Training: Day 7 - Buffalo Jump and Ghost Town

Today was Mother's Day in the UK, so I rang home this morning to speak to Lisa. It was really nice to talk for a change.

We headed out for a journey to explore the west of the area today. We left at around 9:45 and drove for about an hour, till we came to a place called "Buffalo Jump". This is where the indians (sorry, "Native Americans") used to drive the buffalo over the cliff to kill them. It was clearly much easier to persuade them to jump over a cliff than to hunt them down individually. It was odd, but looking at the cliff, you could just imagine it all happening before you.



After driving back up the rather precarious dust track, we carried on down the main road, heading for some "ghost towns" that Kip had read about.

We were travelling through gold-rush country (we even saw some real tumble-weeed!). There are several old towns that were set up just for the people that came over to mine the gold, silver and gems that had been discovered in the area. Then, when all the treasure had gone, the towns were simply abandoned. The one that we eventually found, after what seemed like an eternity driving, was called Virginia City (they use the term "city" rather loosely in the States).



It was a real old cowboy town, and it was fascinating to read the history of all the different buildings. Some were original, some had been restored and some had been transferred from other similar abandoned towns to be restored and added to those in Virginia City.



After Virginia City, we continued on until we reached a small town where we ate some lunch - a very stodgy Chinese. We then headed back on a very long journey to Bozeman. By this time I was feeling a bit fed up of mountains and plains. Kip and Mark were interested in going to the Bozeman Hot Springs, but I didn't really feel like it, so I went back to the hotel for a rest. My laptop had crashed this morning and, as this is pretty much my only link with home, I was keen to get it working. After a while, thankfully, I got it going again.

Dinner tonight was at "Famous Dave's BBQ" - a huge selection of stuff served on a dustobin lid, quite bizarely. We had ribs, chicken wings, coleslaw, beans & fries...good job we're only here for another week and a half!

To see all of todays photos, click here. To see them as a slideshow, click here.