Certainly a sister city of Missoula. Think Missoula with a twist of harbor town add great art and artists and you've got Bellingham.

After living in Missoula, I was impressed with how similar Boulder is.

It's a college town, has a fair amount of activism, and culture." For some reason it reminded me of home. If I had to live on the East coast again, I could live there.

Rolled through there a few times, and always find myself saying, Damn, this is a lot like Missoula!

Missoula is the Berkeley of the Rockies.

It has all the same great outdoor activities as Missoula and the sun rises earlier!

Photo: http://www.flickr.com/.../132676007/

Ashland has the environmental ethic, is a college town, and is clearly defined by a sense of "place."

My hometown of Eugene is about twice the size of Missoula, but it's got the rivers, the hills, the temperature inversions, the college, the Saturday market, the trustafarians, and the underemployed PhDs. Eugene has always been described as a liberal island in an ocean of conservatism, and Missoula as a conservative island in an ocean of fascism ;-]

Also situated in a valley, Asheville is the beloved home of many artists, hippies, panhandlers, transients, students, environmentalists, and big-money-making rancher-types (although they are more moonshiner than cowboy). The area is also the filming location for many feature films (28 Days, All the Real Girls). They have a good radio station (WNCW.org)

Missoula is the gay capital of the northern Rockies!

Madison is another University town of a state that borders Canada. The feeling, the atmosphere, the music and the culture of the two towns are very similar, (for gods sake, in the winter when the lakes freeze they run out there and fly kites...see picture) but the lack of mountains in south central wisconsin and the large amounts of rainfall are very large discrepencies between the two.

Don't laugh. When I first visited Missoula, I really felt that Missoula had a similarfeel to that of Iowa City--relaxed, open-minded, a great mix of college town culture with a small-town familiarity. Iowa City and Missoula are both considered the liberal/cultural centers of their respective states. Both cities are in rural states with an ag heritage, both have rivers running through them, both are college towns, both have fanatical football fans. Of course, the landscapes are very different, Iowa doesn't have the outdoorsy culture Missoula does, and I don't know that IC would ever be a tourist destination. Still, there are some surprising similarities.

Hey, it's Missoula's sister city down under. It actually does remind me of Missoula in some ways... It's inland. It has a river and mountains nearby. Plus it's a college town. That said, I don't think it quite has the funky vibe of Missoula. A lot of kiwis complain about how boring it is there, and that doesn't sound like Missoula!