Superior, MT

The day off was pretty chill. I started off the morning looking things up at the library, and then sitting on a fantastic sofa in a coffee shop called Liquid Planet. I developed a love of sofas while in France (we had a great Ikea loveseat on which many naps were taken), and I certainly still appreciate them now.

I ended up biking around a lot, just exploring what town looked like. University of Montana has a nice quad and campus area not too different from U of Illinois, except for the giant mountains right in the background. For lunch, Michael and I met up with a whole group of people chilling in a plaza right by the Higgins Ave. bridge over the water where they had an outdoor concert and food stands. The public space reminded me a lot of the Campidoglio in Rome, designed by Michaelangelo. America needs more nice public spaces like those.

Right afterwards, I sketched a firestair. It wasn't spectacular architecture, but it was a very layered image that gave a sense of depth. I like being able to sketch things that have a very strong sense of perspective and depth to them rather than singular objects. Perhaps that's why I'm not all that interested in farmhouses.

Some people went tubing, which sounded like way too much physical exertion to me. It sounds like they had a lot of fun, but that the water was absolutely freezing, and they got out of the water pretty early to avoid hypothermia.

Julie's back! Pretty exciting. To celebrate, and bunch of us went out to get icecream at an icecream place, but the line was so long that we ended up walking to a store and buying a tub in stead.

Today was a short day. The road rolled a lot right next to a river, and although we had to be on I-90 for parts of it, it ended up not being all that bad because the shoulder was pretty wide for the most part. Wagley, Chad, and Jeff compared fishing stories. The road also curved through piney mountains that smell evergreen. These mountains actually remind me a lot of South Korea. If the density of people were about 100% greater and there were giant apartment complexes, it'd be exactly like Korea.

People have also started to talk about the approaching end of the trip. On Saturday, we will be a week away from Seattle, which seems insane. The days don't exactly feel short, but it's crazy to think that Seattle is so close all of a sudden.