We left Montana and started our 4 day drive to Lake Tahoe.   A beautiful drive through the Targhee National Forest and then we were in the farmlands of Idaho.  Our first stop was in Twin Falls.  We got off the road early so we can go take a look at the famous falls.  They did not disappoint:

Our second day of driving, we left Idaho and now into Northern Nevada.  Pretty mountainous landscape and it was a beautiful drive.  We stopped for the night in Winnemucca, NV.  We saw it was the largest Basque settlement in the nation, so we partook of a great Basque meal at the Martin Hotel.  They seat you with strangers and everything is family style.  Delicious and the company of the two older gentleman from Reno at our table was wonderful.

Another day of driving and into Sparks NV.  We had planned to get in early and hit a casino in Reno, but Ed was doing maintenance until checkout time in Winnemucca so our arrival was a little later than we planned.  Stocked up on groceries for the trip up to Tahoe as we figured it would be more expensive up there.

Onto Tahoe!  We drove through beautiful scenery near Carson City and then into the mountains.  It was a gorgeous drive.  Our stop for the week would be at Camp Jameson, right on the shores of South Lake Tahoe.  Pretty campground, but the spots were very tight and it was a difficult park.  That, and we had no sewage hookups, so water consumption was going to be minimal.  Pros:  Beautiful campground, lots of things to do on it.  Cons:  The bathrooms were unheated and never cleaned.

I met up with a Navy friend, Sue, and one of her friends for drinks at the Beacon Grill.  Caught up on life and then Ed joined us for the remainder of the evening.  Good times!

Sue took us out for a full day of sightseeing the next day.  Drives up fire roads for stupendous views of the lake and then another crazy drive to see the falls at Fallen Lake.  We spent some time traipsing all over the falls:

Our second full day, we took a long bike ride along the abundant trails that surround the lake.  Beautiful.  Stopped at Taylor Creek to check out the spawning grounds of the lake salmon.  A few weeks later, we would have seen bears there munching on them!  But alas, we were too early.

We planned a hike in Emerald Bay for our third day, but alas, there was zero parking to be found.  So we decided to take a drive around the entire lake.  Some really pretty towns all along the route and the Nevada side was not as built up and I found far prettier.  We met up with Sue again for some good pizza in town!

Day 4, we got that hike into Emerald Bay., with Sue and a friend  A mile and half straight down switchbacks and then down to Vikingsholm, a pretty estate at the foot of the bay.  Another hike down parts of Rubicon Trail, though not all the way out as Sue and friend were waiting for us (they hiked around Vikingsholm).

She was a great host and if I find myself in Tahoe again, I look forward to hanging with her!

Our last full day, we drove up to Emerald Lake.  I got a preview of our drive out of Tahoe and it would be a hairy first few miles.  But the hike was glorious!  There are two lakes on the hike and we made it to both.  Breathtaking scenery!

We enjoyed our stop in Lake Tahoe.  Knock this off the bucket list.  Now we’re on our way to Naval Air Station Lemoore in Central California.

 

We left Grand Teton and headed to our next destination, Yellowstone!  We’re really knocking the national parks out.   It was a quick drive up John D. Rockefeller Parkway and through Yellowstone to get to our next campground, Mountainside KOA in West Yellowstone, Montana.

Our campground was absolutely gorgeous.  A couple of ponds and a quick-moving stream were the backdrop to the Targhee National Forest in our backyard.  I check out their beer selection and they have one I haven’t tried.  Huckleberry Honey from Bitterroot Brewing.  Delicious!  I bought the store out of their entire stock during our time there.

Yellowstone is enormous.  It was a 7 mile drive into the gate and then 14 miles until you reach the first junction.  Every day was a long driving day.   Our first full day, we hit all the geysers and hot spots in the Old Faithful area.  My favorite was one down Firehole Lake Drive, though I can’t remember the name of it.  But it was going off as we got up to it! 

After, we drove down to the Old Faithful Lodge to get some lunch and were rewarded with her going off within 10 minutes of us getting there!  Talk about timing!  Then we drove to look at some stuff that we saw on our drive through the day before, but couldn’t pull over as we were pulling the RV.  Lewis Lake, Lewis Canyon, Lewis Falls – all gorgeous.

The next day, we took the drive up to Mammoth Hot Springs.  More geysers on the way, another set of beautiful falls, and a roaring mountain of steam!  Mammoth Hot Springs was incredible:

After walking through the springs, we ate some lunch and walked around Fort Yellowstone and saw lots of elk just hanging around town.   On the way home, we stopped at Artists Paintpots – which was all bubbling mud and one of my favorite things we saw.

We took the next day off from driving through the park and went to see the Grizzly and Wolf Discovery Center right in town.   This would be my only bear sighting the entire week, despite my best efforts:

While it was a nice place, it didn’t take very long to go through, so we took a drive north of town and found ourselves on a road towards Hepgen Lake.  We saw some signs about earthquake activity there years ago and kept following the road until we came to a place called Quake Lake.  There was a large earthquake here in 1959 that made a new lake from a rockslide in the ravine and killed dozens that were camping in the area.  What a tragic story.

Back to Yellowstone.  We were breaking the park into sections, so now we are going south of Old Faithful and towards Grant Village and West Thumb.  More geysers and hot pools, this time going right into Yellowstone Lake.  Then a drive around the lake, stopping in Lake Village and Fishing Bridge to check it out.  We were ahead of schedule for the day, so we took the South Rim drive of the Grand Canyon of the Yellowstone – beyond beautiful and a place that has been photographed and painted by many:

On the way out of Canyon Village, we took Norris Canyon Drive to head home and lucked into seeing three wolves playing in a field!  They were too far away to get a good picture with my cell phone, but how lucky we were to see them!

The next day was wildlife day.  We took the long drive up to Lamar Valley.  On the way up, we stopped at Tower Falls to get those views in.  Then we entered the valley.   Bison as far as the eye could see.  We got really close to some but this was my favorite picture:

We also saw some more elk and a bunch of pronghorn sheep!  No bears though.

Another day off from the long drive into the park, but we took a long drive anyway and went to Big Sky, MT.   We had a lovely lunch at Lone Mountain Ranch and then drove partly up Lone Mountain to check out the ski slopes.  The drive out and back through the Gallatin National Forest was wonderful:

One more day into Yellowstone and this time, we were going to get some hiking done.  On our way down to our hike, this big fellow decided to hold up traffic:

We did a tough hike up on a loop to go see Mystic Falls.  The views were majestic from the top of the loop but the falls themselves were my favorite of the park:

After that 4 mile elevation hike, we took a shorter 1 miler to the overlook for Grand Prismatic Spring:

And we couldn’t get out of the park that day without running into more traffic viewing this majestic bull elk:

We spent our last day in Montana getting ready for our very long drive back to California.

It was a great week seeing our nation’s first National Park and everyone should make it out to see this majestic place!

 

I was looking at the drive up to Grand Teton from my Google maps and it had us going up the I-15 before we cut over.  It was going to be a really long day of driving, so I tried to find us a place to stop for one night to split up the drive.  No luck as it was Labor Day weekend, so I kept us in Salt Lake City one more night – which afforded us the opportunity to hike up in American Fork.  We got on the road by 9 am for the long drive, but it didn’t have us going that way – it had us driving up through Park City and Evanston WY and on Route 189 north through some gorgeous Wyoming countryside.  We ended up over the mountains into Starr Valley which was beyond beautiful (and there were plenty of RV parks there).  Note to self:  Remember this place if we come back to the area.

After Starr Valley, we wound along the Snake River in the Bridger-Teton National Forest – one of the prettiest drives we’ve had.  Arrived into Jackson to a big fire right in the hills in town and a one-hour delay trying to get through town.  But then we got moving again and came around a corner and now we see the Grand Tetons!  We’ve seen some pretty beautiful places along our travels, but only 3 times have I literally teared up:  Big Sur, the entrance to Yosemite Valley, and now my first view of the Grand Tetons.

This is the one time we were incredibly lucky to have reservations right in the National Park.   We stayed in Colter Bay, right on Jackson Lake.  My literal only complaint is there was no WiFi in the campground, so watching TV and surfing the web was a little hard, but we managed ok!

Our first full day, we walked around Colter Bay area with shopping and a trip to the visitors center and talking to a ranger about good hikes to do in the park.   Our first hike was right in the Colter Bay area – Swan Lake and Heron’s Pond and a little bit of Hermitage Point.  We realized it was going to be too long a hike around Hermitage, so we cut over a very desolate trail that had me a little worried as the ranger told us there were wolves in that area.  But we made it back safely.

Our next morning took us out to Taggert Lake for a hike recommended by our IG friend Amy – and she was spot on about the beauty of this hike.  It has been one of our favorite ones.

And late in the afternoon, we rented a motorboat to tool around Jackson Lake and finished it up with a great trout dinner at the Ranch House.

We’ve been told that the best time to see wildlife is very early in the morning, so we got up early and drove over to Jackson Lake Dam, but nothing there.  A short drive over to Oxbow Bend and while there was an epic sunrise, we only saw a coyote chasing a heron.  We started back and got lucky to see two female elk right on the side of the road!

Loaded up our bikes and drove down to Jenny Lake to park and off we go on a 15 mile bike ride down to Moose Junction.  Great views to be had on this beautiful ride.  And that evening, we took the last dinner cruise of the season over to Elk Island and some delicious steaks and trout and met some honeymooners at our table – we shared our bottle of Krug to celebrate with them!

Off we go on another long hike – String Lake to north Jenny Lake to Hidden Falls and Inspiration Point – we had a plan to go deep into Cascade Canyon, but my knee was saying otherwise with a 3.5 mile return trip back to String Lake.  But what a gorgeous hike!

On that Friday, it was forecast to be raining all day, so we decided to drive into Jackson and check out the town.  Lots of neat shops and we picked up a beautiful piece of artwork at one of them and had delicious pizza for lunch!  Earlier in the day, we met a couple camping across from us that are from Austin and we invited them over for some fireside chatting!

Saturday morning, we drove over to Two Oceans Lake for some views and then headed back to Jenny Lake to hike the south shore and head to the Moose ponds – we were not disappointed!  A moose eating in the pond and another off in the woods on this pretty hike!

On our last morning, we once again headed to Oxbow Bend for wildlife viewing and we were rewarded right away with a bull elk and his herd!

Packed up the rig and now we’re off to Yellowstone!  This has been our most favorite week of the last 6 months and I look forward to returning to Grand Teton in the future!

We left Moab and headed north for a 12 night stay in Salt Lake City.  Pretty desolate part of Utah to drive through as we meandered north along Route 191 until we were getting closer to the Wasatch National Forest just due south of the Salt Lake area and then it turned beautiful.

We stayed at the KOA in Salt Lake City.  HUGE, but super quiet.  A little oasis in the metropolitan area.  Quiet first night, with dinner at Nico’s for some great barbacoa tacos and a trip to the liquor store to stock up on some Wasatch Brewing’s fine offerings.

We hadn’t hit a major metropolitan area in over a month, so we took advantage of this stop to get some business taken care of.  But first, finding our gym and getting a workout on!  I’ve been having trouble with my glasses on hikes, as they are trifocals and I’m constantly looking down, so we found an eyeglass place and got me a pair of new glasses without the readers attached.  In the afternoon, we met up with one of Meghan’s friends from grad school who is doing his residency here and we had some great beers at TF Brewing and then a drive to an overlook showing the valley!

He gave us a lot of great tips on things to do and places to go, so our next adventure was out to see the Great Salt Lake at Antelope Island State Park.  Great views of the valley from the island, lots of buffalo roaming around, and a dip into the very salty lake for a few feet.

That Sunday, we took a drive up to Park City.  It’s only 25 miles away, now I know why the Olympics were held here.  We toured around part of the old Olympic venues that are still in use then took a walk around the historic Main Street.  A farmers market was going on so we walked through there.  We planned to hike, but never got around to it.

That Monday, we took the trolley car right into downtown.  We spent the day wandering around Temple Square, where the Mormon church is headquartered, and walked up to the State House and then I commenced my search for a dress for Meghan’s graduation.  At night, we met up with my dear friend Mike, who happened to be in town for work.  We ate fantastic Mexican at Red Iguana, then he came back for some beers at our place.

We had a lot of lazy mornings in Salt Lake, but managed to get out each afternoon.  We took a tour of Red Butte Gardens near the university.  They were quite beautiful:

The next day, we took another drive up to Park City area and a plan to do a hike in Wasatch State Park.   We literally picked the worst trail in the entire park to hike, really nothing to see, but it was another pretty drive up and back.

A recommendation from a Navy friend took us up to Big Cottonwood Canyon and a hike to Donut Falls!  I could have spent a week in this Canyon alone!

That evening, we took the trolley back in town to hear the Mormon Tabernacle Choir practice.  It’s open to the public and what a treat to hear them sing.

Our last full day, we drove down to American Fork Canyon and hiked up to Timpanagos Caves National Monument.  The hike was pretty intense and gorgeous, the caves, meh.

But it was a good last day activity as the next day we would be spending a long day of driving to our next destination, Grand Teton National Park!

 

 

We left Grand Junction and headed for our next destination, Moab.  Drove through some pretty desolate parts of Utah and then all of a sudden, we are coming into this great red valley!

We stayed at Spanish Trails RV Park.  Really wide spaces and we’ve been pretty much alone in our little corner of the park all week.  We spent the first day setting up our 10 day trip here, the longest we’ve stayed anywhere.  Got ourselves set up for some activities then ate some great pies at Antica Forma:

Our first day, we drove into Arches National Park early in the morning, a 10 minute drive from our camp.  We did several hikes around the park, but the longest and hardest was the hike up to see Delicate Arch!  We climbed up slip rock for more than 500 feet on this 3 mile round trip hike.  And we picked the middle of the day to do it – I think we went through a gallon of water hiking up there.  But the view was worth it:

The next day, we took a jet-boat ride down the Colorado River for 3 hours.  Got to see lots of cool canyons and our guide pointed out petroglyphs along the canyon walls.  It was nice and breezy on the river and a cool respite from the heat.

After an afternoon nap, we went back into Arches to see the other side of the park, Devils Garden.  It was very cool to go hiking at dusk and see the park in a different light:

Tuesday, we were up with the morning sun to head out to Red Cliffs Lodge for a 3 hour horseback ride through Castle Valley.  A number of John Wayne films have been shot here and they even have a small museum dedicated to it.  I had a really ornery horse named Oak who pretty much drove me crazy through the ride.

For lunch, we stopped at a food truck in town called Quesadilla Mobilla.  I didn’t take a picture, but it was green chile chicken with artichokes, spinach and olives and was outstanding!

One of the things that was recommended to do was take the Hummer Sunset Safari tour, so we signed up for it.  But no one told me we were going high into the rocks at a place called Hell’s Revenge and would be climbing all over them, to include one called the Defibrillator!  It was sheer dropoff on both sides!  I think I had a few heart jumps on the drive, but the views over the Colorado were magnificent!

We hit our second national park of this leg, Canyonlands!  This park is really huge and split up into 3 parts, none of which you can get to from the other.  We chose to go to the Island in the Sky portion.  Some great hikes to see more arches and lots of different canyons but the best view was the one of Green River:

On Thursday, we rented UTV’s for a great trip through the desert.  Ed was having a ball driving all over.  Not a big fan of driving all over rocks, but we did get one big wet section to muddy through.  And checked out some dinosaur tracks and a cool cave:

We didn’t have anything planned for Friday, and it was going to be 100 degrees out, so we took a down day and got some work done around the “house” and relaxed.

On Saturday morning, we started out for a bucket list place to go visit – Monument Valley!  It’s 150 miles south of Moab, so I booked a hotel in that direction so we could do an overnighter.  It was a gorgeous drive down – lots more canyons, mountains, and crossings of the San Juan River!  Soon the famous buttes of Monument Valley came into our sights!  We stopped and took pictures at the “Forrest Gump” part of the road – you must!  Then continued the drive towards the visitors center, which is run by Navajo Nation.  I didn’t realize there was a hotel right there on the grounds – because staying there would have been epic with sunset and sunrise.  Did a wee bit of shopping and met a young Navajo girl whose boyfriend is in the Navy!  Then we got on the gravel drive around the valley and got up and close and personal with some of the buttes of this unbelievable place.  After this breathtaking drive, we drove back through the Navajo reservation towards our stop for the night, Desert Rose Resort in Bluff.

We had a lovely cabin for the night.  Our dinner at Duke’s restaurant was only undone by the no-alcohol menu – they wouldn’t even let us bring our own bottle in.  But the food was tremendous and this place would be on any culinary map if they at least had beer and wine.  After dinner, we enjoyed a good bottle of our wine on the porch of our little cabin and watched the sunset.

The next morning, we had a fantastic breakfast at Twin Rocks Cafe – so named for the twin spires above the restaurant.  The blue corn hotcakes were absolutely to die for!

We drove back through town and headed to take a picture at the actual Mexican Hat rock formation and then to see the horseshoe bend of the San Juan River in Gooseneck State Park:

Since we were in this part of the world, a trip to Four Corners was mandatory!

After that, we drove to a place we had never heard of – Hovenweep National Monument.  The ruins of stone structures built by the Pueblo’s in the 13th century!

We’re having a quiet last day in Moab.  Laundry, packing up, cleaning.  A dip in the pool this afternoon.  Going to go back into Arches tonight as it is so close and do a trail we haven’t hit, Park Avenue.  We had a wonderful time here, but it’s time to move on and head towards the city – in this case, Salt Lake City!

 

 

 

I’m finally catching up on these blog posts and now will write as we finish the stay at each place.

It was a short drive out of Glenwood Springs to head to our next destination, Grand Junction!  A beautiful drive through De Beque Canyon before entered the Grand Valley!

If you’ve never been here, the Grand Valley has views to die for.  It is surrounded by the Book Cliffs on one side, the Colorado National Monument on another side, and the Grand Mesa to round it out.

We are staying at yet another KOA.  We had the best spot in the park, this little shaded grove that would have been wonderful, except we ended up with noisy neighbors after quiet time each night.  They were basically partying right outside my bedroom for 3 of our 5 nights there.  That pretty much sucked.

On our full first full day, we drove up Colorado National Monument.  Did a few hikes around the visitor center along the rim of the canyon, then we drove Rim Ridge Road throughout the rest of the park.  I’ve stated before I’m afraid of heights, so some of the turns were pretty hairy for me as we made our way around.  But it was beautiful!

The next day, we made the long drive down to Black Canyon of the Gunnison National Park.  It was pretty countryside and soon the San Juan Mountains were coming into our sights.  It looked we were heading straight for them, but then a quick left and we’re heading up to the park!  This might be one of the most magnificent canyons I’ve seen!  Sheer dropoffs too.   We took one pretty technical hike almost to the canyon floor.  It was gorgeous.  Heard there was a bear running around that trail, but we never saw him.

After two days of hiking, we had an off-day.   Drove into the town of Grand Junction and had fantastic eclectic Mexican food from a place call Tacoparty.  A great cucumber sour beer from Palisades Brewing was just the right touch for this spicy meal!  Walked around the town and checked out the local shops and Ed found a great barber!

Our last full day, we took the drive up to the top of Grand Mesa.  Feels like you are climbing forever, then you are on top of the great flat mountain that stretches for miles.  It was about 30 degrees cooler than the valley floor, so it made for a nice break from the heat.  We went for a great hike around a few lakes, then had a beer at Mesa Lodge and then drove back down to the valley.  I highly suggest going up to the Mesa, you won’t be disappointed.

It was a short stop here and I feel like we should have stayed for at least a week, but now it’s time to head back to Utah and now we are headed for Moab!   I much enjoyed our time in Colorado and will be back next year.

We’ve had some occasional mechanical issues with our RV as we have been traveling.  As we started the drive out of Denver, one of our tires was losing pressure (we have a pressure gauge for all the RV tires).  So, we pulled over into a chain area and Ed put some more nitrogen into the tire.  Within 5 miles, the tire pressure gauge started alarming again.  Ed asks where is the nearest rest area so he can change the tire.  19 miles away.  He says we aren’t going to make it.  We pull into another chain area and he changes it right in that lane!  Well, it’s a good thing he did – because now we are driving down the longest incline of our entire drive – 9 miles all way down into Frisco!

As we started the decline, what comes on the radio but John Denver’s “Rocky Mountain High”!  How about that!  The most breathtaking mountain scenery was right in front of us!

Just wow!  More and more of these beautiful landscapes awaited us as we traveled through Breckenridge and Vail.  At one point of the 1-70, we were traveling at almost 12K feet elevation.

As we started the slow descent down the highest parts of the interstate, the scenery wasn’t quite as beautiful – but then all of a sudden, Glenwood Canyon! Honestly, I knew nothing about this part of Colorado other than the RV park was in a good location halfway across the Rockies and it was driving distance to Aspen.  Glenwood Canyon was one of the nicest surprises we’ve found.

We stayed at the KOA in Silt – about 20 miles west of Glenwood Springs.  Brand new KOA and right on the banks of the Colorado River.  Really nice place to stay.  Huge spots and great amenities.

We saw a bike trail as we were driving through Glenwood Canyon, so this what we did on our first full day there.  Rode 16 miles through the canyon.  It was gorgeous, though at times a little unnerving as the interstate was right above us.

On our second day, we took the shuttle out to Hanging Lake trail.  They limit how many are allowed to take this trail each day.  It wasn’t a far hike, only 1.2 miles, but it had 1500 of elevation change on the way up!  Glad I had my poles as it got hairy in some parts.  But the view at the top, oh my:

This lake literally hangs off the side of the mountain.  After the hike back down, we were both pretty sore.  Glenwood Springs is so named due to the amount of hot springs that are in the area.  There are several places you can enjoy them.  We chose Iron Mountain Spring – it was a bit more private and we could enjoy several beverages while we soaked our sore bones in the soothing waters.

Speaking of water, our next adventure was a 3 hour whitewater rafting trip down the Colorado with Class III and one Class IV rapid!  So much fun!

We were starving afterwards, so we stopped at Brickhouse Pizza in Silt for some excellent pies and great Colorado beer on the way home.

After three straight days of adventure, it was time to give my knee a rest and have a down day.  We got some grocery shopping done and worked around the RV and relaxed.  That night for dinner, we headed into Miner’s Claim after seeing a lot of great reviews for it.  It did not disappoint!  I had a wonderful grilled pork chop and the salad and veggies were to die for!

Our next day, we took a long drive out to Aspen.  It’s about 70 miles from our campground.  The drive was spectacular, but the hike at Maroon Bells was the icing on the cake.  Truly one of the one most beautiful spots I’ve ever seen.  I could have stayed there forever:

How do you follow up a hike of this much beauty?  You take a gondola up to the top of Aspen Mountain!

On our last day, we took a hike up to see Doc Holliday’s grave high above the town of Glenwood Springs:

After such a great week, I really hated to leave here.  But onto the next destination – Grand Junction!

After a leisurely drive down the I-25, we finally got into Colorado!  Lots of traffic as we headed south towards Denver but we eventually got to our home for the week, Dakota Ridge RV Park in Golden.  Nice place, with some good views of the foothills of the Rockies behind us.  Stocking up and planning the week seems to be the norm for an arrival day in a new place.  We also got in a meal at Carrabba’s, one of our favorite chains when we lived in Virginia.

On our first day, we drove into Golden to partake of some of the local Mexican food.  Xicimiti did not disappoint with their flavorful small tacos and grilled corn!  After, we took a drive up to Lookout Mountain.  Beautiful views of the Denver suburbs and a tour of the Buffalo Bill Cody Museum – and he’s buried there also!

We also drove over to Red Rocks!  Beautiful venue and they let you tour it for free.  U2 at Red Rocks was one of the best concerts ever recorded.  Unfortunately, the show we were planning to attend on Sunday was cancelled due to illness.

Our second day, we had a quiet morning at the park, but in the afternoon, we went to do the tour at the Coors Brewery – yes, you must do this in Golden!  It was a great tour and there were 3 heavy pours in the tasting room afterwards!  They have a corn lager that is a seasonal one that they only sell in Colorado, but alas, it wasn’t due out until August.

The next morning, we got up early to head for our bucket list part of the trip – Rocky Mountain National Park!  The views pulling in were just breathtaking!  I decided to swallow my fears of ravines and heights and let Ed drive us to the top of Trail Ridge Road – 12,180 feet!!  We spent some good time at the Alpine Visitor Center and even saw an entire herd of elk in one of the valleys. 

After the breathtaking drive back down, we checked into our hotel in Estes Park.  Tons of visitors in this small mountain town.  We had a fabulous meal at Himalayan Curry and Kebob – I had the elk and it was so delicious!  Wandered around town a bit then had some of the local flavor beers at Park Theatre beer garden.

We dragged a bit the next morning and had a leisurely breakfast at Notchtop (with great Bloody Marys) then set out for another day in the park.  But the road to Bear Lake was closed already to incoming traffic.  We parked at Moraine and thought we’d hike into the trails we wanted to do.  Well, the trails we planned on were not well-marked and we ended up on the road for good portions of it, but did see spectacular waterfalls on this hike.  We got a bit lost and decided to head back to Moraine and ended up getting lucky enough to be able to get on the road to Bear Lake in mid-afternoon!  It was a bit rainy, but the views were incredible.  Took the hike around Bear Lake, but after our morning of hiking, we were kind of beat to do anymore.  So we headed down the mountain and out of the park and back to Golden, driving through Boulder on our way back.

On Saturday, we drove into Denver.  Wandered around the downtown area and near the statehouse and ate some yummy ramen, but rain started coming in, so we cut the day of wandering short.  I suppose we could have gone to a museum, but we didn’t feel like it.  So, we went to the movies!  “Once Upon a Time in Hollywood”.  I loved it, Ed was non-committal.  Then again, I’m a big Tarantino fan and he is not.

On our last day in this area, we decided to drive the Peak to Peak Skyway.  We cut part of it short, as we wanted to go to Golden Gate State Park.  So glad we did.  The hike at Panorama Point was one of the loveliest we have done.  After the hike, we continued the Skyway until we once again were in Estes Park.  Beautiful drive!

Packed up on Monday and now we are headed deep into the Rockies!

We got into Rapid City and the minute we parked and unhooked, WHOOSH!  Torrential rains started pouring down!  We decided we may as well go get something to eat, so we headed to Firehouse Brewing downtown.   Nice atmosphere and great beers to be had.  I liked the way Rapid City is, a real downtown and manageable.

On our first full day, we drove up to the reason for the stop – Mount Rushmore!  It was crowded as expected, but we got a nice little hike in around the base.  After that, we took a drive over to the Crazy Horse Memorial.  Honestly, don’t waste your time.  It doesn’t look they are ever going to finish it and they charge you for the privilege of being 2 miles away from an unfinished statue.  But the museum was pretty good and the drive up there was glorious.

We then drove into the town of Custer and had some great beers and sandwiches at The Custer Wolf.  Some homemade ice cream at Horatios and a walk around the town and then off to Wind Cave National Park!

Except the caves are all closed right now because they are fixing the elevators.  So just a look around the visitors center and a short walk to one of the cave openings was all we managed to get in.  On the drive back, we decided to drive through Custer State Park.  Just gorgeous!  And we got our first look at some of the buffalo roaming through the park!

 

The next morning, we took a drive out to Badlands National Park.  We had planned on spending the entire day there, but we were able to get signed up for a buffalo safari in early afternoon.   But we took the 31 mile Badlands Scenic Drive and got to take in the best parts of the park.  I’d like to go back there one day and do some more exploring.

In the afternoon, we met up at the Custer Game Lodge and got on our 3 hour buffalo safari!  We didn’t have to go too far as the herd we saw down in a valley the day before was now crossing the road right in front of us!  We spent a good 30 minutes just hanging around the herd and taking video and pictures and I got real close to this big guy:

 

After seeing the herd, our guide took us on a spectacular drive around the park, one of the biggest state parks in the country.  And then we had some refreshing beers on the front porch of the lodge!

Our last full day, we didn’t do much.  Ed wanted to have a maintenance day and I needed to do laundry.  So, we hung out at the campground, Rapid City KOA (great location for all we wanted to do).  But the evening proved the best:   Remember the Aussies we met up with in Fresno earlier in our travels?  We finally were intersecting on our trips!  We planned to BBQ at our place, but the evening rains (it rained every single night we were there) prevented us from firing up the grill.  But they treated us to some good Thai food and we opened up a couple of the Pliny the Elders to share with these great people.  We really enjoyed the evening with them! (And we forgot to take pictures!!)

Onto the next destination in the Black Hills, but on the way there, we stopped in Deadwood!  We enjoyed the town and made the trek up the mountain to see the graves of Wild Bill Hickok and Calamity Jane also.

Our next stop would be at Devils Tower in Wyoming.  That thing just sticks out of the earth like a middle finger!  We stayed at the KOA campground (we found out we really like KOA’s) that was right at the base.  One of the nicer campgrounds we’ve stayed at and the grounds were just beautiful.

The next morning, we drove up to the visitors center (we could have hiked) and explored around two different trails.  Got to see some rock climbers practicing their craft too.

The next day, we drove out to Keyhole State Park to get a swim in.  Gorgeous drive through the countryside on dirt roads, but the beach wasn’t even a beach.  No place to even rent kayaks either.  Oh well, it was a nice drive.

The thing with Devils Tower is you really only need one night there, or even just stop on the way somewhere else.  But I will say, we relaxed a LOT those few days.  And the KOA had a great supply of local beers and we found a lovely one called Copper Mule out of Blacktooth Brewing in Sheridan.  We left there with several six packs!

Heading South now and onto our next stop, but it would be a long drive.  So we split it up and stopped at Pony Soldier RV Park in the bubbling metropolis of Lingle, WY.   Fort Sheridan, which was the way point for all the settlers heading west on the Oregon Trail, was literally right up the street!  After a quiet night, we got up to head to our next major stop, the suburbs of Denver!

 

After leaving Springfield, we began our journey back out west.  We weren’t going to be able to get reservations at some of the places on our original itinerary, so we changed it up and put some stops in that weren’t planned until the following year.

But first, we went to Peoria!  Our close friends Leroy and Tania live there and a friend of theirs let us park the RV at his campground and we got to enjoy a night in a house with all the space to spread out.  We joke with them all the time about living and traveling together.  We enjoyed seeing their kids and their grandkids.  Leroy took the next morning off and took us out for breakfast and a drive through Peoria Heights and a bakery tour at his friend Jeff and Martha’s bakery.  We stocked up on gooey treats and then headed out.

We headed west on I-74 and connected with the I-80 and once again crossed the mighty Mississippi in LeClaire, Iowa.  The farmlands of Iowa are just beautiful and I never could get the best shot on either day of driving.   We stopped for the night in Altoona, IA, just outside of Des Moines.  Pretty good BBQ at Jethro’s and we stayed at Adventureland RV park, right next to an amusement park.  It was a perfect on and off spot and sufficient to our needs.  Cheap too.  We were in early enough to go to the park, but kind of wiped out from driving all day.

The next day, we stayed on course heading heading west on I-80 and then connected to I-29 and now a new state, South Dakota!  I had factored in more days than we were going to end up using, so we decided a two-night stop in Sioux Falls would be great.  We stayed at Tower Campground.  The pros:  Convenient location, wonderful staff.  The cons:  The pull-through site they had us in was complete blacktop and we were practically on top of our neighbors.  Literally the shittiest site we have stayed in.

But Sioux Falls!  What a wonder!  I just loved it there.  Wonderful meals at Oshima Sushi and Phnom Penh.  Cocktails on the outer patio at Crave and cigars at Stogeez.  A hike around the famous falls of Sioux Falls.  A visit to the Butterfly House.  A tour of the Cathedral of St Joseph.  We packed a lot in in our short time there.  I am most impressed by this small city.

Onwards West!  We got on the I-90 to make the long trek across South Dakota.  It was a lovely day of driving and we stopped at a few places to break it up as it was going to be one of our longer days.   The Corn Palace in Mitchell.  Yes, entirely made of corn!  The rest area before crossing the Missouri River to see the beautiful statue of Dignity and gaze at the lovely river views.  A stop at Wall Drug – the midwest version of South of the Border.  After the long day, we finally pulled into our next longer stop, Rapid City.