Home: I Can See It From Here

By Bob Wire, 8-06-08

	Caption: Here's the fabulous Great Hall, the largest chamber of the Lewis & Clark Caverns. Notice the brilliant colors brought out by the minerals in these incredible formations. Did I mention there's no flash photography allowed?

I never thought I would be so glad to see Billings. After being screwed out of a motel room in Wyoming the previous night, we vowed that our last night on the road would be an orgy of comfort and self-indulgence. And if I could get the kids to take a long walk, maybe a little sex.

We pulled into Billings (a Crow Indian word meaning “accounts receivable”) around dinner time, and snagged a room at the C’mon Inn. Despite the aw-shucks name, this place is a posh oasis. A giant fake rock approximately the size of four garbage trucks is the centerpiece of the atrium. It has two waterfalls, a koi pond, and is surrounded by hot tubs. Tunneled beneath the thing is a black light arcade. Rusty and Speaker spent several hours in there, using a dayglo rifle to blast the shit out of a cartoon deer. Hmm. Working out some pent up aggression? Better here than in the truck.

Barb and I luxuriated on the balcony, drinking Coronas and eating humongous salads while the kids cavorted. I soothed my aching shoulder in a hot tub, and we all got a decent night’s sleep. Check-out time was noon. Damn, I love Billings.

You’d think that after three weeks and over 5,000 miles, we’d be ready to set the land speed record between Billings and Missoula, but we had one more Official Tourist Stop, one we’d promised Speaker on the way out three weeks ago. Lewis and Clark Caverns, near Three Forks, would be our final attraction of the journey. Speaker was chattering faster and faster as we approached the turnoff from I-90, and by the time we pulled into the parking lot she was pretty much vibrating with excitement. “Whew!” she gasped, as we climbed out of the truck. “All that freaking out made me tired!”

Barb announced that she would not be joining us for the 90-minute tour, which was not surprising. She is somewhat claustrophobic, and gets nervous when someone opens an umbrella. An hour and a half trapped hundreds of feet beneath the earth is not her idea of a good time. She had her book, and said she’d be fine just hanging out while we took the tour.

The tour begins with a steep, half-mile long hike up an asphalt trail to the cave entrance. It was a warm day, and I was sweating like Condi Rice at a peace rally by the time we reached the top. Our tour guide was Ranger Tom, who turned out to be the Dane Cook of State Park rangers. The guy was hilarious, and kept our group of 35 people laughing throughout the tour. He’d been dragging people through the caverns for over ten years, and possessed an impressive amount of knowledge beyond the canned tour spiel.

“What if there’s an earthquake?” someone asked.

“Actually, there’s an earthquake happening right now,” he said, walkie-talkie pressed to his ear. A nervous murmur passed through the group. “Nah, just kidding,” he said. “You wouldn’t notice an earthquake down here.”

“How much of the cave is actually underground?” asked someone else.

“Are those vampire bats? How do they know when the sun comes up?”

“Why do they keep it so cold in here?”

“Why didn’t they build it closer to they interstate?”

Ranger Tom looked at the ceiling for a moment, seeming to study a stalactite. “Why don’t we just move along to the next chamber,” he said with a pasted-on smile. Then he surreptitiously spoke into his walkie-talkie, ordering a pitcher of strong margaritas for after the tour.

Playing his flashlight along a rough cave wall, Ranger Tom pointed out some “cave bacon.” Then he showed us a formation called “cave popcorn.” Speaker raised her hand. “Is that how they invented the popcorn ceiling?” Tom looked at me and I shrugged.

The final chamber of the tour is called the Great Hall or something, and it is loaded with spectacular formations, all of which have some kind of obvious name. (This one is called the Louisville Slugger. That one is the Empire State Building. Over there is the Rock Shaped Rock.) They have installed white LED lighting that allows the full spectrum of color to be revealed in the formations, which really does make it an amazing spectacle.

We emerged from the cave some two and a half hours later, one of the longest tours of the summer, according to Tom. We were blinking and rubbing our eyes in the sunlight like newborn babies, only not covered in slimy placenta. The ground was wet—a thunderstorm had passed through while we were some 400 feet beneath the surface of the mountain, but we were oblivious.

The kids and I found Barb at the visitors center, and we walked over to the restaurant. We were starved. They were closed. We drove to Butte, and had our last meal on the road, at McKenzie River Pizza. From there, it was a short drive to Missoula, and the terminus of our epic journey.

It was near midnight when we pulled into the driveway, and we carried our essential bags into the house. My cousin Chris had house-sat for us the whole time, and she’d left the place spotless. We were delighted. She’d kept the plants alive, nurtured the vegetable garden, and kept Houdini company. He looked like he’d actually dropped a couple pounds, probably from the frequent walks. Chris, we owe you a big one.

As I pawed through the mountain of credit card offers and bills on the kitchen table, I tried to process the vital stats of our trip. Twenty-one days. Thirteen states (we’d clipped the corner of Alabama for four miles). 5,475 miles. Ten campsites. Six hotels. 800,000 Corn Nuts. Sixty-two CDs, two books-on-tape. I read four and a half books. Wrote about 12,000 words, and two songs. We took nearly a thousand photos. I haven’t shaved since June 28th.

No one got sick. No one got injured. Well, seriously. The 4Runner ran flawlessly (thanks, Kent Bros).The kids each earned nine Junior Ranger badges. We sent almost 20 postcards. We bought 27 bags of ice. We saw the green cornfields of Iowa, and the blue grass of Kentucky. We saw the hometowns of three fictional characters: Radar O’Reilly, Superman, and Fred Thompson.

How much gas did we use, and how much did it cost? I don’t know yet. I haven’t tallied it up. We paid as much as $4.19 a gallon, and as little as $3.85. Whatever the cost, I don’t care. We’d saved for this trip and still spent less than it would have cost to fly.

Crazy? Maybe. Stupid? Hell no. This was The Road Trip, baby. This was one for the ages. We’ve got a million stories, only a few of which I’ve shared with you in this space. For three incredible, unpredictable, exciting weeks, our family moved through this vast country together, taking in some amazing sights and creating some indelible memories. It was a roaring success, and we’ll be swapping stories about it for years to come.

But for now, it’s back to reality, which means back to work. Hey, somebody’s got to pay for all those Corn Nuts.

[We hope you enjoyed these Dispatches From the Road. We now return you to our regular blog, already in progress.]

http://www.top-blogs.com/cgi-bin/rankem.cgi?id=ednor59