July 17th and 18th: Palmer, AK to Soldotna, AK (Day 26 & Day 27)

Pictures for Day 26 & Day 27

July 16th: Alaska Highway to Palmer, AK (Day 24)

Pictures for Day 24

July 15th: Jasper National Park and Yukon (Day 23)

Pictures for Day 23

July 14th: Banff to Jasper National Park (Day 22)

Pictures for Day 22

July 13th: Calgary and Banff National Park (Day 21)

We woke early and started making breakfast while we broke camp. The plan was yummy omelets with the left over veggies from Cheri’s fajitas but we ran out of Coleman fuel after the coffee was done. This turned out to be interesting because the closest and only place for breakfast turned out to be a Café Louisette’s owned by a Canadian born man whose mother was from new Orleans. He was living in Mississippi when Katrina hit and had the only house left standing, albeit without a roof, rescued 6 days later, still has $60,000 in insurance checks that can’t be cashed because made out to 5-6 different entities. Cat 4 0r 5? Ask NASA! Very interesting.

Banff National Park is awesome, most of the little towns (Banff, Canmore, etc.)
are just shopping centers in the woods but the park is great. We picnicked near a very cold, blue stream that was about 6 feet deep but looked much shallower because of how clear the water was. We skipped a really long line of cars waiting to buy park passes, then walked right up to a window in Banff and bought one. We got one of the last 3 tent spots at Lake Louise. The campsite was awesome and was surrounded by an electric fence to keep the grizzlies out(just the tent area). There was an amazing river running very fast through the park just outside of the campground. We got quite a show from the ground hogs, which must be mating because we watched one stand on his hind legs on a stump with his hands crossed in front of him singing until a female finally came up to listen. After that...what happens in Banff, stays in Banff. We took the dogs for a walk through one of the many pedestrian gates of the electric fence (basically a handle wrapped in a few layers of plastic was used to open the gate) to walk down the river to the bridge where we entered the tent area. We had a campfire dinner, washed up the dishes and headed to bed.

Pictures for Day 21

July 11th & July 12th: Calgary (Day 19 & Day 20)

We got a late start and headed to the closest coffee shop to try to catch some free wi-fi. Evidently, Canada doesn’t believe in free wi-fi, so in the interest of being cheap we headed downtown to check out the old buildings and the view from the space needle. The Calgary space needle has a glass floored section where you can look straight down about 30 floors. The theatre next door is aptly named "The Vertigo Theatre". From up top you can see the Stampede rodeo going on but it seemed kind of small compared to the Houston rodeo. Next we walked to an outdoor shopping area and talked to a local artist about the photographs he was selling. He showed us a picture of one of the mountains in the Canadian Rockies that we would be passing and was a pretty nice guy.

After being in the wilderness and small towns for so many weeks, the big city was kind of an overload so we left downtown and hit some thrift stores and an awesome Vietnamese restaurant in the artsy side of town. Finally, we remembered to mail back our hotel key from Cody. We also stopped in a camera store and got a tripod for the camera. Next, we decided to try to go to another local brew pub for dinner. We drove and drove and finally found it, but they had just closed for the day. I guess we looked really bummed out because the brewers that were still chatting in the tasting room, gave us two free glasses and some “belt buckles”. It was worth the trip – we found some of their beer in the local store – Big Rock (Warthog Cream Ale).

We headed to camping – found a great spot with lovely green grass and wi-fi. Even though we suspected the lovely grass might be from waste water runoff from the RV’s up the hill – it was still a nice spot with only the occasional smelly wind. The campsite also had a view of the site of the 1988 Winter Olympics. The ground hogs here have set up a tunnel system with a hole under each and every picnic table so they can get scraps without being seen.
We were too hungry and tired to cook so we set up camp and drove into the nearby suburbs for some food. We found Montana’s – which was good. I had a very interesting chicken faijitas with a apple butter salsa – weird but good. Kevin had the ribs with the “Texas Bold” sauce – Northerners really like their sugar! After dinner we were able to do all our laundry and check our email for a very reasonable price.

Pictures for Day 19 and Day 20

July 10th: Drumheller, Vulcan, & Calgary (Day 18)

Drumheller (Royal Tyrrell Museum) was an amazing museum!

We drove onto Vulcan, Alberta just for the nerdiness of it. Besides almost getting lost and running out of gas, and all the rain, it was a still a worthwhile trip. Vulcan is desperately trying to lobby for the premier of the next Star Trek movie. We asked the guide at the Vulcan welcoming center if they had a theatre, she said “well no, but we have an auditorium and we are trying to get a screen and projector”. So if you get a chance…go to their facebook site and send an email to help them.

Afterwards, we drove to Calgary and got the nastiest and most expensive hotel of our trip so far. Calgary was in the middle of their “Stampede” and all the prices were jacked up for the event. The dogs loved the room because there was plenty of floor space and nasty smells for them to rub in. The only advantage to this hotel was the closeness to downtown and patch of grass that was right outside the door. We didn’t have to leash the dogs even once – they were so good. We showered, it had a been a while, and headed to a local brew pub (Wild Wood) for a sampler of beers and local food. All 7 of their beers were great, except for the pilsner which tasted like skunky honey. We didn’t even bother to finish that one. It had been a very long day, so we headed back to the hotel.

Pictures for Day 18

July 9th: Kevin, MT to Canada (Day 17)

The next day we overslept and barely made check out – but we were able to wash our camp dishes from our previous campsites, and took much needed showers. Kevin picked up a couple of coffees and muffins from next door and we checked out and headed to our next stop…Kevin, Montana. We did remember to return the key this time!

Kevin Montana is an old, half-dead oil town that was interesting and sad at the same time. We left Kevin and headed to Canada. Luckily the dogs were feeling calm (usually they bark at anyone who comes within 100 feet of the car) so Border Patrol passed us through with no problems. Apparently we got off easy because the Menonites that were trying to get through next to us were stopped and had their van searched. We made a couple of sandwiches on the road and headed on to the Alberta Badlands, where the largest concentration of dinosaur fossils in the world was found. We passed through Vauxhall, the Potato capital of the West, on our way to see the Dinosaur find. Along the way, we realized that none of the stores in Canada were able to treat our check card as a debit card so we had to go cashless until Calgary.

We drove through the Badlands and then drove 2 hours to Drumheller to see the Royal Tyrrell Museum of paleontology. It was late when we arrived so we decided to find a campsite, make dinner and call it a night. It was a little cloudy, but it looked like it would clear up soon so we set up camp. Almost immediately we were eaten alive by mosquitos, so we headed into town for bug spray, some groceries, and firewood. As we were spraying down in the parking lot of the grocery store, a local laughed at us and said “been there, done that – it’s not going to work”. Once we got the coils burning and the spray on, it wasn’t too bad. The mosquites may be in great quanity, but these "far north" mosquitos' bites don’t sting or itch and you can hardly even tell where they’ve bitten you. However…….the rain did not pass. What a night! It stormed and stormed and stormed - with wind and hail! At one point it quieted down and we were able to get a little bit of sleep. I woke up to tell Oops to stop "snurfling" (noises he makes when he takes an undue interest in his nether regions) but we realized that it wasn’t him. Something was outside the tent, but I guess it didn’t find anything interesting or maybe my mom “cut it out” voice worked on whatever it was. If we hadn't been camping in a stand of trees I don't think our tent would have survived the onslaught of hail and wind that night.

Pictures for Day 17

July 8th: Livingston, Bozeman, Conrad Montana (Day 16)

Livingston was really cute! First we stopped to do laundry, catch up on email, and make some phone calls. A fellow Texan caught me photographing the prairie dogs right outside the laundry and asked “where are you from??!”, when I told him Texas, he said “well – you’ve seen gopher’s right? Well these are the same thing – target practice!”

We had a great lunch at a cute Italian bistro. We began to notice that every little town that we went to had a senior center right downtown so everyone can get to it! We shopped at the senior center thrift shop and Cheri bought a genuine forest ranger uniform jacket! We wandered to several other thrift stores, tried to find the local brewery, Neptune’s Brewery (which turned out to be closed, so we just bought some bottled at the store. It wasn't really worth looking for in the first place). After Livingston we headed to Bozeman, where we hit several thrift stores and used ski/outdoor shops to get some winter essentials.

Bozeman was really cool and hip and reminded us of Austin (if it were in Colorado). It was cute, but we wanted to get a little out of town before settling for the night. Our plan was to drive just out of town and get a campsite – but we wound up driving to Great Falls to find camping. The only campground we could find in Great Falls (Mostly RV – only 5 campsites), was sandwiched between 2 highways, a railroad and in a really bad neighborhood, so we decided to move on and drive until we found the next campsite outside of town. That night we drove and drove but there was no camping to be found. The towns got smaller and smaller, too small to support any hotels. We couldn’t figure out why there were suddenly no camping sites in this part of the state since we had seen tons before. Our answer came when we stopped on the side of the road to let the dogs out to pee – The mosquitoes swarmed like nothing you have ever seen before – worse than a swamp in Louisiana, Florida, or East Houston! The car was full within minutes and we spent the next 2 days killing them. Needless to say, we gave up on camping.

We drove on to Conrad in the dark and found a cute Motel. The owner had already left for the night, but there was a phone on a TV tray outside the office with his number written next to it. Luckily, they allowed pets and had one room left. We waited a few minutes for him to show up and get us into our room. We loaded in and then realized that it was very stuffy and the AC window unit had a “Do not use this unit, it has been winterized”. Kevin had to go around back to see if it had indeed been winterized – it hadn’t thank goodness. We finally got everything settled and hit the sack after a very long day.

Pictures

We have reached a snag with the pictures - they are too large and have to be resized. We've also had a really hard time picking which pictures to post on the blog because there are so many. So....I'm working on resizing them and we will be posting them on another site just for pictures. I'll add the link to the blog as soon as they are done. Happy Friday!

July 7th: Yellowstone to Livingston (Day 15)

We got an early start on this day – a REAL early start! For some reason our phones kept changing back and forth between time zones so when we set our alarm for what we thought was 6:30am, it actually turned out to be 5:30am. We broke camp and didn't realize the time until we tried to get breakfast and everyplace was still closed. The morning started out slow, but we finally got to see a buffalo – as it ran right by our car! We also saw more deer, some bears (from the car - with park rangers moving the traffic along), a jackrabbit, a grey wolf, an eagle and an elk. We saw one of the bears when we stopped to see the only known standing petrified tree. By the time that we arrived at Mammoth Springs we were exhausted – so we only managed to walk the lower section and drove up to the upper section. We were pretty happy to spend the two days at the park that we did, but we could have spent a week and still not seen all the incredible sites.

We left the park and drove to Livingston. Right outside of town we found a fantastic campground between two mountains on the Yellowstone River. It was just a small camping park with mostly RV sites and a few primitive tent sites. The couple that ran the place were nice and gave us a great deal. After getting camp set up and making a big taco salad, we walked to the little burger joint right beside the camp and each got 2 scoops of ice cream for only 3$! Even better, they had Wi-Fi so we could catch up on our email! After a good night's sleep we packed up camp and drove into Livingston to catch up on some laundry and to see the town.

Pictures for Day 15

July 6th: Yellowstone (Day 14)

We arrived at Yellowstone and discovered that we had forgotten to check out of the hotel in Cody. Luckily, Kevin has a habit of taking every hotel pen he can lay hands on so we had the phone number of the hotel and, once we found a pay phone in the park, were able to call for the address to send the key.

About five miles into the park we saw a black wolf trotting along the side of the road. Like all the animals in Yellowstone he seemed to be desperately pretending we were not there (throughout the park you could almost hear the animal mantra, "there are no cars, there are no cameras, there is not a crowd of humans following me wherever I go). He moved quickly as if on a very important mission but Cheri still managed to get some good pictures of him as he climbed the steep hill next to the road and disappeared over the the top.

On our way to see Old Faithful and Castle Geyser we saw quite a few deer but the buffalo were still elusive and mule deer are only interesting for a short while. The geysers were amazing though. We were lucky enough to see Castle Geyser erupt. It has a cycle that is much longer than Old Faithful so unless you happen to be near by when it is ready to do its thing you could wait around all day and still not see it. Castle may not shoot as high as Old Faithful, but the formation around it and the sounds it makes are much more interesting. We hung around for Old Faithful and then headed out to see the rest of the boiling thermal pools.

Since we hadn't been real sure about when we would arrive at Yellowstone we had not made reservations for the interior campsites. They were packed! Long lines of reserved and hopeful campers waited outside of each campground so we headed out of the park at the west exit to look for camping elsewhere. At the first place we stopped, the owner was kind enough to ask if we had a tarp, which we did not, and explained that the ground in his tent area had been rained out the previous day and really hadn't dried enough. We thanked him for his honesty and headed down the road in search of drier digs.

About 10 miles out of town we found a sign advertising what appeared to be a great campsite; showers, riverside camping, the works. The road to this campsite was being prepared for resurfacing and the crews had stopped just short of making it drivable without a truck, jeep or SUV. Even at 5 mph, the fillings were being shaken out of our teeth so we turned off on what looked like a side road. It was much smoother than the main road ad we could tell it was heading back towards town so we took it, even though it was only about a car width across. It turned out to be a snowmobile/ATV track! Who knew you could go off-roading in a mini-van? Yay Mazda, heart of a sports car indeed!

We finally found a KOA and even though it was more of a carnival than a campsite (it took 5 minutes to thread our way through the crowds of kids on rented hotwheels and bikes) we took a site and settled in for the night.

Pictures for Day 14

July 5th: Lovell, Bighorn, Cody (Day 13)

We got out of Lovell pretty quick this morning and decided to try to see the wild mustangs that were supposed to be wandering around the state park. Lovell is home to one of the first wild mustang refuges in the country and when I asked the hotel owner if there were going to be any city July 4th celebrations he said that Lovell didn’t really do July the 4th because they celebrate “mustang days” the weekend before and set of all the fireworks then. The mustangs are a really big deal here. We never saw any mustangs, but we did get to see some great views of Bighorn state park and the canyon. The oddest thing we saw today was some kind of outhouse floating on a platform in the river way down at the bottom of the canyon, out in the middle of nowhere. We left Bighorn and headed to Cody, WY. The upward/downward trip through the mountains and canyons were really rough on the breaks and we had to stop several times just to cool them down enough to drive on. We decided to see if we could get someone in Cody to take a look at them just in case. On our way to try to find a place that was open on the weekend, we found a thrift store and decided to stop to see if we could find any cold weather gear. We found a couple of things and when we asked to see the phone book a nice gentleman overheard us and offered some advice on where to find an honest mechanic. When he realized we didn’t know the town, he wasn’t sure how to give us directions – so he offered to escort us there. We lucked out and not only got the brakes checked for free, but also got some advice on how to keep the brakes from smelling and overheating when driving through the mountains. After that, we did a little shopping and found a hotel right downtown. It was a great room with the laundry room right next door. We left the dogs to watch Nascar and went out to find a late lunch. We had lunch at Maxwell’s, which was the first really good gourmet meal we’d had since Deadwood. After walking the dogs and a quick nap, we went out to catch the 6:00pm “gun fight” that was supposed to be in the street near one of the famous salons and visit the Wild Bill Cody Museum before it closed. First, we stopped back by an antique store that we had visited earlier and picked up a pair of really cool cowboy boots for Kevin (used, black, Nocona “roach-stompers” in great condition for 50 bucks!) . We didn’t get one of the Jackalopes that Kevin wanted, but we figured they might be cheaper somewhere else, or that we could catch one ourselves. We waited for the gunshow, but it never happened so we headed to the museum. They were kind enough to let us in free since we only had about an hour and half before they closed. We didn’t get to see everything, but the stuff that we did see was pretty cool. Afterwards we picked up a pizza and headed back to the hotel room. Squeak finally seemed to get the going to the bathroom while on the leash and got to sleep in the room instead of locked in the bathroom – so we all had a really good night’s sleep! Thank goodness!

Pictures for Day 13

No Wi-Fi, no time

Free Wi-Fi has been hard to come by and we haven't had much time to post. We are heading into the Canadian Rockies today so we will probably not be able to finish the blog until we arrive in Alaska. There's lots to tell and lots of pictures, but no time (or connection) to do so :(

Heading to Canada

We haven't had time to post lately. We are heading to Canada today and we hope to stay in Calgary a couple of days to rest and catch up on the blog. We've got some great pictures to post and a buffalo video too!

July 4th: Devils Tower and a Long Hike (Day 12)

Yesterday we left Deadwood and did a lot of driving. We detoured to Devils Tower where the aliens from Close Encounters landed and then found a place called Medicine Wheel, an Indian holy place built about 800 years ago. The various points around the circle line up perfectly with the sun's setting and rising during the summer solstice as well as with certain constellations that are important to Native American culture and religion. The site is only reachable for 2 months around summer solstice and since they had a snow storm 2 weeks ago here the road up was closed and we had to hike in about a mile and a half over 2 snow banks to get to it. Luckily they let dogs go on the hike as long as they don't approach the actual site so Oops and Squeek had their first tourist experience that wasn't just sitting in the car with the windows cracked. They loved it. It was worth the detour and the hike to see not only a very ancient ritual site but also some great views of the Bighorn mountains and the local flowers, birds and even some chipmunks and a fox.

We made it to Lovell pretty late and found most of the town lined up and down the main street patiently waiting in the half dark for prime fireworks shooting time or else already in for the evening. Since it was the 4th of July, the town’s 3 hotels had only one vacancy. Luckily the hotel in question allowed pets, and wasn’t across the street from the only bar in town (the other hotel with vacancies seemed to be problematically connected to the only bar in town by a wavering, stumbling line of bar patrons). After checking into the hotel and meeting the only nice and friendly person in the entire town, the owner of the motel, we went in search for food. Only one place was open in the entire town, Taco Johns – proudly serving “West-Mex”. We were the last people in the door and the teenagers running the place were extremely distracted trying to close up for the night. We finally got our food (YUCK!) ate, and went back to hotel and straight to bed.

Pictures for Day 12

July 2nd & July 3rd: Gambling Kangaroos and Calamity Jane (Day 10 & Day 11)

We had breakfast at the diner next to the Lazy U motel and then headed back to Keystone to finish sight seeing and to tour "Beautiful Rushmore Cave". Rushmore Cave is a privately owned cavern that has been kept pretty much as it was found (apart from the lights and the stairs and the handrails). After the tour we spent some time at a cool rock shop in the old part of Keystone and an antique store while waiting out the rain. We had lunch at the Trail Drive Cafe (mmmm, BBQ Buffalo ribs!) and then headed on to Deadwood.
Deadwood doesn't like dogs. We weren't able to find a hotel that allowed pets unattended in the room, or in the room at all in most cases, so we headed out of town and landed at the best place we've stayed so far – Wild Bill's Campground (Saloon & Grill too!). No running water, no cell phone reception, but plenty of WiFi to go around. We got in late and were really tired from the hiking through the caves and Keystone (on a very steep incline) so we splurged and got the cutest cabin ever. It had everything that we needed and the dogs were able to hang out there while we headed back into town to check out the nightlife. The entire town of Deadwood has been declared a National Historic Monument but once you get beyond the restored facades it is pretty much one big gambling casino. Not being gamblers, the novelty wore off quickly, but not before we had a great meal of melt in your mouth 10 oz. filet mignon at the historic Mineral Palace Gem Steakhouse. Even Cheri had some to go with her salad and soup. The Mineral Palace stands on the site of the notorious Gem Theatre which was the naughtiest "entertainment" venue in 1800's Deadwood. It evidently consisted of numerous one room theatres for entertaining and in 1876 made $5,000 on a normal night and often pulled in $10,000 a night when things were hopping. We also went to the #10 saloon where Wild Bill Hickok was "assassinated by the murderer John McCall". We got back to the cabin and sat quietly on the porch for a while watching a doe graze near the creek behind our cabin (Strawberry Creek, which meets up with Bear Butte Creek at the other end of the campground). The doe froze because she spotted us and eventually won the staring contest when we went back due to the chilly weather.

Pictures from Day 10

After the best night's sleep so far (despite the dogs bathroom break before dawn), we discovered that the campgrounds are fully wireless and the signal was great! It's good to have internet since we haven't been able to get a phone signal for more than a few minutes since Rapid City. We took our time catching up, posting the blog, and cooking breakfast before checking out. Our first stop was in Deadwood at Woody's Wild West to get an old timey western picture made. We picked the bar scene with Kevin as a rough neck cowboy and Cheri as a saloon girl. It was pretty fun and the pictures turned out pretty funny. Our next stop was Roo Ranch right outside of town. What fun! Lots of kangaroos, wallabees, wallaroos, zeeboo's (zebra and burrow), sugarflyers, and several other interesting animals. We got to pet a cute wallabee named Gizmo who actually saved the life of one of the kangaroos there named Matilda. Kangaroos are rather serious about the whole survival-of-fittest thing, so if someone isn't ready to be out of the pouch when mama says its time they have pretty much had it. Matilda's mom put her out a little early but Gizmo the wallaby came to the rescue and kept her warm until she was ready.
After our animal adventure, we headed back to Deadwood to visit Mt. Moriah Cemetery Deadwood's "boot hill" which is located at the top of a ridge overlooking the city. Wild Bill and Calamity Jane are buried here. It was pretty interesting and it also provided a fantastic view of the city. Next we headed to Lead, SD which is just a few miles away and stopped at the Twin Cities Mall. It was really more of a general dollar and grocery store, but we found what we needed for our camp dinner of skillet cornbread, greens, and beans. Yum! Lead seems to be where the "nice folks" live. Whereas Deadwood has 24 hour gambling, Lead was having a community picnic.

Pictures from Day 11

Tomorrow we're breaking camp early and heading to Wyoming to see Devils Tower Monument (you know, from Close Encounters).

July 1st : Canine and Car Calamity (Day 9)

Last night, Oops had an allergic reaction to most likely the pine pollen that painted the ground, the table, our shoes, and just about everything in the campsite with yellow powder. We showered quickly at the campgrounds shower (surprisingly comfortable and clean) and then headed into the town to look for coffee and a vet. We had coffee and tried to catch some wi-fi at a local coffeeshop which resides in the old bank building
(built in 188?). The wi-fi was a little too slow to use for finding a vet, but one of the locals called up the neighborhood vet to let her know that we were on our way. We stepped across the street to the Baker’s Bakery for a hot meal - we split a monstrous breakfast burrito with a spicy, yummy green chili sauce. After that we high-tailed it to the vet’s office where they were really busy, but took pity on Mr. Oops and squeezed us in for a visit. The vet had to shave even more hair off from his tail (he had to have some spots shaved before we left Austin), clean him up, dust him with some anti bacterial powder, and take his temperature. Poor guy, he also gets to take prednisone andantibiotic. To add insult to injury, he also left with a cone on to keep from scratching and biting. We hope to get him healed up before we try to cross the Canadian Border so he doesn’t wind up in quarantine. A big thank you to Dr. Sharon Seneczko for taking care of Mr. Oops in between a full schedule of surgeries (we saw a husky being wheeled through half sedated) and office visits.
After the trip to the vet, we drove through Custer Park and stopped several times to take pictures and enjoy the serene lakes throughout the park. Next, we took the Needles Highway through the park, which was just amazing. There were waterfalls and deer along the way and we even stopped to soak our feet in a refreshingly crystal clear creek. Needles Hwy is so named because of the needlelike spires that you drive through at the top of the hills. When we got to the highest point of the drive and got out of the car to view the “needles”, it started to rain so we got up under an outcropping to wait it out. Suddenly we hear a child screaming in terror. A family, everyone from Grandpa and Grandma down to the little girl we heard screaming, of ardent rock climbers decided today would be a good day to introduce 8 year old Suzy to climbing up and rappelling down a pretty much flat faced cliff. When the rain started she really lost it but was finally talked down. She looked like a disaster survivor as they led her to the car. Shame on you Grandma and Grandpa! Our drive up and down the Black Hills caused a terrible smell to come out from under the hood of the car so we stopped in Keystone to let it cool down. We had buffalo sandwiches at Ruby’s Saloon and then strolled through a couple of the gift shops.
Even though the car seemed alright after awhile, the smell had been really awful and we have many, many miles left to go so we decided to go back to Rapid City for the night (about 30 miles off) and take the car in for an oil change a couple hundred miles early and have everything checked out before heading to Deadwood on Wednesday. The car checked out fine, evidently brakes will make that smell sometimes when over taxed but it is not a problem if they are allowed to cool down. The car must be alright because the mechanic didn’t even want to get any money for fixing anything. We checked into a cute little local motel called the Lazy U. Even though they advertise wi-fi, we weren’t able to keep a connection. Kevin talked the owner into letting him work on the router and repeater setup he had so we could get connected. He got the system up and running but unfortunately we still had to pay for our room.

More pictures for Day 9

June 30th: The Badlands and POTUS (Day 8)

June 30th
After a night of rest, we shipped our boxes at the local post office and hit the road. As we traveled through the countryside of South Dakota, the rolling hills of grass began to reveal more and more of the massive rock and clay formations that lay beneath. We saw plenty of prairie dogs and chipmunks in an area that really looked unlivable. We reached Badlands National Park and made our way through the scenic drive stopping along the way to do some rock climbing and to take pictures. The badlands is the place in all the westerns where there is no water and Trigger has to be either set free because he can't traverse the terrain or shot because he broke his leg trying to traverse the terrain. Our hero then wanders thirsty through the winding rock formations until he passes out under an outcropping and is later revived and nursed back to health by a kind Indian wiseman. Luckily, we brought water and left our trusty steed Mazda on the paved road when we ventured of the trail to climb rocks and use the port-a-potties. On the way out of the Badlands we saw a pair of black horned antelope (mom and baby) before continuing our ascent into the Black Hills and stopping in Rapid City, SD for lunch downtown and a little bit of shopping.

In keeping with the Mount Rushmore theme of the area, Rapid City commissioned bronze statues of every US President and placed them on street corners throughout the town. This is a really cool idea and makes for a fun game of "who is that guy" as you go through town. After awhile though, you start to wonder what it is that seems odd about these brown men on the corners and it finally sinks in that it is their diminutive size. Except for the founding fathers, Washington, Jefferson, etc., the presidents are kind of hobbit sized and top out at maybe 5' tall.

Continuing our patronage of roadside attractions, we went to Bear Country on the way to Rushmore. It’s a drive through wildlife park where you can see wolves, rams, antelope, coyotes, wildcats of all kinds and, of course, lots and lots ‘o bears. The dogs growled and made generally aggressive noises during most of the drive, but remained strangely silent and attentive in the big bear area. The drive concludes in a walk through zoo like area containing all of the baby animals and, most importantly, a huge play area full of baby bears. It looks like a playground at recess sans the adults with all the bears fighting, swimming and climbing trees. Cheri took a few hundred pictures and tried to sneak a baby bear out of the park in her backpack. :)

Afterwards, we headed to Mount Rushmore. We spent a couple of hours walking the trails and stopping for a presentation about the artist and the workers that sculpted the mountain. It was truly awe inspiring to see an artistic vision realized on such a large scale.
There is a great quote at the site by Gutzon Borglum, the sculptor of Mount Rushmore:
"A monument's dimensions should be determined by the importance to civilization of the events commemorated."
It reminded me that most of our presidents are just normal guys, clocking in every day and doing the best job they can. Just like the rest of us, precious few of them truly make an impact that lasts more than a decade beyond their term in office. We even saw a picture taken at the beginning of the process that shows the beginnings of a head to the left of Washington. I haven't had time to find out which of the four it was or if it fell off or what.
From there, we headed to Custer State Park to make camp for the evening. After getting settled, Kevin made a delicious veggie stew which we had to eat out of the pan because of a mix-up with our bowls and the dog’s bowls. Even though our night owl neighbors were a little loud and we didn’t have access to water at the site, it was still a good night.

More photos for Day 8

June 29th: Another Roadside Attraction (Day 7)

Today we woke up and made a breakfast before breaking camp. After breakfast, we took the dogs for a walk along the beach at the western end of the camp. We were up early so we pretty much had the whole place to ourselves. It was very peaceful. By the time we broke camp and headed to the showers the other campers were waking up and the park was starting to come alive. We met a man named Quinton who is a professor of history at Dordt College, a small private school in Iowa. He seemed to know the area pretty well so we asked him if he had any suggestions for things to see and do on our route. He told us to drive Needles Highway in Custer state park and it turned out to be one of the highlights so far. We left Lewis and Clark Park (I just love saying "Lewis and Clark Park") and were bombarded with billboards for tourist traps all along the highway, so we finally gave up and decided to make today a roadside attraction day. The first stop was the Pioneer Auto Show ("It's as much fun as a circus!")
in Murdo, SD. They have the original General Lee from The Dukes of Hazard, Elvis' motorcycle, and a cornucopia of trash and treasure from the last 150 years . We didn’t make it through all of the 42 buildings that the show boasts, but we did make it through quite a few before heading to our next roadside attraction, Wall Drug.
The town of Wall, SD (just outside of Badlands National Park) has a huge “drug store” that has room after room of western art, gift shops, camping gear, cafes, and cowboy/Indian/giant-jackrabbit statues to pose for pictures with. Evidently the original owner built the business up from its humble beginnings in 1931 by advertising "Free Ice Water" all along the South Dakota highways. It had been a long day of driving so after a couple of buffalo burgers we decided to get a room at the Sunshine Motel instead of heading on to Rushmore. The Sunshine is owned and operated by a Vietnam veteran who is about to head back to Vietnam for a reunion with not only his fellow soldiers but also a contingent of Vietcong soldiers that they fought against. He said he has mixed feelings about this but has heard from others who have done the same that it turns out to be a pretty amazing experience. Before bed, we did some laundry and gathered up 3 boxes worth of unnecessary stuff to ship to Soldotna (70 bucks well spent on more space in the van).
We also took the dogs for a nighttime walk through the streets of Wall where we saw the strangest display of wildlife sculpture. The front and side yards of one of the houses were filled with life sized representations of every kind of animal you are likely to find in SD. It was kind of funny, not funny ha-ha but the other kind, and Squeak started barking at the animals.

More pictures for Day 7

June 28th, June 29th: Lewis and Clark Park On A Saturday Night (Day 6)

Day 6

Nebraska was, well, Nebraska, so we took the quickest route through and stopped as soon as we got into South Dakota. We camped in a great state park, Lewis and Clark Recreation Area on the Missouri River. The last available camp spot turned out to be one of the "premium"spots right on the river, and at the end near the beach. The weather was gloriously cool and we managed to get our new tent up in about 10 minutes. We cooked dinner on the trusty Coleman stove that my dad bought sometime in the 70's (Coleman really knows how to make a stove), reorganized the van, watched a little bit of Cloverfield in the tent and then crashed out hard. It was the most relaxing and comfortable camping we've done in a long time. Sunday we woke up early and walked around the park with the dogs before breaking camp and heading west into South Dakota.


More Pictures for Day 6

June 28th: Nebraska (Day 6)

On Saturday we drove through Nebraska.

June 27th: Kansas City Blues (Day 5)

Day 5 - 212 Miles

We are sitting in the van in the town square of Geneva, Nebraska so I am just going to post yesterday's blog and add pictures later.

Kansas City was a blast! Caton took us on an in depth tour of the brewery,

including a trip to the top of the rooftop tanks with a fantastic view of the city. We sampled his wares from the source (there is something inherently cool about tapping into a 2 story tall keg). We also went to the Rosedale Memorial Monument honoring KC veterans, and to the country’s only WW I museum.




We didn’t make it in time to go into the WW I museum but the site, building, and the view of the city from atop the museum were spectacular. There is a tower in the center flanked by two sphinxes, one facing west (the future) the other facing east (the past). Both are covering their faces with their wings supposedly out of shame for the wars of the past and future, although I suspect that they ran of money to pay the sculptor and since wings are easier to do than faces...
After a quick power-nap we hit the town Thursday night for dinner at The Flying Saucer and then drinks at a really cool old bar called The Country Club. The Country Club has the best jukebox this side of La-La’s in Austin. It’s full of oldies like Hank Sr., Frank Sinatra and Patsy Cline as well as new stuff like Tom Waits and The Reverend Horton Heat. The décor was frozen in time somewhere around 1950 (possibly earlier). Think dark wood, giant mirrors, martinis and Cuban cigars and you’ll get the picture.
Caton was at least the 5th person to express concern about us about going to Alaska unarmed, and the first to actually do something about it. Out of the kindness of his heart, and his fear for our safety, he sent us on our way with one of his rifles. It’s a real “Rifleman” affair, a 30-30, lever action straight out of the old west! The only thing missing is a compass in the stock for dealing with Black Bart and his gang.
The museums, the brewery tour, the downtown nightlife and the gracious hospitality of our hosts, made it hard to hit the road on Friday so we stalled by running around with Caton all day. We did manage escape velocity at 4 pm and hit the road for McPherson, KS to camp out at Cheri’s sister’s new house before heading north to Mount Rushmore. The drive out here was uneventful (cows, cows, hay, goats, horses, more cows) but relaxing. We passed the 1000 mile mark in a town called Strong City but I would be hard pressed to describe what strengths it possessed. Tomorrow morning we head towards Nebraska and all points north.

Pictures for Day 5

June 26th: Kansas City (Day 4)

Day 4

We got into Kansas City at about 7:30 Wednesday night and stayed with Caton and Dani right on the KS/MO border. Caton says you can shoot BB guns at people from his back porch and they can’t do anything about it because you are on the other side of the state line. We are staying an extra night to test this theory out. Actually we are staying an extra night because we haven’t seen C & D in awhile (and we are exhausted and need to revitalize before heading north. Plus there’s the little matter of Caton being a brewer at Boulevard Brewery; there is something comforting about having ready access to some of the best Ales made in America ☺). Today we are going to run around the Westport section of KC.


It’s the oldest part of town and is full of amazing buildings and businesses that have been run by the same families since the Civil War. KC residents say that St Louis is lying about all that “Gateway to the West” stuff since Westport was actually the last city pioneers would see before hitting the Oregon, California, and Santa Fe Trails. It certainly seems like a good place to head out from.

More pictures for Day 4

June 23rd, June 24th, June 25th: Austin to Kansas City, Mo

Day 1 - 220 Miles from Austin to Plano
Day 2 - 300 Miles from Plano to Manford
Day 3 - 280 Miles from Manford to Kansas City

We made it to Dallas Monday night to stay with Cheri's sister in Plano. The next morning, we drove to Denton to reminisce.

We visited the chapel that we were married in and other places that we used to frequent - including some of the places that we used to live. Many places had been torn down :( The Flying Tomato is an empty lot!) It was a quick visit and lots had changed. We made it to Manford, Oklahoma Tuesday night and went to dinner with Cheri's parents. The next day we visited Cheri's grandfather and his wife and went to lunch before heading to Kansas City, MO to visit with our friends, Caton and his wife Dani. Now we must go out and sample the KC night life (it must be done for anthropological exploration!)
We'll post some pictures soon!

http://picasaweb.google.com/fatnoise/Day1Day2Day3

Goodbye to our friends

It is with great sadness that we are starting our new adventure without our beloved cats, Noise and Little. Little passed in April and Noise passed on Sunday night after 18 wonderful years of sharing her life with us.

Many of you may remember Noise by a scar of some kind that you received when trying to pet that wonderfully soft belly. Others of you may remember her as “fatnoise”, and as the sweet old cat that she became. Noise and Little will be missed greatly and they will always be in our hearts.

Move 'em out!

The mover (singular) showed up today at 8:30 and is finishing up now (high noon).  Once he's done we will head down to the Clay Pit to have lunch with Brad.  The house is empty so I guess we have no choice but to go ahead and move.   k