We didn’t see or do a whole lot in Roundup. It’s an okay town with much the same sort of architectural makeover malady that I’ve seen so much before.

Here’s one example:

I did like the windows on this one; not sure what to make of the sliding cover:

There appears to be a well-connected local family:

And I did meet an awesome dog, Odin:

But mostly what I want to say concerns the forest fires in the wider area. Southeastern Montana was hit pretty hard with some major fires, all of which are fully or mostly contained now (we should be riding through some charred landscape over the next couple of days). But back when they were blazing, roads were closed, people were evacuated and livestock were set free to find their own way to safety.

Roundup was one of the staging areas for firefighters and a place of refuge for evacuees. The town cancelled some events at the fairgrounds so people had a place to pitch tents.

The first couple of guys I spoke to in Roundup were volunteer firefighters from Stanford and Winnett. They had just been cut loose from their duties, but with the heat, winds and dry conditions everyone remains alert. Even thunderstorms are a mixed blessing because many of the fires were started by lightning.

A few of the local businesses have signs about where to go for assistance – clothes, food and animal feed – and there are lots of signs thanking the firefighters and volunteers.

So even though to the casual passing-through traveler there’s not much to recommend the town, it was evident that the community had rallied to deal with a serious common problem of a type for which there is no equivalent in DC, where a half inch of snow brings everything to a standstill.

It is reasonable to expect climate change and its effects on rainfall distribution will make the fire situation worse in the west. How the region eventually comes to terms with that remains uncertain. Right now, environmental groups are being blamed for obstructing logging and controlled burn efforts, which it is said would have reduced the burnable fuel available. Efforts to restrict the use of steel-jacketed shells, to reduce sparking, are being resisted by gun groups.

Montana’s strong campaign finance laws were invalidated by the Supreme Court so it will be interesting to see how things play out as outside money floods in.