Biking by the Bridgers

Today I decided to go on a long bike ride, even though it was raining and not very pleasant outside. I rode out towards the Bridger mountains and ended up on a trail that went along Bridger Creek.

Bridger Creek

Then I ended up further back towrds where I had come from and decided to ride up the Story Mill road, which was a good decision.

The view was pretty good even though it was cloudy and raining, and once again I got to explore a place I had never been.

I've decided lately that one of my favorite things about Bozeman is that it is surrounded by 360° of mountains, and every one is worth exploring.

Hyalite Canyon

My mom came to town for the past two days, so yesterday we decided to go hiking in Hyalite Canyon. It is a really cool place in the mountains on the south side of town which has a road leading about 12 miles through the mountains. We drove all the way down the road to hike the Hyalite Creek trail, but the trail was still covered in snow so we could only walk part of the way. We still got to see some waterfalls and cool rock formations along the way, though:

Me and Grotto Falls

Me and some "karens"

Since we didn't get to hike as far as we had planned, we decided to check out another trail further back on the road, and walked out to Palisade Falls, which were awesome:

Palisade Falls

We climbed a little further than the trail and got to the top of a rock outcrop, and the view was amazing. You can see Hyalite Lake in the background on the right.

Overall it was a fun day, and I'm glad I got to explore part of Hyalite. There's tons of stuff to do back there, including camping, fishing, a cabin, mountain biking, and rock climbing. In the winter, you can cross country ski, snowshoe, and ice climb. Basically, it's an outdoor paradise. I'd highly recommend exploring it if you come visit.

Free Download, Local Music!

Cure for the Common, the local band who has previously played in my friends' basement and at Bobcat Fest (which I have blogged about in the past), has made a live recording of theirs from the "Rock Against Rape" in the MSU Strand Union Building Ballrooms on April 21 available to download for free!

Click here for some good, free, local, funky music.

Start the summer right!

Finals Week

It's (finally?) finals week, and I'm 1/3 done with my finals for the week. I had my Spanish 102 final at 4:00 today so I'm glad that's over, although I should probably continue to study considering I will be in Argentina before I know it.

Unfortunately, I am one of the unlucky few who has a final on Friday, and worse, it's at 8:00 am! All I can say is I will be ready to celebrate by Friday night.

My other final is tomorrow at 8:00 am for British Literature II (which is being discontinued after this semester, so I am one of the last students to have to take it...awesome), so I can get that over with and study for my last final, which is in Educational Psychology and will probably be the hardest.

Two of my roommates are already done with finals, and my other roommate isn't in school this semester, so basically motivation is hard to come by at this point. However, that's what the library is for (although I haven't ventured there so far this week).

Three more days...

Bobcat Fest!

Yesterday, Friday, from 5-8 pm, several blocks of Main Street were closed down for the Bobcat Fest. It was the last day of classes for the semester, so it was a celebration sponsored by ASMSU (the Associated Students of MSU). There was free food, free t-shirts, and live music, and it was super fun!

Cure for the Common, the same local band who played in my friends' basement a few weeks ago, played first, followed by Keegan Smith and the Fam. One of my friends has an apartment on Main street which has a balcony overlooking where the stage was, so we had a great view, although I went down to the street to dance for a while.

The view from the balcony.

Due to the fact that it is spring in Montana, it was snowing on and off throughout the event and thus was slightly chilly. However, a lot of people still came out and it was a lot of fun.

After the Bobcat Fest, the same friends that had Cure for the Common play in their basement had another live band play in their basement, named Mister Downtown. They were pretty good, although a little bit too punk/alternative for my liking.

All in all, it was a great night of free live music!