7/22
It is cloudy this morning. They grow several crops here and have cattle and horses. One of the crops which has yellow flowers is Canola. Another has red flowers but we did not find out what it is. Lethbridge, a town we passed through, has an interesting history. In 1869, the American Army decided to stop trade in alcohol with Indians on reservations across Montana. Two American traders built a trading post near the future site of Lethbridge. The post became known as Fort Whoop-Up. An important trade commodity was “whiskey” a concoction of 9 parts river water to 1 part pure alcohol, to which was added a plug of chewing tobacco for color and a can of lye for more taste. Alarmed by the activities there the Mounted Police came to bring law and order to the area and immediately put a stop to the whisky trade. Lethbridge has a railroad bridge which was built in 1909. The bridge, -- with a mile long span and 300-ft. elevation – is still the longest and highest bridge of its kind in the world. We passed through the US Customs with no problems. We are very glad to be back in the “lower 48”. No more converting kilometers, litres and Canadian/ US money. We entered Canada on our way to Alaska on 6/2 which makes it just over 3 weeks we were there. During that time we drove 4,625 miles in the RV. That does not include the side trips we took in the pickup. This area of Montana is very flat. It seems quite warm this afternoon. We may be getting into some hot weather which we are not used to. Now the wind has started blowing quite hard. Dorothy, maybe we are back in Kansas. We will be staying in Great Falls, MT. We stayed tonight at Walmart. We learned at the Tourist Info Center the State Fair Grounds has a small RV Campground so we will plan to stay there for a few days.