Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Hunter's Campfire On the road again.

Flat is easy, .long as you ain't riding into an actual gale. The thing to remember about all these photos tho is the quote "TWO HUNDRED DAYS OF WINTER"

Anyways.....

Just like my Google Maps app told me nothing about Fort Benton, so it told me nothing about Box Elder, just eleven miles further along. While Box Elder doesn't apparently lie ON the Rez, it might as well do so, tho I wasn't aware of this until having ridden through it.

The Rocky Boys Rez had been suggested earlier in this thread as a place where a person such as myself might encounter hostile Indians, at least to the point of getting beat up. Indeed, I did pass an apparently notorious bar and grill right at the intersection called "Jingles", and indeed there were some darker-complected individuals in a couple of pickup trucks out front in the parking lot, but having just conversed with a couple of Texas Hispanics over lunch back in Big Sandy I just figured they was just more of the same, honest. (See, at powwows in South Texas the audience generally looks more Indian than the actual Indians). Not having looked at an actual map in several days, I had assumed the Rocky Boys Rez was off somewhere in BFE further east without reflecting upon the fact that I was actually IN BFE at that point.

Had I known I woulda ridden another eleven miles to Box Elder and had the famous "Jingleburger" as per the sign out front (which may have included some of yer own teeth I dunno ).

As it was, in my ignorance, I only took two photos in Box Elder. Being usually both dry and cold, Montana is a great place for classic cars, this one was parked next to some guy's mobile home....




...and then, in the middle of town (blink and you'll miss it) I came across this sign and thought "Hey, small world!" assuming the Agency mentioned was prob'ly some distance away over in the Bear Paw Mountains (in actuality the actual town of Box Elder, just like the town of Big Sandy, prob'ly lies off to the east of the highway).

Also of note in this photo note the dark line running down the horizon to the left of the highway. These were railway flatbed cars, at least fifteen miles of 'em parked along the rail line from north of Big Sandy to and through Box Elder, the kind of cars that each hold two stacked shipping containers straight from China or wherever. Gaps were left in the line to allow for roads and driveways. On the way back my buddy told me that a tunnel on that line did not allow for the passage of stacked shipping containers, relegating that whole stretch of rail to the status of a very long siding.



A bit further along I came across this way-cool billboard , which also shed further light on the probable ethnic composition of the town of Box Elder itself.....



Well damn, and I had just ridden right by.

A ways along though I came across this other building, which I swear from a distance looked like an Evangelical Church, or else that is what it would have been looking like that along a highway in Texas. What threw me is the sign out front which was mostly all white and heavenly-looking and not legible from a distance (strange choice of color scheme, I'll bet its invisible in a blizzard).





Just as I was taking these photos a car left the casino and turned left towards Box Elder, two young college age Indian-looking girls in front, and what looked like someone's high school age little brother riding in back, the driver's side front window was open. They looked to be having a good time in general and seemed to find me amusing. "What's he doin?" said the woman in the front passenger seat in what sounded like an American Indian accent. "He's takin pictures!" replied the driver in that same accent. "I'm from Texas!" I called out. "Here! take a picture of us!" the driver called back. So I did.

Note that there are TWO raised fingers in the photo, in a palm-forward "victory" gesture. Maybe she was the Girls Basketball Coach I dunno.