with soft drinks and candy bars. In another show of American trust, they have an honor system. If you take anything from the fridge, you leave the money in a tin. How trusting is that? Less awesome was the outhouse toilet with a hole in the ground.
The less said about that the better.
We lifted up for the final bit of filming, the rodeo, run by a bloke whose name is, and I kid you not: Pokey Armitage. What an insane name! Although perhaps not, considering top 20 Montana names include: Wyatt, Hunter, Landon, Caleb and Shelby. That last one being a girl's name. "thanks ma, fer namin' me after the railway station".
Anyway, the bucking bronco's are an impressive sight. Apparently the horses buck because their testicles are tied together. Fair enough really, it would probably make be buck too... Surely that's an urban legend though? Right? I mean surely the most popular sport in this north-western state isn't based around a group of leather clad men constricting a horse's nutsack? I'd Google it, but I'm too afraid of what I might find....
Posts
No comments:
Post a Comment