Babb, MT--my Internet destination!

Sunday August 5, 2012

This is our last night at Rising Sun.  We've been here 6 days and it's been wonderful!  Weather has been spectacular (except for one night of an interesting thunderstorm).  Ed has had many good hikes.  And we even got to eat a trout he caught!  Life is good!



View of Glacier from Babb, MT

My quest for Internet during this week has taken me to Babb, Montana.  The only Internet I could find in the town of St. Mary, MT, is $2.50 for a half hour and it stayed on for maybe 10 minutes of that.  It comes from satellite and is really bad.....so I went on a driving quest to find free Internet.  I have found very few Libraries on this trip.  Montana is almost like Canada in that way--no libraries.  I guess it's a factor of our being in Indian Country most of this trip which must not have government funds to establish Libraries.  A real shame.

Babb, MT is a small unincorporated community in Glacier County, Montana, on the Blackfeet Indian Reservation located on US Rt 89 about 10 miles north of St Mary and was named after C. C. Babb, district engineer of the Saint Mary's Irrigation Project. The first post office was established in 1905 with Cicero Bristol as postmaster. In 1912, it became the headquarters for the Reclamation Service Project which diverted water from the Saint Mary's River (which drains into the Hudson Bay) across the Hudson Bay Divide to the Milk River. Today the town consists of tourist cabins, a few houses, a general store, a post office, and one school, a K-6 elementary school which had 36 students as of 2005.


Cows while getting Internet

I pulled into the parking lot for Babb Elementary school thinking perhaps there would be Internet access there.  The school was next to an unidentified beige building, the fire department and an EMS office.  I found a signal in front of the unidentified building so I have spent 2 hours a day sitting in an idling car.  I'm shocked I haven't been picked up by the police for loitering!



Our original plan after camping at Rising Sun, was to go next to Many Glacier campground in the Park, but I read an article the other day in USA Today that has changed our mind.  The article mentioned the 10 Best National Park Campsites.  The number one spot was Devils Tower National Monument: Belle Fourche Campground. We've been to a lot on the list but not this one!  So we decide to make a detour for a new adventure!  However, it is 15 hours away, so we are going to have to do a couple one nighters since 6 or 7 hours a day of driving is all we can handle.

We have to be at Covered Bridge Campground in New Hampshire on Aug 24, so we have to start making some 1 day stops.  We'll see how it goes.