White Line Fever - Champoeg State Park, Oregon 9/6/10

It’s hard to believe that it’s been a month since Josh returned from China. It’s been great to see him again, hear his travel stories and spend so much time with him. (Moms you know what I’m talking about). But, like most 24 year olds, his restless spirit is leading him onto another adventure. Fortunately, this time it’s a bit closer to home - Washington. Ned and I decided it would be fun to caravan with him and spend some time exploring the Pacific Northwest. This morning we began our journey and headed for Portland. We meandered thru farmland back roads in the early morning light as we made our way to highway 5. Along the way we stopped at a California valley fruit stand, (see today’s pic) and picked up some local peaches. Yum! It was pretty much an uneventful drive, but we did notice a large number of vehicles crammed with camping equipment and covered with a light white dust. Finally it dawned on us that these were people returning from burning man. Knowing we had a long drive ahead of us, we didn’t do our usual stopping and exploring. A lunch in Dunsmuir was pretty much our big stop of the day. We didn’t pull into Champoeg State Park until 7:30, but it was still light enough for a quick bike ride, along side of Josh running, thru the park. Tomorrow we are looking forward to exploring this historical site and checking out Portland before heading to Mount Rainier.

A Good Time Was Had By All – Nevada City, CA 7/1

We headed out early this morning as we had a date with destiny! Today was the day we chased down some Farr Premium ice cream to see if it was, in fact, the winner of the best ice cream in the USA. After a couple of hours we pulled into Salt Lake City and managed to locate the distribution center for Farr’s. We weren’t interested in buying a three gallon tub (well Ned was, but I wasn’t buying into it) so we inquired where we could buy it retail. Shortly after 11, at an upscale outdoor mall in Salt Lake City, our tongues carefully gave it a lick. Well…it retained the first place status, but with a caveat. The scoops we had were from the bottom of the bucket so not as great as the ice cream at Ruby’s, but still pretty darn creamy and tasty. For the rest of the day we took turns trading off driving every two hours, listening to tunes and composing our “best ofs” for the trip. For all of you who joined us on our trip, thanks for being part of the journey and reading along. Until next time, this cowgirl bids you, “Happy Trails.”

Lofty Heights– Lakeside Camperworld, Dusechne UT 6/30

At dusk last night three elk sauntered across the meadow by our camp ground. All of them had pretty big antlers and seemed nonplussed by the nearby campers. They hung out for about an hour grazing. It was beautiful to see their majestic silhouettes as the sun faded. We enjoyed the ranger talk, but felt a little sorry for all the kids in the audience. The talk about carnivores was quite academic, including graphs, and geared for an adult audience. What ever happened to the good old days when everyone sang “On Top of Old Smokey?” This morning we were thrilled to be greeted by absolute crystal clear blue skies knowing we would have quite an adventure driving over the Rocky Mountains. We first started at a Visitor’s Center and watched a movie about the park and then took the Trail Ridge Road up, up, up. We made several stops along the way taking in the different perspectives of the rocky ridge and valleys. When we passed the sign that said, “Two Miles above Sea Level” and kept going up I started getting a little altitude sickness. I think we peaked out at 12,183 ft. Some of the highlights for us were seeing the historic Ute trail knowing that people walked here 6,000 years ago, and the headwaters of the Colorado River. It’s hard to believe that this harmless little creek created the Grand Canyon! Our next destination was Steamboat Springs. After driving through the desert and modest little towns we were amazed at this huge posh ski village. Wow – the resorts, upscale condos and chalet homes looked like something out of architectural digest. Once you leave the town heading west, the poor desert towns begin again - ironic to see this wealthy oasis amongst this humble setting. Rather than staying at a desert state park in the middle of nowhere, we decided to push on. Ned was a hero and drove on and on. We are now settled in at a private campground and enjoying the amenities. We love camping at the National Parks and taking advantageous of this great American resource, but don’t love the lack of basic amenities – i.e. showers! Tonight we have electricity, showers and wi-fi!! How luxurious. Tomorrow we head thru Salt Lake City and in the name of research hope to find a Farr’s Ice Cream Parlor to verify that it is, in fact, worthy of the first place status.

Rocky Mountain Hi- Rocky Mountain National Park, CO 6/29

We sadly left Custer State Park under a gorgeous brilliant blue sky. We really enjoy the vibe and the surroundings of this place so it was hard to say goodbye. Wanting to avoid the interstate as long as possible we took the back roads out of the Black Hills and into Wyoming. It was fun to see the lush green long views into the distance after being in the evergreen forest. It became abundantly clear when we hit Wyoming as the landscape flattened out and the population was about one person for every 500 miles. We drove by several working ranches and saw cowboys rounding up the cattle, which helped break up the drive. As we left the flatlands of Colorado and headed up toward Rocky Mountain National Park we enjoyed the dramatic flow of Big Thompson River thru a scenic rocky gorge. We finally came into Rocky Mountain National Park at about 3ish and were lucky to get one of the last 3 campsites in the entire park! That’s the good news. The flip side is that we are camped at Glacier Basin Campground which has been devastated by the pine bark beetle. The campground has been completely cleared of every tree and we are basically in a basin, which feels like it’s been hit by a bomb. (See today’s pic). What a difference trees make! This is so unlike camping at most national parks. That goodness we are at a high elevation with a cloud cover or we would be cooked by now. The pine bark beetle is really changing the landscape of our forests. In Custer Park the devastation was also really noticeable by the vast amount of dead brown pine trees. The beetle has really hit this entire park hard. Thousands upon thousands of the dead brown pine trees mar all of the scenic vistas. Apparently, this is a phenomenon that happens about every 500 years. The specific forests of Rocky National Park that was first hit by this beetle, about five years ago, is beginning to reemerge with Aspen trees. We figure that by the time our grandchildren view this park it will look vastly different. Once we settled into our camping spot we jumped on one of the park shuttles and checked out a couple of the Visitor Centers. We were particularly impressed with the Moraine Park Visitor’s Center and enjoyed the interactive displays on the geology, weather and fauna of the Rockies. Unfortunately, we missed the movie that was playing at the Beaver Meadows Center, but hope to catch it tomorrow. There’s a program tonight at 9 pm at our campground entitled, “Large Carnivores”, which we’ll probably go check out. Right now chicken is on the barbie, a glass of wine is being poured and we’re hanging out with all our fellow bomb victims.

Biking in the Black Hills- Custer State Park, SD 6/28

It felt rather luxurious to spend two days at the same campsite. When we arrived last fall at Custer State Park we fell in love with the Black Hills and vowed to return and bike the George Michelson Trail - or at least parts of it since it’s 109 miles long! After driving into Hill City we took a dirt road for about 12 miles until we came to the Mystic trail head. The bike path was a very slight uphill grade for about 11 miles. We rode over several trestles, thru two tunnels and alongside a river. The rolling hills were bright green, the sky was deep blue and the wildflowers were still popping up everywhere. (See today’s pic). We took a break once we reached the abandoned town of Rocheford then had the best time riding back – since it was downhill almost the whole way! We ended up doing a little over 23 miles. By this time we were famished and decided to take a trip into town (Hill City) for some lunch and also to do some errands, like give the Winniemobile a much needed car wash and do some grocery shopping. We headed back to Sylvan Lake and just hung out for awhile on the deck of the general store enjoying a soft serve in the warm sun and looking at all our pictures. It was a fun, lazy summer day!

Wall to Wall Adventure- Custer State Park, SD 6/27

Ned here again. We woke to a beautiful morning on the Missouri River. The drive through western South Dakota was gorgeous, with lots of green rolling farm and pasture land. The constant Wall Drug billboards along the interstate kept us entertained as we approached Custer State Park, and eventually we agreed to partake in the Wall Drug experience. (We had purposely avoided it on our trip here last Fall.) It was WAY more than I had expected, including the extensive assortment of cowboy hats and boots, collectible historic rifle reproductions, homemade donuts and ice cream, and a roaring fiberglass T-Rex dinosaur out back, all populated by a frantic crowd of tourists. Despite all the chaos, we received two good things from our trip there: Two delicious buffalo burgers for lunch, and a couple of good sessions at the shooting gallery for Debi. (Did anyone know that Debi absolutely LOVES using a rifle at a shooting gallery???) Once we arrived in Custer State Park we were stunned again by the beauty of the place that had impressed us so much last Fall. We took the Needles Highway to our campground at Lake Sylvan, and loved every scenic turn of the road. To our amazement, two full size touring buses were making the same trip, even though one of the tunnels is about 8 feet wide, and 12 feet high. I don’t understand how they made it through, but they apparently did. After checking out our campsite, we walked a little around Lake Sylvan and the general store next to it. Both were absolutely buzzing with activity on this warm Summer afternoon, which was a far cry from how we remembered them both last October when almost no one was here. We retreated to our campsite for a short rest, before returning to the beautiful Sylvan Lake Lodge to eat dinner on their outdoor patio. Dinner was great, and our extremely polite waiter from Bali only added to the experience. Afterwards we stopped at Sylvan Lake again and made a complete hike around it as the sun cast wonderful light on all the surrounding granite boulders. (See today’s pic). The lake was completely calm, and only a few people were there, so it was a delightful after dinner stroll. We’re looking forward to biking the Michelson Trail tomorrow, followed by a possible dip in the lake.

Bushels of Fun– Snake Creek State Park, SD 6/26

We had a long drive today through southern Minnesota. Actually, this part of the state doesn’t look much different than Iowa with miles and miles of cornfields broken up by the occasional dairy farm. Our original plan was to camp at the western border of Minnesota at Lake Shetak State Park that boasted swimming and a 6-mile bike path into the town of Currie. After about 5 hours of driving we finally pulled into the park, but deliberated whether or not to camp for the night. The concern wasn’t so much the campground, but the 70 mph winds, hailstorm and weather warnings that were continually being broadcast on the radio. So far we were fortunate in that we hadn’t seen any rain, but knew it coming. Even though we had already done a lot of driving, we figured it didn’t make much sense to stay put and be in the inevitable storm that was heading our way. On the way out of Minnesota and into South Dakota we decided to stop by Pipestone National Monument famous for the red soft stone that was the preferred source of pipestone among Plains tribes. The Visitor’s Center had several Indian crafts men and women carving and creating stone pipes and jewelry and a nice museum. As we drove down the main street of the nearby town, Pipestone, most of the buildings were made from this rock. While the architecture was similar to many small towns across America, the colors were definitely unique. I’m glad we made the side trip. Once in South Dakota we drove thru the storm, impressed by the strong winds and sheets of rain pelting down, but were pleased that in half an hour we were driving out of the storm and into blue skies/ We heard on the radio that the place we were going to camp was being pelted with golf ball size hail stones. Good call Team Russell! The next stop was the world famous and only Corn Palace! See today’s pic of Ned looking corny but cute in front of the Palace. (bad pun, I know). We pulled into our campsite quite late, about 8ish, but were rewarded with the last campsite directly situated on the expansive Missouri River. It’s a gorgeous evening and we’re enjoying a glass of wine, playing cards and taking in the sunset.