Montana Means Business!

So for the past few days we've been driving around the spacious state of Montana. It is very very pretty, but I'll be happy to look around and not see sandy dirt everywhere. What I love is rolling into a city at night and having no idea of what my surroundings look like and waking up to a mountain in my face.

Our tour of the Treasure State began in Missoula, a city known among theatre folk for its Children's Tour company. It was nice to perform in the city where they train, to see what they see when getting ready for their tour. Here's a pic of the space, which was great except for the 50 yard dash up 2 flights of stairs to get to the ladies' dressing room. I'm all for cardio.

After Missoula we traveled back to Billings and the Dude Rancher! Oh yeah! This was a lovely time because we had the afternoon before the show to explore. It was absolutely Billings for the win because not only did we find a great chocolate shop with some odd truffles (pineapple cream, honeydew) and get some great local grub at the Montana Brewing Company, we found an excellent vintage clothing store. I found several items including a navy blue pearl snap shirt (my first) and...drumroll please...powder blue vintage cowboy boots! Yes! And they were only $28 so my feet and wallet are happy. I've been wearing them just about everyday since and it makes me wish I had them for Footloose. Also, the brand of the boots? Capezio! I was not aware that the dance shoe company made cowboy boots but does that mean I can go to dance calls in them? Because I will.

Billings had a myriad of specialty stores, including a dude ranch clothing shop, a real Indian trading post,  and a trinket store called Prairie Blossom.

Next up on our whirlwind Montanaganza was Butte (giggle) and it was a Butte!

What I loved about Butte was that there was a creperie which we visited upon arrival and their "Crepe of the Day" was as follows: Pepperoni Black Bean Broccoli Potato Cheddar Feta. WHAT?! Sarah and I ordered what we thought was a Potato Cheddar crepe only to discover that what we had in fact ordered was a grocery store on a pastry. Our bad.

On the plus side, Butte's got a handle on passive aggression and measurement skills.

Word.

Finally we finished our tour de force with Helena, an adorable town with many adventures in store.

We arrived last night and a bunch of us got in the pool and played a bunch of games which was surprisingly fun, I didn't mind being thrown in for once! The hot tub was a bit like lava which made the adjacent pool especially rewarding. But my favorite part of Helena came today. Greta and I decided to explore the downtown area a bit and so we went for a substantial walk. I saw a beautiful cathedral in the distance and suggested we go check out the architecture and upon arrival about 2 miles later we poked our heads in and saw mass going on. We didn't want to disturb but then we walked around the front of the cathedral and saw a sign that said "Daily Mass: 9am and 12 noon" and since it was only 12:30 we thought, hey, people come to church late all the time. And we snuck in a side door and sat down to listen. We enjoyed the stained glass windows, Greta took a couple quick pictures with her phone, and we said the Lord's Prayer, this and that. As we got further into the prayer time we noticed the priest kept mentioning one woman's soul in particular which seemed odd but we figured maybe it was just a close congregation. Then he said, "Now, we'll have a luncheon downstairs after the service for those of you who can't make it to the cemetery, you can pay your respects to the family there." And Greta turned to me and mouthed the words, "IS THIS A FUNERAL?" Luckily upon this realization there was another prayer and everyone bowed their heads. We did too, only to laugh in our silent shame. Luckily we were sitting in the very back. As we silently stepped out we saw the casket. Woops! It was such a beautiful church and I don't regret doing it but sorry to those who thought some tourists crashed their family member's funeral...you thought right.

I leave you with pictures of said church, as well as some pics of the theatre and the downtown area. What was cool about this theatre was that it was made out of a closed mosque back in the 30s, so the artwork was especially beautiful and I think there must have been 30 chandeliers in the whole place, they hung 'em lie they were going out of style! I'll miss Montana, between the gorgeous scenery and the hospitality (so what if some of the volunteer stage hands were folks from the local prison doing mandatory community service) I think this was a pretty darn great state.

Later Montana, on to Idahooooooooooooooo!