badlands; both offer hands on paleontology field research programs that range from three hours to ten days. (It could be that three days along the front isn’t enough time, after all.)
Charlie Russell may have been one of the first and most famous artists to draw and paint these sacred, glacier- scarred, two-faced landscapes but certainly not the last. Latigo and Lace, located in Augusta, with its western store- front, 1900’s theme, and fine art is well regarded as the cultural watering hole of the front’s sparsely populated, 100-plus-mile neighborhood. Here you’ll find the spirit of Russell alive in fellow artists’ work with oil, watercolor, antler carvings, pottery, bronzes, quilts, leather, beadwork, and more. (While you’re there, grab a cappuccino, one of the few you’re likely to get in these parts.) The Rocky Mountain Front is a special place in Mon- tana. Whether you spend three days, three months or three years here, where the heavens meet the mountains and the mountains meet the prairies, it will stay with you forever.
Kim Thielman-Ibes grew up in eastern Montana. Armed with an unrelenting curiosity, a love for the outdoors, an MBA, and a wagon full of books she lives and writes in Bozeman.
www.distinctlymontana.com
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