Amy Kline

2025

Devil’s Tower and the prairie dogs

July 20, 2025 Amy Kline

In order to break up all the days of driving, we camped at Devil’s Tower for one night. Jeff and I love this National Monument. It was our first “National Park like stop on our first roadtrip back in 2005h. Fun hikes, important historical stuff, a great campground, a movie connection (Close Encounters of the Third Kind), and prairie dogs galore!

The cottonwood shaded campground is first come, first served, so we were nervous that there wouldn’t be any sites left when we got there about 4 pm. We were lucky enough to get a wonderful site! Once we got set up, I went to the visitor’s center, while the boys and Jeff relaxed at the campsite. It was pretty hot out, so we didn’t go for the hike around the base of the tower.

At the info board at both the campground and the visitor center, there is a sign that is now required. You can read it in the photos of this blog post and also the sign that someone put up near it as a form of resistance.

Jeff made yummy chicken legs for dinner and got a campfire started while I attended the ranger talk. Ranger talks are one of the best features when staying in a national park. Some state parks have them too. The subject tonight was how to recognize heat stroke and we also learned about thunderstorms and super cells. Apparently in August 2024, a tornado went through Devil’s Tower area and the park lost a few hundred trees due to wind and baseball sized hail. The KOA campground that is down the road got the worst of it though. Lots of ruined campers but no one was hurt.

After the Ranger talk, Jeff and I sat by the fire (kids sat in the camper where there weren’t any bugs). It is our 28th anniversary on the 19th, and we are proud of how we have built a nice life together with great kids, and jobs that let us travel the country in this way together every summer. Around 10:30, we began to see lightning in the distance and figured we would have to bring the camper down when it is still wet which means we will have to raise it to get it dried out at a rest stop somewhere or else set it up right away when we get home. Resigned to that, we went to sleep.

Somehow, the rains never came overnight, so in the morning, I quickly went to the prairie dog town to get some more photos of the doggies and the tower, then we all packed up and were on our way to Sioux Falls for the last hotel night.

2025

Fiberworks Quilt Shop and the bridge from the Untouchables movie

July 19, 2025 Amy Kline

We are starting to work our way towards home again. The first day of driving is to get from our campsite in St. Mary’s to a hotel (and a real shower!) in Billings, Montana.

A quick note on a couple organizational things that help on our trips. If we are going from campground to campground, we leave the sleeping bags, pillows, and duffles with our clothes right in the camper. If we have a hotel night, then we just have to grab our duffle bags then. also, Jeff has a neat system so he doesn’t forget to do things with the camper (empty gray and black water, turn off propane tank, turn off the water heater, close the ceiling fan, etc). He has slap bracelets labeled with each one and wraps them around the steering wheel when we are at a campsite. Then he takes them off as each one gets done as we take down the camper. Trying to climb into a closed-up pop up camper on the side of the highway to try to close the ceiling fan is not fun, so this prevents that from happening!

As a quick stretch break on the day’s drive, we stopped at the bridge that was used in the movie, The Untouchables. It looks just like it did in the movie, though the movie portrayed it as at the Canadian border. It was in a very pretty valley with rocks and mountains all around it.

Once we got to the hotel we all took wonderful, hot, long showers. So luxurious! We had stayed at pretty rustic campgrounds and only the last one had a basic shower. We relaxed and all fell asleep early.

The next morning, we stopped at Fiberworks Quilt Shop. Laura Heine is a rockstar pattern and fabric designer in the quilting community and this is her shop and warehouse. She is known for designing collage quilts and I had just bought a couple of her patterns to make this summer with some friends. I was so excited to see that her shop was just a couple minutes away from our hotel!

The shop/warehouse has all her patterns and so many quilts made from her designs. I took a couple close ups of the pattern I just started working on and a couple others I really liked.

Patten is Garden Party and I just started it before we left.

2025

St. Mary’s and Going-to-the-Sun Road

July 17, 2025 Amy Kline

Our first day at the campground in St. Mary’s was very low key. It rained all night long and continued raining all the next day. The rain was definitely more than sprinkling, but not quite pouring. We didn’t really feel like hiking in the rain, so we just hung out in the camper all day, napping and reading. When we looked outside, we couldn’t even see the mountains that we knew were there so figured driving on the Going-to-the-Sun road could wait until the following day.

It was pretty chilly both nights that we camped at St.Mary’s. Thank goodness for the heater in the camper. We were nice and toasty!

The rain finally stopped during the second night there and we woke up to a little fog that burned off as the sun rose. Beautiful mountains in 2 directions!

We sat outside in the sunshine for awhile and went exploring the Going-to-the-Sun road around mid-day. One reason that we chose the St. Mary’s area is because there isn’t timed entry like the other entrances have.

The drive was breathtaking! The east side half of the road is not as scary (meaning hairpin turns and no shoulder) as the west side half that we did in 2019, but had just as awe inspiring vistas.

Well, we made it to the Logan Pass Visitor Center where we were planning to stop and learn about the area and hike around a little bit. The parking lot was full and blocked off. Cars were making their own questionable parking spots on the sides of the road in both directions. Jeff had to keep driving another 5 miles at least before he could get to a turn out that had an opening so he could pull in and turn around. Additionally, there were people walking on the sides of the roads all over near the visitor centers, some of asking on the little stone walls that keep cars from driving off the mountain. We get what they have resorted to timed entries, and think St. Mary entrance will have it in the next year or two also.

As we were driving, we got stopped in an “animal jam”. It is our first grizzly bear sighting! We got a picture as we slowly drove by. A minute later there was a mountain goat that crossed the road. It’s not a popular National Park visit if you don’t get into an “animal jam”!

We decided to go back to the campsite and come back after the peak time is done. We were told that it is less busy after 4, so we went back at 5 and the drive was almost as busy, but the views looked completely different due to the sun being in a different part of the sky. We got in the parking lot of the visitor center at top this time, drove around for 30 minutes and still couldn’t get a spot. So we gave up and drove down with some stops for pictures.

We ate at an outdoor Mexican restaurant and listened to a singer/guitar player that was performing. It was perfect weather and a fun family dinner!

I took lots of wildflower pictures at the campground and also in the Park. I love all the plant diversity as we travel through all the different environments.

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