Montana, Yellowstone, and the Marlboro Ranch (Part 2)

We received our tickets only about a week before we were set to leave. Those days leading up to take off seemed to drag on; the excitement seemed unbearable. My wife and I are not world travelers. We are barely travelers at all. We get down to the Memphis area as often as possible to visit family but that's about it. Other than Vegas back in '07 we had never taken a real vacation together; time and money constraints won't allow it. Finally we were going to get a real vacation, and someone else was picking up the tab.

When the day arrived, we loaded our bags in the back of the Mustang, donned our "ranch hats" that Marlboro sent us and requested we wear on our flight, and headed for Port Columbus. Having flown only one other time in my life, I expected my nerves to be unbearable. I was wrong. I barely noticed the nervousness as the excitement of the unknown took hold of my consciousness.

The reason for the hats became evident when we landed in Min/St Paul for our connecting flight to Bozeman, Montana. The hats seemed to take over the airport the closer we got to our gate. Everywhere we turned, we encountered other people on the same unbelievable high that we were on.

When we finally arrived at the Bozeman airport, we were immediately greeted by staff of the ranch. They were unmistakable with their bright red shirts, perfectly authentic cowboy hats and boots, and strangely genuine smiles. We're from Ohio, we are not used to genuine smiles from perfect strangers. Their staff gathered our luggage, there was a quick "getting to know you" speech and then we were off.

As we traveled down the highway toward the ranch my mouth stayed agape. Never before had I seen such beautiful landscape; the not so distant snow capped Rocky Mountains, the farms that looked so similar yet so different than what I was used to seemed to stretch for miles. The sky...the sky and clouds were so close I could have reached out and touched them.

When we arrived at the ranch, we were shown to our rooms and were greeted by a bed full of free gifts. Stetson cowboy hats, Resistol cowboy boots, Columbia windbreakers, heavy coats, sunglasses, backpacks, stainless steel water bottles, the list goes on and on, and none of it had the Marlboro logo on it (another plus). The gifts alone would have been enough, but the adventure was just beginning.