Monday, September 10, 2007

Montana Fur Trappers Convention

This was definitely an interesting trip to Lewistown. Lorissa and I were scheduled to leave Bozeman to go to Lewistown on Saturday morning at 9. It didn’t really work out that way because as Lorissa will tell you, she had a bad Burger King experience that kept her feeling pretty ill that morning. Due to our late departure I drove the necessary speed it took to get us there as close to on time as we could while Lorissa slept off her flu. Luckily I made it there just about at the time we needed to be there and went to the Yogo Hotel where we were told the convention would be taking place this year. Lewistown was flooded with Choke Cherry Festival go-ers so we had to take a detour to get to the hotel. Once we got there no one knew anything about the Fur Trappers so we were left to find the Fur Trappers in the small town of Lewistown amidst all of the Choke Cherry people. Finally we discovered they were at the Fairgrounds and when we arrived…we were early! Whew, thank goodness!

The convention was filled with fun activities for all ages. They had trapping contests for men, women, and kids. Unfortunately, Lorissa and I didn’t get a trap setting lesson before we went and since we value our fingers we chose not to partake in that event. But there were some pretty fast times! We also got to see a beaver get skinned which was fascinating, once you got past the smell. The ever-so-famous skillet toss was pretty fun. The skillet wasn’t nearly as heavy as I thought it was going to be so we were able to throw it pretty far.

After the games and demonstrations was the fashion show and banquet. Lorissa and I got to model fur coats from Paparazzi Fur. The coats we modeled would be up for a drawing later in the evening. My favorite coat was a white sheared and bleached beaver; it was even featured in the magazine Vogue! Neither Lorissa nor I won the drawing but it was a lot of fun to wear the coats. After we helped with the live auction we left the fairgrounds and couldn’t believe that it was snowing! Thankfully for me, I didn’t have to drive in a snow storm the next morning. The hotel we stayed out was a little old but the room was very big. Good thing Lorissa and I like each other because it was one small bed for two queens! The room was very cold and neither one of us knew how to run the propane heater so for fear we would turn it on and gas ourselves to death we decided to bear the freezing cold and bundle up in whatever we had in our bags! Both of us made it through the night but we were both ready to be back in Bozeman on Sunday. I had a great time and I think Lorissa did too, even though it was quite an interesting day. Thanks to the Hebbe’s for being so generous to us all year and all evening. It was so nice getting to talk to them and listen to all of their fun stories!

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