US Border to Helena

We had already planned to get to Yellowstone National Park as fast as possible. Having been told that there is so much to see there from a wildlife, scenery and volcanic perspective, it seemed like a natural first major stop.

The best place to stay would therefore need to be somewhere north of Yellowstone.

We picked Helena. Now we pronounced this ‘Heleena’ but were swiftly corrected by  a local. He reckoned that they changed it to ‘Helunna’ because it sounded more feminine. Not sure about that one to be honest. I think we were thinking of St Helena.

Tip 10 – Don’t believe everything you hear from the locals.

Arriving in Helena

After arriving in Helena, and checking the bags in, we decided to go for a drive round. Our navigation device was a little quirky, so we felt confident navigating to Mount Helena on our own using a map.

20 minutes later, we ended up at the frisbee golf course, (which we thought only existed on a Playstation game) we turned the GPS on and it took us to the mountain.

Tip 11 – Maps are great. Navigation is better. 

Mounting Lions

Still daylight, but getting dimmer, we started up the mountain. The sign at the bottom mentioned that Mountain Lions had  been spotted in the area, which sounded interesting. These aren’t really lions with big manes, but what we know as Cougars. Mountain lion sounds more scary though eh!

After a brisk walk for about 20 minutes, we figured that the bloke who told us we were half way there 10 minutes ago might be telling porky pies. Decision time. It was getting dark, the kids were tired, so we decided to retreat back down the mountain and away from the lions.

Tip 12 – See tip 10

Great view though – first we got a fantastic shot of Helena from the air and second, some deer wandered across the path, so we got some up close photos of scared deer.