You know that feeling when things are going just a tad too easy? That’s when you know something’s going to happen.
Last Friday we began our trek to Glacier National Park in Montana from northern Utah. Yes, that would be the Friday of Labor Day weekend, usually one of the less joyous times to be on the road, but what the heck. We planned to make the nine hour drive over two days so we could relax and do some sightseeing as we travelled. The sightseeing part happened. The relaxing part, well mostly.
We were expecting long delays in certain portions of I-15 we knew had ongoing construction which would shrink the road down into a single lane of traffic. Always fun times during holiday weekends. We were shocked (no seriously, we were shocked) at the relative ease in which we glided through those stretches. Foolishly we felt we were actually going to make it to our hoped for rest stop Montana for the night.
And then, then we hit Blackfoot, Idaho. Normally this is not a bad area but oh on this Friday evening it was…Stop. And. Go. Traffic. Over an hour delay creeping along a 20 mile stretch of highway. It was then we resigned ourselves to calling it a night just after the pass that leads into Montana.
Night was full on when I stepped out of the RV to stretch my legs at our way station. I couldn’t help it, I exclaimed “wow” rather loudly when I exited. This was quickly followed by my husband shushing me (also, I wish to point out, rather loudly). Despite the lights illuminating the rest stop the sky overhead was black with a million stars twinkling down at me. Even the milky way could be seen in wisps across the sky. It was incredible.
We took our time walking around the rest area. It wasn’t huge but it was definitely a favored spot for truckers who had filled in most of their spots. As we were strolling along I stopped suddenly then backed up a few paces, pulling Dave back with me.
“Is that the moon?” I asked, pointing at an enormous orange orb hanging low in the night sky. It sat just above the treeline, shining down on the semi-trucks humming quietly in the parking lot. The photo is terrible quality unfortunately and does not do the magical moment justice.
The forced early stop turned out to be a bit of a blessing in disguise as we were found a charming little diner called Yesterday’s cafe to enjoy breakfast at. We were the first people there the next morning allowing the husband of the couple running the place to take a few moments for chatting and sharing the cafe’s history with us before taking our orders and running them off to his wife who was the cook.
The cafe was originally a school house built in the early 1900s and remained so until the 1960s. It was later turned into a cafe, changing hands once to the current owners. Inside and out remind one this was once a school house as the original bell still hangs in it’s post. Chalkboards, books and other bric-a-brac fill the interior in a fascinating manner. Not so much as to feel overwhelmed yet you can look at the same area several times and still see something you missed before.
This was a promising way to start the day.
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