National Parks

We found a new park, of course we traveled thru states we haven't before! We were in North Dakota and stopped at a rest area. It had a Ranger Station as a part of the stop and a 1 mile loop trail. It was only 98 there and the feels like was...98! I don't care what anyone says, whether it's humid or dry that's hot! Here is the write up on the area by the NPS.org website: "Theodore Roosevelt National Park is a United States National Park comprising three geographically separated areas of badlands in western North Dakota. The park was named for U.S. President Theodore Roosevelt. The park covers 70,446 acres of land in three sections: the North Unit, the South Unit, and the Elkhorn Ranch Unit."

 


I'm not sure which section we were in but it was beautiful country. That stop cost us an extra hour but we were quite happy to explore and take it in.

The trial was the Painted Canyon Nature Trail.









Here is a panoramic shot I took with the iPhone.









Bob on the trail.

Me further down.









Part of the forest along the path. A nice respite.















This looks like a basalt shelf?











Beautiful signage showing the Badlands in the background.

Also along the way were acres and acres of sunflowers. These pictures don't do the yellow justice but you can see some of the magnitude of the fields.

Memories

I've heard it said 'you can never go back' referring to past times and happy happenings. I beg to differ! We may not be able to reenact the days and times we had but a visit is sometimes so well worth the effort that years can be washed away.

Such was the case on this trip. We went to visit my cousin, Jon, and his wife, Sheryl, in St. Paul, Minnesota on Friday. It had been about 41 years we figured since we have met. Yeah, we're older now and have been thru a lot of life, but with about 5 or 6 hours of chatting, we caught up on our families and just had a few laughs together. Very sweet!



From St. Paul, we headed due west and after a full day of driving, ended up in Bismarck, North Dakota. Even though it is the capital city, there was only one high rise building in the downtown area and that was the State Building. The grounds around there are meticulously maintained and beautiful.

There are a number of monuments and we walked around on Saturday evening reading about each one and enjoying the walk. (We may have been catching Pokémon also, but that's for another day :)








Here is a picture of a French Freedom Train and the shields represented by different areas. We couldn't find more info on this but it was covered and part of the stationary exhibits.










This monument had the names of all people that had fought and died in all the wars from ND. Very well done!

Note how green and lush the grass is too.








This sculpture was made from rebar...long steel bars used for reinforcing in concrete. There was no mention if this rebar was from some that was recycled or new but it was wonderfully crafted! A bonding theme for most of the sculptures was the celebration of settlers that traveled over the plains to settle in ND in the 1800's.





This statue is of John Burke, former US Treasurer from ND. The building in the background and the next picture is the tallest structure we saw. The front steps were being reworked so we weren't able to get close. The flowers in the foreground spelled out North Dakota.


















This is the State Library Building. Made of what looked like granite and sandstone, it makes quite an imposing statement!

We really enjoyed driving thru ND. It has a number of interesting areas to look at.

Clean air and blue skies. Hot too but that doesn't beat out interesting and pretty!

Heading North

First stop was Atlanta to visit with Bob's mom. She is recuperating from a broken ankle in rahab. We had a sweet 3 days with her, spent a few hours and ate dinner with friends Mike and Gloria (leftovers were even tasty for lunch the next day, thank you again!); and ate dinner with and were introduced to Pokémon by Carl, Kimberly (thank you for making the delicious meal Kim!) and Kaleb (also even saw Cherice during dinner!) before heading to Nashville.





I'd never been to Nashville and Bob was there once many years ago so this was a new experience. We were able to check in to a Quality Inn early and drove to the Gaylord Opryland Hotel to walk around. Wow, just wow!









This hotel is massive with 3 atriums and 5 sections with a convention center. The atriums are more like a conservatory with exotic and native plants. We spent almost 2 hours just walking around.
























This is a glass sculpture in the Cascade's Check-In area.












There were several waterfalls, one very large, and even a gondola ride in one of the 'rivers.'























Afterward we went to the Nashville Palace for an early dinner and listened to a one man show. We understand why so many musicians flock to Nashville now. Every bar (and there are many) as well as some street corners have people playing and singing waiting for that big break.










We elected to not go to Opryland because we wanted to visit the downtown area too. A shuttle bus picked us up at the hotel and dropped us off downtown, about 15 mins away at 4th and Broadway Streets. It was a Wednesday afternoon/evening and it was loud and hopping. We walked around several blocks and peered in many bars when allowed due to large windows open to the street.




Some bands were just loud, there was blues, hard rock, but mostly country with current or the oldies being featured. There were several blocks with bar after bar with live music available. After walking around for an hour, we went into a bar named Roberts, went in and enjoyed a beer, a super 3 piece band with an incredible guitarist and some fun dancers on the floor.



Note: In May 2010, the rivers crested at 10 to 15 feet over its banks and flooded the Grand Ole Opry House and the Gaylord Opryland Hotel and Opry Mills Mall, all in the same location. The Opry House and Gaylord reopened in November 2010 and the Mills reopened in March 2012.









We caught the bus back at 9:30 so got about 3.5 hours in downtown fun!

Time to Wake Up - It's a New Year!

And here I am again to play the part of host for the next few months as we head out on a fresh trip back to Yellowstone. :)

Start date is August 1 as usual and we are looking forward to seeing the wonder and majesty of God in this land. Even though this is our 4th year of going, it doesn't get old. Our anticipation is high and the truck is packed.

There is a down side this year. We have been living in this house for 6 years now. And we are getting attached to it and the neighbors. We still intend to travel...often...but leaving is somewhat harder now.

Catching up on news: We bought a 36' 5th wheel RV in January and have taken it on several trips already. Each time we go out is further than the last. Most often asked question...Are we taking it to Yellowstone? No. Part of our 'job' is to live in the cabins and take care of the other 3 and all the people that come and go. They are so nice that 2 spots to park it were provided in case we did drive it out there. We scoped out both spaces and unfortunately our comfort level with getting it in either one isn't very high. We are talking mountains here.

So it is nicely parked and stored in a fenced, protected yard with other large trucks, RV's and boats. I guess you could call it a work and toy yard!

This year we are taking the northern route. Atlanta, Nashville TN (never been, can't wait!), St. Paul MN (to see cousins I haven't seen in 40+ years), then due west to land in Bozeman MT the night before checking in to Yellowstone Association.

Bring it on!!

Trout Lake

This day was our last to be able to get into the park this year. The work load our last week was pretty tough so no more time to drive around after this.

We still had not seen a bear or a wolf and inquired where the wolves were hanging around and decided to try Lamar Valley. On the drive in, these mule deer were grazing along the side of the road.





This looked like a mother-daughter pair. They usually aren't quite this tame, this close, but these two weren't worried about the cars and much more concerned about getting to the grass that was close to the street.






When you are driving down the road and see a crowd like this, you can be sure there is bear or wolves being watched...from very far away.

 It is common practice to just roll down the window and ask "what's out there?"

We lucked out! A wolf was trotting through the sage up and down the ravines up the hill.




A picture that show these guys are hard to come by but Bob was able to get these pictures of a black wolf. At one point he stopped and starting howling. He was obviously trying to locate his pack. I've blown them up so if you view it full screen you can see it is definitely a wolf.





 We couldn't find out his identity (they all have numbers and are identified to belong in a pack). He was down by Lamar Buffalo Ranch and was probably from the Soda Butte Pack.









Here is just a Fall shot of the Lamar River with Dog's Bane along the shore.

And this is the Gardiner River back toward Gardiner. I guess this should have been first, but I'm not going back now, ha!

This was just a cool shot Bob got of a guy in the Lamar River that apparently had a problem with his fly rod. Oh to be so immersed in your hobby that the world passes you by while you concentrate on fixing a problem!







We wound up driving almost to the back gate toward Cooke City and decided to do a small hike up to Trout Lake. Bob had gone with his photography course last year but we went together now.









As usual, it was a very windy day. September was windy most of the time! I loved this wind-swept cirrus cloud. To my it looks like the Millennium Falcon from Star Wars :)










 Here we are at Trout Lake. It is one of those areas where the water collects from a stream in the mountains. You just don't expect to run into it up this high.








The hike around was only a little more than a mile, but so serene and scenic.











You can see the trail from this picture. This was where we started and Bob took this at the end.











So many trees throughout the park was killed in the 1988 fire. There were more in this area. This beautiful, old tree is still standing and completely dead. Look how large it is! It made us think of the Redwood Trees in CA.

Paul came to visit!

Paul Trombetta lives in Bozeman so is able to make the trip each year to come and visit when we come out here. Paul and Bob go back to age 5 growing up and he was the Best Man in our wedding 46 yrs ago. So we enjoy his visits and try to take him on a moderate hike that his knees can handle.





This year we took him on the Yellowstone Picnic hike that travels along the edge over the end of the Yellowstone Grand Canyon. I posted pictures on this hike earlier when Bob and I did it but here are some more!

The scenery is so amazing when you are higher up.






Here we are with the other side of the canyon in the background.

This big guy was all alone and walking among the sage bushes parallel to our path. That can cause a little anxiety when he looks at you like he may just wander over. This time, however, he continued down the hill to a greener patch of grass to munch on.





The hill behind me is the start of Specimen Mountain. There are at least 3 trail heads to take one up to the top, this being one of them. The trail is about 10 miles long. Bob and I have decided to tackle this next year. :)








This is looking back into the canyon area from the end of the trail. This is the Yellowstone River which travels north to the Gardiner area and up to Livingston, MT before turning east to eventually run into the Missouri River. 








We had 3 days of rain right before Paul came. It dumped water below and snow above. The Mt. Washburn peak we had just hiked was now covered in snow!

The buffalo were on the move all throughout the park. This group was trailing down into this valley and the leader had already gone halfway up the next hill. I've heard you can tell the weather by the animals, but we are really stumped about whether it will be a tough winter here or not. The animals all were going places we've never seen then in before. It will be interesting to see what happens.