Well gosh, I’ve been busy since we got back from vacation. It was a great trip, and I did manage to get some decent stretches of stitching in. I haven’t taken a picture of my progress so that will come in a later post. I’ve finally gotten my vacation pics up on flickr though. Here’s a summary of the trip:
July 11: drove to Hurricane, Utah. Saw a fabulous thunder/lightening storm from the window of our hotel
July 12: went to Zion and Bryce. We hiked 5.5 miles total between these two places. We took Luke hiking up the Virgin River a little bit, but he and Tom forgot to bring their water shoes so their footing was tricky, and it got a little deep for Luke pretty quickly. Oh, and I tried to work on my tan lines for the wedding:
I must post a big thanks to my friends who recommended we visit Bryce, as well as the random woman we met on the Zion shuttle who said we should visit Wall Street when we got there. It was spectacular and definitely a highlight of the whole trip:
We spent the night in Beaver, Utah. Aside from being a convenient place to stop on the way north, well, that’s really all there is to say about Beaver.
July 13: drove to Jackson, WY. It was a long-ish day. We drove through Provo and up the east side through the Wasatch, stopping in Park City for lunch. I still haven’t actually seen Salt Lake City except from the airplane a few years ago. We stayed at the Antler Motel a block or two from the central square in Jackson.
July 14: drove to Yellowstone, with a stop at Grand Tetons.
Camped at Madison Campground inside Yellowstone. This was a great day. Luke got to see a Bison, we saw Old Faithful erupt, and I got to see Grand Prismatic Spring, which I’ve wanted to see for years. It was crowded at Yellowstone, but still well worth the trip.
July 15: Spent the day driving the grand loop of Yellowstone, had dinner near Old Faithful, and camped at the same place as the night before. Note the full Bison attire…Luke loves them:
Steamboat Geyser:
Mammoth Hot Springs:
Luke got really tired of the sulfur smell, although he did think the Mud Volcano was cool otherwise:
Bison stopping traffic:
July 16: Drove to Missoula, Montana, stopping at the Lewis and Clark Caverns on the way.
July 17: Drove to Glacier…my new favorite place in the world. Actually I always knew I would love it there. I was right.
Our campsite (where we spent the night the 17th and the 18th):
I loved the beautiful flowers everywhere; in flower boxes or hanging baskets, they were everywhere on the trip. These were at Apgar Village in Glacier:
July 18: Drove the Going To The Sun Road…phenomenal. We also took Luke on a 10 mile hike that started in Many Glacier, to Iceberg Lake. Being in the heart of grizzley country, we came prepared with bear spray and told Luke to be as loud as he wanted. He didn’t disappoint, although it carried on for another hour in the car afterwards…
Going To The Sun Road:
Iceberg Lake:
After the hike:
July 19: Went on a 2 hour horseback ride inside Glacier, and then a 9 mile class 2 and 3 rafting trip in the afternoon, on the middle fork of the Flathead River. Luke’s favorite thing of the whole trip was rafting, followed by the hike to Iceberg Lake. I have a rafting pic, but don’t have it digitally so I may scan it in later. Here is a picture on the horse:
Drove back to Missoula afterwards…made it a late night since Luke really wanted to go in the pool at the hotel, but the next two days were long driving days so we humored him.
July 20: drove from Missoula, Montana to Elko, Nevada. The only thing more boring than driving across southern Idaho is driving across northern Nevada…
July 21: left Elko, Nevada pretty early, got to Tuolumne Meadows about 2pm. We did a 7 mile hike to Cathedral Lake. Luke (and I) had a much harder time on this hike than on the Iceberg Lake hike. It’s amazing what a difference 7,000 feet in elevation can make.
We spent the night in Mammoth.
July 22: drove Luke up to the Mammoth ski resort so he could see what it looks like in the summer. I still get a kick out of the fact that you ski over the road there; I didn’t know that road was there until after skiing there a few times. After going to Grand Tetons, Yellowstone, Glacier and Yosemite, we were disappointed to have not seen a bear. We saw mountain goats, deer, elk, bison, countless squirrels, mountain goats, and a marmot. It wasn’t until we were driving down Minaret in Mammoth that we had a bear enounter, the first either of us has ever had in the Sierra’s. Tom yells “bear” and sure enough, a smallish black bear ran across the street right in front of us. Close enough, in fact, that he had to hit the breaks so we didn’t hit it. It was really cool; we laughed about it for the next 20 minutes.
So, that was the trip. It was phenomenal. I would move to Montana if I could…although I don’t know how I’d handle the minus 40 winters!! I cannot wait to have the opportunity to go back to Glacier; it is such an amazing place…if you get the chance to go there, do it!!
