| I do love to drive on the open road.
The only bad things about driving in the middle of nowhere are
having to closely monitor your fuel gauge and closely monitor your bladder level. |
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| The last thing to see on the trip was
originally supposed to be on Sunday morning, but it got pushed back
to Saturday afternoon. |
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| It was Memorial Day weekend, so little
flags were planted in the nearby cemetery. But it is in a national
park, so maybe they are there all the time. |
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| The large marker memorializing the men
of the U.S. 7th Cavalry who lost the Battle of the Little Bighorn
against the combined forces of the Arapaho, Lakota and Northern
Cheyenne on June 25-26, 1876. |
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| The markers are in the approximate
locations where the men fell. |
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| Please Mr. Custer, I don't want to go. |
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| Aw, the poor horsies. |
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| The view of Wooden Leg Hill from Last
Stand Hill. On the other side of that hill a young Cheyenne warrior
called Wooden Leg gathered along with other Lakota and Cheyenne
warriors out of the view of the 7th Cavalry soldiers. After an
exchange of fire, shots from the soldiers ceased and the Indians
rushed up Last Stand Hill. |
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| Last Stand Hill is the hill where Custer made his
last stand. I mean, what else would it be, the last lemonade stand
for miles? |
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| This would have been the view of the
Native American warriors, under the leadership of Sitting Bull and
Crazy Horse, toward the hill and Custer's men. |
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| This is an interesting marker. The red
ones are supposed to be for Indians, but as I look up Wasicu Sapa or
Black White Man I find a fellow called Isaiah Dorman. He was a black
man who for a period of time lived with the Lakota and married a
Sioux woman, but at the time of the battle was a part of Custer's
group as an interpreter. |
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| Finally completing the longest driving
day of the trip, I needed something to eat. I didn't want to go back
to the place I went the previous Saturday, so I opted for Ciao
Mambo. |
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| It is a chain of three Italian
restaurants, but local to Montana. |
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| God bless modern technology. I was
sitting there eating my margherita pizza while watching the second
half of the Nashville SC v. Indy Eleven match on my phone. |
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| Sunday morning and nothing to do but
grab some breakfast and head to the airport. The hotel had a thing
where guests got a free breakfast. |
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I went with the (giant) pancake,
scrambled eggs and coffee.
|
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| So let's bid goodbye to Billings. |
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| And to the Big Sky country. |
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