Home for a rest

To paraphrase the Canadian folk rock band Spirit of the West---"These so called vacations will soon be my death, I'm so sick of the drive, I need home for a rest."  

   Things I learned over the last 10 days on my Yellowstone trip.
     1. Grand Prismatic Spring has to be the most beautiful 2 acres on Earth. 
  

  2. Although rain is inconvenient and doesn't make for great photo-ops, it's a great fire suppression system.  The low humidity out there not only creates a volatile tinderbox on every hillside it also allows quick temperature swings.  The temperature was 100 degrees when we picked my wife up at Bozeman airport on Tuesday and 28 degrees on Monday when we dropped her off.

   3. The libertarian philosophy out west can show itself anywhere, at anytime and is completely understood by everyone present.  Take the four-way stop at the corner of N. Canyon and Yellowstone Ave. in West Yellowstone MT.,  where rather than passing through the intersection in order in which they stopped at their respective stop signs the drivers proceed in order of their level of disdain for the government and no one beeps their horn and middle fingers remain in their holsters.  It's as if Fox News told them that the stop signs were put there by President Obama.
    4. There is a speed limit on the interstates in Montana and its not the same as the road's number designation.  My co-driver  was given 3 souvenir points to carry on her driving record for the next 2 years. On the plus side she did knock of an hour off of our GPS's estimated time of arrival in less than 3 hours.  I'm told that while I was trying to nap the arrival time display was ticking down like a NASA countdown.