From Buffalo,Wyoming to Billings, Montana

 Since Billings is only about 2.5 hours away, we got up, had breakfast and went for a hike up Grouse Mountain.  We hiked for almost 11km and had nice views.  Nothing spectacular but lovely nonetheless.  During our hike, Remi hit a rock with his toe that already hurts because of his latest gout attack.  He was a trouper and kept going.  Near the top of our hike, we met a group of mountain climbing cows! They looked at us like we didn't belong... 

After our hike, we had lunch at Dash-in - a fast food joint that last night's server recommended.  We had fried chicken and lemonade.  It was decent - actually better than KFC - nice and crunchy without the oil dripping.

We made our way to Billings - gotta love the 80 miles/hour highways!  It gets you places! Ontario could learn a thing or two about highways!  The road here is not boring, but boring.  There are no trees, only dead looking grass and mounds.  It's pretty for a while but then...

Once in Billings, we stayed at the hotel for the rest of the afternoon.  It's crazy hot here it was 34.  It's a dry heat - so much different from Ottawa.  You feel like you are burning!  My hands actually feel somewhat better in this dry heat (arthritis in hands is no joke - some days, I can't even make a fist it hurts so much).

We did have dinner at Cracker Barrel - we were really excited!  We first saw this restaurant in Nebraska and wanted to go.  We thought we had missed our chance until... What are the chances? There are 2 of these restaurants in all of Montana and one of them is 5 minutes from our hotel!  Cute restaurant, good food.

We are spending tomorrow in Billings - planning on a couple outings and then paddle boarding in the afternoon.

Farm animals:  Cows and horses

Birds: Mountain bluebird, grouse (they were too fast for a picture), turkey vultures, some other little bird, flicker?, robin, chickadee -not sure if it was black capped or mountain

Road Kill: porcupines - lots of them.  Why are there porcupines here? There are no trees... pronghorn looking thing - can't be sure as it was mush... but it was big so...

Wild animal: pronghorn, butterflies