Why walk when you can ride?

Bao was getting tired, so we took it easy yesterday. The Last Chance Tour Train chugged delightfully through a neighborhood of old Victorian mansions as our driver regaled us with stories of Helena's younger, wilder days. It wasn't always called Helena, we learned. The city's original name was Last Chance Gulch, because a handful of prospectors decided to give it "one last chance" before they gave up -- and promptly struck gold. There's a moral there, somewhere.

At one point, Helena (they changed the name, of course. Last Chance Gulch just didn't have that ring to it!) boasted more wealth per capita than any other city in the United States. But when the gold ran out it looked as if the gold-rush city would become just one more ghost-town. So with the help of a couple of local millionaires and a (perhaps) rigged election, Helena became the capital of Montana and thenceforth lived happily ever after.

There were deer everywhere. We saw a doe and her fawn munching grass under an apple tree in someone's front garden, and several other deer in other yards. In fact, we saw more wildlife in suburban Helena than we did in Yellowstone.

Then, grooming. This was not an unqualified success. The young man at Petco was was still in training but between the two of us, we managed a bath and a bow. Bao hated every minute of it. He's still giving me dirty looks.