Episode 41 | Bozeman & Livingston, Montana
Montana doesn’t ease you in. It just sort of presents itself, big sky, bigger mountains, and waits for you to catch up.
My first stop after landing in Bozeman wasn’t some scenic overlook or a craft brewery with reclaimed wood furniture. It was Walmart. Because before you go wandering around grizzly country, you need bear spray. And bear spray is one of those rare purchases where the goal is to spend the money and never, ever get your money’s worth. I stood there reading the label — works on cougars too, sprays up to 40 feet — and thought, well, let’s hope that stays purely academic.
I asked the woman working the sporting goods section if she’d ever had to use it. Twice, she said. I didn’t ask follow-up questions.
Under Canvas: Glamping Without the Guilt
From Walmart to what I can only describe as the nicest tent I’ve ever slept in.
We headed just outside of Livingston, north of Yellowstone, to a place called Under Canvas. If you haven’t heard of it, the concept is simple: canvas tents with real beds, wood-burning stoves, pull-chain showers to conserve water, and absolutely zero electricity. There’s a front porch with chairs, a little rug on the floor, and a view that makes you forget you were standing in a big-box store forty minutes ago.
I’ll be honest, I was already mentally framing shots before I even set my bag down.
The light that first evening was doing something interesting. That kind of late afternoon glow that photographers spend a lot of time chasing and don’t always catch. It was landing on the tent canvas and the surrounding landscape in a way that felt almost painted. The Absaroka Range sitting out in the distance, a little haze in the air from distant wildfire smoke, the golden grass catching whatever the sky was willing to give. I grabbed the camera and started walking before I even finished the tour.
No ads here, this isn’t that kind of blog, but I’ll put a link below because they’ve got locations near Moab, Zion, the Smoky Mountains, and both the north and west entrances to Yellowstone. Worth knowing about.
The temperature was sitting right around 70 with a cool breeze rolling through. The kind of evening that makes you feel like the trip is already paying off.
The Characters
I should introduce the cast, since it seems like the right moment.
Joining me for this leg of the journey is Denise. She’s probably my best friend. She’s also my ex-wife. I know how that sounds, but we get along well, we have a daughter together, and she was turning 60 this month, the same milestone I hit in May, which is the whole reason I’m out here doing 50 at 60 in the first place. She had some time off work, I had Montana on the itinerary, and it just made sense.
Our daughter is flying in from New York and meeting us Saturday evening down in Jackson. So for this stretch it’s the three of us, which feels right for Wyoming and the Tetons. More on that as we get there.
The Storm We Didn’t See Coming
We walked the property that evening. There’s a main lodge tent where they serve food, fires going out back, s’mores, a guy playing guitar. The kind of scene that makes you feel slightly too relaxed for someone who just bought bear spray.
Then the sky turned. Fast.
What followed was a genuine thunderstorm, lightning and driving rain battering the walls of a canvas tent. I’ve ridden out my share of Florida hurricanes. This felt about as intense, minus the news coverage and the plywood. We were zipped in, no electricity to lose, nowhere to be. At least we had that going for us.
Here’s the thing about storms though, at least for me. There’s a moment right when one rolls in where the light goes strange. The sky takes on this particular quality, the contrast cranks up on everything around you, and if you’re paying attention and you move fast, you can get something worth keeping. I went outside and photographed as much of it as I could. The clouds building over the Montana landscape were doing things I genuinely don’t have words for.
The shot I’m most proud of from that night is the one below. I set up as the lightning was flashing behind the property and the tent lights were glowing warm against all of that purple and violet in the sky. It was one of those situations where you just try to hold the camera steady and hope the exposure gods are with you.
We laughed a lot that night. About the tent, the rain, the bear spray still sitting unused in the bag. About the fact that two people who were once married are now out here doing this together, turning 60, watching a Montana thunderstorm roll through a canvas wall.
Stranger things have happened. Most of them on this trip.
