U.S. Virtual Road Trip- Day 26- Montana & #Giveaway

Yesterday we where in Missouri with Lisa @ Lisa Loves Literature  Literature. You can check out the post here.

Today we are in Montana with a really special post. Crow Mountain by Lucy Inglis, releases in September 2015 VIA Chicken House and I had the pleasure of reading it recently, you can check out my review here The book is set in Montana and is quoted as an YA historical real life drama romance. I thought it was fantastic and will be sharing my review next month. Lucy has kindly wrote us a post as Cal, one of the lead males in Crow Mountain. I loved Cal as a character. Over to Cal :)

Well, thanks for having me on the blog, Megan. Hi everyone - wow, this is weird from the office on the ranch on a Sunday morning . It’s a nice day today. Pretty warm and breezy. I can see the horses from the window, and they’re mainly trying to stay out of the sun near the haybarn. Anyhow, these questions were real fun to answer, so thanks for sending them over. Montana’s full of places to visit , most of them are for the scenery, but we’ve got some great history too. I’m just going to put these in order of my preference on this one, but if you’re coming to Montana, you should see all of them, I think. 

1) Going-to-the-sun Mountain in the Glacier National Park. It’s a beautiful mountain, and the road leading to it is pretty spectacular too. I like the drive up there, through the park. It hold a lot of memories for me. And my family too. You should check the times and everything though, because there’s just been a huge forest fire up there last week. People are talking about a thousand acres. Our ranch was affected a little, but the damage in the park was worse. Although our cabin up there was fine, I already went to check.

2) The Western Heritage Centre in Billings. People think Western heritage is all cowboys and stuff, but there’s a lot more to it. People think Montana is all ranching and mining, but before that there were a lot of different Indian tribes and pioneers. I like the WHC because it tries to bring all those stories together.

3) Little Bighorn National Monument. People mainly call it Custer’s Last Stand. It’s to do with the Sioux Wars, which were a pretty big deal around here. In a way they still are, because they forced the Native people to sell or starve, which took their land away . Anyhow, I could go on, but I won’t. People tell me I can get a little worked up about this stuff. 

Places to eat in Montana

This is a great question, seeing as no one in my family tires of eating, although we mainly eat at home because we’re miles from anywhere. But, when we are going to go out to eat, it’s because I’m making the airport run to Helena. Helena’s a nice town and here are the places I like, in no real order. 

1) Nagoya's Steakhouse and Sushi  This is great place for dinner. My dad loves a steak, my mom loves sushi, which to be honest, is pretty thin on the ground in Montana, plus they do vegetarian stuff, so it keeps everyone happy.

2) Steve's Cafe , Helena. If  I’m trying to meet the early flight, I’ll go to Steve’s. Or we go after the airport. It does ranching size breakfasts and the eggs are great, but it does a pretty sweet stack of huckleberry pancakes too.

3) The Old Minter’s Dining Club at the Caretaker’s Cabin was some of the best BBQ food we ever ate, but it’s just closed. We had my last birthday there. I think they’ll reopen again. I hope so. It was some lease problem. It’ll be great to see them back

Quirky things about Montana

Montana doesn’t seem the kind of place to have too many quirks, but believe me, it has it’s share. 

1) Pole Bridge Merc- I was going to put this in places to visit, but really, I think it’s more quirky than that. Check our their website, it says more than I could. They’re famous for their sweet pastry bear claws. What?! I said, ranchers have got to eat

2) We have some pretty quirky radio stations. Some of them are real religious, some of them are local news. I like the local news ones, where the news is so local they role call lost dogs and cows on the main street. My passengers sometimes complain about the music, or lack of it, but I like it. 

3) Okay, so this is a weird one: In Montana you can’t have an unchaperoned sheep in the cab of your rig. It’s a bylaw and I have no idea what it even means. First of all, why would you have a sheep in your cab, except a winter lamb, or something, maybe. And second, what’s a sheep chaperone? Also, unmarried women aren’t allowed to fish (I may or may not have to disclose having broken this law once in a while - don’t tell.) 

Famous people from Montana.

1) Sitting Bull the Lakota chief.  
2) David Lynch the director. His stuff’s weird, but I like it. 
3) Someone’s just come in and told me Violet Beauregarde from Charlie and the Chocolate Factory was from Miles City. Wasn’t she the girl with the bubblegum and the bad manners who went blue from blueberries? The bad manners doesn’t sound much like Montana to me (it might have something to do with the fact that the person who just came in was still eating their breakfast blueberries - it’s almost eleven and the days around here start at four, how’s that for timekeeping)

Authors or books set in Montana

There are almost too many for me to talk about, but here goes. 

1) Ivan Doig is my favourite living Montana writer. Well he was, he died in April. But still, I rate his stuff. It feels like home.

 2) Joseph Kinsey Howard wrote a book called High, Wide and Handsome, which is a really famous history of Montana. You should look it up, if you like. 

3) James Willard Shultz, aka Apikuni He named Going -to-the-Sun-Mountain and so I had to put him in here. 

That’s it! Thanks again, Megan . And thanks for reading, it’s been fun. The lunch bell just rang across the yard. We’re having a BBQ today and my friend Matty’s truck is coming up the drive. Better run. Oh, and you really should come to Montana. Sometimes, people love it enough they decide they want to stay.

This post was so much fun. Thanks Cal. It was awesome learning about Montana. I really want to go now. What do you think?

Tomorrow we are in Nebraska with blogger Kimberly @ Caffeinated Reads.

Follow all the road trip posts here

Giveaway

When a finished copy of Crow Mountain by Lucy Inglis. Giveaway open to anyone in the UK/ Ireland / Europe. Giveaway being sponsored by the author, publisher and me. Giveaway open till the 28th August 2015.

Blurb

While on holiday in Montana, Hope meets local boy Cal Crow, a ranch-hand. Caught in a freak accident, the two of them take shelter in a mountain cabin where Hope makes a strange discovery. More than a hundred years earlier, another English girl met a similar fate. Her rescuer: a horse-trader called Nate. In this wild place, both girls learn what it means to survive and to fall in love, neither knowing that their fates are intimately entwined.

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