Disappointment - August 12, 2015

After such a wonderful day yesterday, we were all geared up for animal nation in Yellowstone. As we first drove in the park, we saw a prong horn deer. We just knew it was going to be the day we all hoped for in seeing big game. Boy, were we wrong.

Due to time constraints, we only got to make a backwards S through the park. We went down the side that they said had the most bear activity. We even went down a 6 mile dirt road (don’t tell the rental company) that we just knew was going to produce some animal sightings. It didn’t.

So much of the park has had forest fire activity. It’s really difficult to see through the woods as the younger trees coming in are all about eye level from the car. We managed to see a couple of elk, a white tail deer, a couple of herds of buffalo from a long distance, a ground squirrel, and a robin (Tony wanted me to make sure to include that find!).

We managed to see Old Faithful blow her top without any problems. We probably only spent 4 hours in the park total. I couldn’t seem to get the crew motivated this morning. For one, I turned off the alarm at both 6 and 7 a.m. I just couldn’t drag myself up after such a long day in the car yesterday. It set the tone for the rest of the day.

We made our way through to The Grand Tetons and they were as gorgeous as ever. We got there right at sunset and took some beautiful pictures. Jen decided this was her favorite park. It’s somewhat of a strange park. You don’t actually get to drive over to the mountains. You just ride alongside of them and stare in amazement at their rugged beauty.

As we were headed out of the park, two bull elk were right off the road. There were lots of folks out of their cars taking pictures. There was an Asian woman that walked right up to it and nearly touched it. Of course she scared it away and ruined the pictures for everyone else. We were more than annoyed!

That was sort of the theme for the day. Everywhere we went, there were RUDE people. We didn’t even have to get out of the car to interact with these jerks. As we were doing the speed limit through the park trying to enjoy the beauty, cars were passing us left and right. It really is a shame that folks can’t stop and enjoy the beauty of nature. I think they were just hurrying to the next big attraction to take their selfies to post on FB. UGH!

We’ve somehow managed to get a day ahead in the schedule. We’re heading back to Denver tomorrow. It’s a seven hour drive that I’m sure we’ll manage to turn into at least twelve. Let’s just hope Tony doesn’t find a taxidermist this time with a 50% off going out of business sale. Our goal is to go back to Denver and maybe hit Rocky Mountain National Park Friday. That will make a total of 8 national parks this trip if we can manage it. We had only planned on 6 originally, so we’re ahead of the game!

We tried to not be disappointed in Yellowstone today since it was a bonus park. But not seeing the wildlife that we love sure made it hard not to be. With that and being around all the inconsiderate people, it may have slid down the favorite park list a bit. Maybe we’ll have to come back again to give it another shot. I don’t think that will be difficult. I’m always game for exploring national parks.

We’re staying in a rather shady motel in Jackson WY tonight. Again, not planning ahead, all the hotels were full. We feel lucky that we got what we did. We walked downtown after a very late dinner. It has a little bit of the Gatlinburg feel to it. Not really our kind of town, but it will be short lived. We’ll check it out tomorrow in the daylight and be on our way.

Our vacation is winding down, and so are we. We’ve had a wonderful time seeing all the sights, but we’re not as young as we once were. The girls have even reached the point of dreading getting in the car. They really aren’t looking forward to trading the cushy van in for the truck for that trip home. Speaking of, we got a call that it won’t be ready now until Friday evening. Keep your fingers crossed they can make that happen. Else, it’s going to tighten the schedule and cause some problems. We’ve been so lucky for the remainder of the trip after the bumpy start. We don’t want to go backwards!

Cardiac arrest - August 11, 2015

Today was amazing. We stayed at the perfect place last night. It had a train that ran close by that woke us all up at an ok hour. We realized breakfast was over at 9 so we all yanked on clothes and headed to the restaurant. Dinner was much better, but we all found something edible.

We were supposed to wake up at 5:45 to see if the local moose came to the pond outside the restaurant for breakfast. That didn't happen. I woke up, but Tony refused to get up. We still haven't seen any big game while we've been out here. The funny thing is that back home we have to stop and gander at any and every deer we see. It has barely been a blip on Tony's radar at the deer we've seen out here. We hope to remedy that tomorrow at Yellowstone.

We decided to go into Glacier on the east side since we had to travel so far to find a room last night. It was totally the best way to see the park since so many people start from the west side. We ended up turning in too soon but that was a great uh-oh. It routed us back around to where we needed to be. Along the way we got to see a beautiful lake, sheer rock mountains, and a hawk. Gorgeous.

Once we got on the right track, we started seeing burnt forest. We all sat in stunned silence in the car. This was old burn versus what's burning now. It was miles and miles as far as the eye could see of what looked like tooth picks standing. It was a very solemn drive into the park. It almost felt like driving through a graveyard. Tony even likened it to driving through an Indian burial ground.

But the good news is that the new growth is prosperous underneath it. The small pines are probably about a foot tall. The further we drove, the taller it got. In looking at the landscape, I'd say the large majority of the park has burnt at some point. There are so many patches where you can tell it's burned. Some are small areas and others are vast acreage. A natural state for a forest, but still hard to swallow being a tree lover.

We got to the area that is currently burning. We didn't see any flames, but the charred ground and trees still reeked of fire. We did see one small trail of smoke high on one ridge. One whole section of the road into the park had all the pull outs blocked. The trails in those areas were blocked off, too. The smoke on one section was so bad visibility was limited. But it soon cleared and with the trees limbs gone, we saw much more of the park than we would have otherwise.

The views in the park were simply stunning. We ran out of superlatives to describe one ginormous mountain peak from the next. The mountains were layered in valleys of trees at the bottom, to large meadows of wild flowers, to then sheer rock. The rocks are layered in various colors that range get in color from yellow, green, red, pink, white, gray, and black. 

There were mountains that formed a single, pointy, rocky peak, some that formed a ridge of multiple mountain rocky peaks, and others that were a solid rock plateau. There were so many beautiful water falls and rivers gushing down the crevices we lost count. 

At Logan's Pass, which is the pinnacle of the mountain range, we dropped over to the other side. A sign said it was an eleven mile descent to the bottom. Crazy gorgeous doesn't cover it. We also decided having the monster truck in that park would have been a very bad idea. The roads were pretty narrow. We also discussed how bad it would be to have car problems on the road. It wasn't mush later that we saw a car with a flat tire blocking traffic. Fortunately there was a park ranger there helping them. We were glad it wasn't us!

We stopped at numerous pull outs along the way for photo opps. The girls hate that phrase. We're taking pictures at break neck speeds. I just pass the camera to whomever has the best view point and say "Photo opp"! The biggest problem is two windows have to go down to stop that gosh awful air pressure imbalance in the car. Wind whips through the car for a bit, and then all is well. We've gotten some beautiful shots for sure.

At the bottom of the mountain, we were following a river that got bigger and stronger as we went because of all the glaciers melting into it. We stopped for the obvious photo opp. Jen found a trail down to it. We had not hiked all day and felt we couldn't really say we'd been to the park unless we did, so we went for it. Once we got down there we realized just how beautiful it was. It was crystal clear. It had a bluish tint to it from all the glacier water. We could see each and every little pebble in the bottom. 

As I looked down on it, I got this strange urge to jump. I asked Jen if she'd do it, she agreed immediately. We then looked at Cass to see if she'd go. At first she refused. I had to sell it to her that we had clothes and towels in the car. The hard part for her was she had big hiking boots on. I knew she'd need them on to climb out of the water that was lined with rock walls. She finally caved, and said she'd go. 

We were going to go one at a time, but then decided to all go together. Cass then chickened out of that proposition. Jen and I said we're out of here, and at the count of three, jumped. It felt a tiny bit like Thelma and Louise. My adrenaline was pumping up to the point I was airborne. It was about that time I remembered what the feeling of falling felt like. The bottom of my courage fell out, but I was shit out of luck in backing out. 

The next shock was hitting the frigid water. As soon as I hit the water I thought maybe I was wrong to be so eager to take the plunge. It was damn cold. I popped up and immediately wanted the ejection button. I looked at Jen and saw the same look on her face. Our original plan was a bit flawed from the start. We were to swim back up stream to get out. Problem was, it was at a white water drop. We swam, but we didn't get anywhere. I gave up pretty quickly and started for the closest rock. 

It's amazing what frigid water temperature does to a body. I think my heart may have stopped on initial impact. Then my brain seemed to stop working. Cass jumped in right after we did. I sort of remember her jumping in, but all my brain could think about was survival. Getting out of that water was first priority. I'm glad Tony caught it on camera, because my memory of it is extremely foggy. 

Once we hauled ourselves out, we started warming up quickly. We then had to figure out how to cross back over. We decided to go down the river and see if it got more shallow so we could cross. We had to boulder a few places, but we found a spot. The bad thing was the water was moving very swiftly through some big rocks. We decided to back up a bit and cross in the water. 

It's amazing how quickly the brain forgets sometimes. It didn't look like it was that far to cross in the water. I hopped right in the water without thinking. Again, the the water took my breath. We scurried across and felt like bosses when it was all over. 

My skin tingled for the better part of an hour after our excursion. I kept saying I wish we could do it again. For me, it was the highlight of the trip so far. Everyone loved Glacier Park. It will be hard to top for the remainder of what we're going to see.

Tonight we drove into Bozeman, Montana to stay before heading to Yellowstone. We saw that park on our last trip. We loved it best with of all of the critters we saw. Since we haven't seen any so far this trip, it may still take the cake if we can score some big game sightings there.

As the trip is coming to a close, we're finding it more and more difficult to stay in the car for long stretches of time. I had to beg everyone to continue on to Bozeman tonight to make tomorrow's trip to Yellowstone shorter. When we're in the parks, riding is no problem. It's just the long distances in between them that are so tiring. Yellowstone is a HUGE park and will take a long time to get through. We're planning to stay in Jackson tomorrow night. We're all looking forward to it and The Grand Tetons. After that, it's back to Denver.

The warranty company approved about 75% of the costs of fixing the truck. They're supposed to be working on it and have it ready for us to pick up on Friday. We're mostly in denial that there will be any issues with that schedule. We're just thinking positive. We've had enough heart issues for one trip!!

Glacier, August 10, 2015

This road trip is starting to take its toll on everyone. We got in fairly late to Spokane and no one wanted to get up early to head for Glacier.  I had set an alarm for 6:00, just laid back down. We all slowly got moving and finally headed out around 9:30.

We sat downstairs for a bit watching people as they came in for breakfast. There was one couple that had 4 or 5 kids that were having an argument. There was a woman that came rushing in asking for a locksmith. She had locked their keys in the car and had a plane to catch. As we were leaving, we saw them finally getting into their car. She started crying once they got into their car, and I so knew what she was feeling!

We’ve had a lot of evidence that our Mom’s are watching out for us. We think they worried too much in our initial shenanigans they’re doing their best to keep the rest of our trip uneventful. We’ve had near misses with car accidents, I nearly lost Tony’s cell phone today when I hopped out to get a picture and it was in my lap (fortunately I had left the door open and Tony saw it on the ground), and we’ve been able to find lodging even at peak season out here without reservations.

If there’s one piece of advice I’d give anyone traveling out here, it would be to make sure you have reservations. We’ve spent a considerable amount of time calling places and dropping in to find that everywhere is booked. Even though I had planned 6 places where we’d need reservations, I never made them. After the rocky start, I didn’t want to jinx us by making reservations that we may not be able to keep if we had any further problems. But like I said, we’ve always managed.

Some places have been nicer than some. Tonight we nearly had to stay in a complete hole in the wall. We’re not entirely sure what it was, but it looked like a small trailer converted into a hotel. You couldn’t even open the door to the place without bumping into one of the beds. You had to close the door and shimmy around the bed to get to the little bathroom. Cassidi who is our picky hotel queen refused to stay!

We went on down the road and found a really cool place that is a cabin. It is part of a complex of cabins out in the middle of nowhere. We had a wonderful dinner in the restaurant that overlooks a small pond/lake. I asked if wildlife ever came up. They told us a moose usually does. We waited, but no moose. We’re supposed to get up super early to go look for him. I’ll be surprised if Mr. McCann ventures out that early.

We’re in the final push through Glacier tomorrow and then we’ll head south. We hope to hit Yellowstone before we get back to Denver. I think everyone is ready for some rest, quiet/alone time, and to not sit in a car for hours. We’ve done reasonably well with tolerating each other. No homicides have been committed just yet. We still have a week to go, however.

We’re hoping Glacier is fully open due to all the wildfires. We saw a bit of it this evening before we decided we better head out to find a place to stay. We had hoped to stay in the park, but everything there was booked, including the campsites. We saw a place that looks like it was recently damaged by the fires. It’s sad to see, but we realize it’s a necessary evil in nature. I just wish they could be controlled burns instead of these crazy blazes.

Tomorrow will most likely be another slow moving day. I’ve grown weary of being the vacation nazi and am fine with whatever. They all just have to suffer the consequences of losing sleep when we have to be somewhere in order to stay on schedule to get back to Denver. I knew it would come to this, but there wasn’t a thing I could do about it. Some things in life are just a given. And whirlwind vacation trips are exhausting… perod!

Pacific NorthWest - August 9, 2015

Today we reached the furthest point west on our trip. We got up extremely early to do a sea kayaking trip in search of orcas. After we were on the water, our guide told us he’d been in WA for 4 months guiding and hadn’t seen a whale as yet. It would have been nice had he told us that before we paddled around an island for 3 hours! Oh well. We saw an eagle, harbor porpoise, and a couple of seals. We felt successful because no one fell out of their kayak.

When we finished, we headed to the little town of Anacortes for lunch. They were having an art festival so we got the added bonus of seeing street performers and local art. We wandered around for quite a while before we decided to get back in the car to head for the North Cascades park.

The park was another drive through park. It had numerous snow caps and amazing rivers and lakes. Actually, there are three dams in the park. The water is an emerald color. Simply gorgeous. We have taken picture after picture along this journey and not a single one captures the true beauty. We keep taking them though.

We decided to continue on to Spokane this evening to hopefully get some time in Glacier tomorrow afternoon. We rode through a little place that looked like an old west town. It would have been nice to find a place to stay and spend the evening there. But one draw back was that too many people were there. It was sort of a mini Gatlinburg.

It’s been another long night of driving. Fortunately Jennifer has done the majority of the driving in the last two days. Tony had another dud day for some reason. We’re all laughing at him as he’s the one usually making fun of us for dragging. I can only imagine the shock his body is in after all his London travels on top of all this driving. He hurt his back just before the trip and no amount of massage, stretching, or ibuprofen seems to be helping him. He just needs rest. Maybe in a week or so.

We have moments of crabbiness and then moments of belly laughter. We’re making new memories that one day will be reviewed in much the same manner as we’re rehashing our old memories now. The girls never remember much about our first west trip. All their memories are our memories regurgitated or pictures we took. Hopefully with them being older this time, they’ll remember.

We are all in need of some rest. I don’t think we’ll be getting any of that in the very near future. The schedule is quickening in pace it seems. We’re expecting to be back in Denver this Friday to pick up the truck. We haven’t heard from the guy on the progress at this point. I’m sure we’ll hear something tomorrow. We’ve mostly been in denial about those first 72 hours of the trip. These last few days we’ve managed to enjoy without incident. We continue to knock on wood hoping our good luck will hold out.

We’ve had a great time in the Pacific NorthWest. The parks are gorgeous, the people have been nice, the cities held different surprises, the ferry ride from one corner to the other was interesting, the weather has been beautiful, and we’ve crammed every day full of activity from sun up to sun down. I don’t think we could have seen or done anything more than what we have. But we have left some things undone so we’ll have to return. Later… much later.

On schedule, August 8, 2015

Last night we decided to sleep in until 8:00 today. Jennifer said it’s the first time she’s ever considered getting up at 8:00 as sleeping in. Last night wore us to a frazzle. "Mr. I can sleep when I die" spent the day in the back seat sleeping the majority of the day. I think we’ve found his Achilles heel. He drove the large majority of our first week. Jennifer took over the wheel today. I’ve pretty much decided that every time I drive, I do something I shouldn’t. I’ll just let them drive.

We went to breakfast today at a really nice diner in Port Angeles. It’s a beautiful little town at the top of the Washington peninsula. Olympic National Park was just south of the little town. We decided on a route that would hopefully let us see a good bit of the important sites of the park but still make the ferry we had scheduled in Port Townsend. We saw the rainforest, the beach front, and the mountains from afar. Cass was unhappy that we didn’t make it to the visitor center where you could view Mount Olympus. But the weather was rainy and cloudy and we wouldn’t have been able to see the top of the mountain anyway.

Port Townsend was also a neat looking place. We didn’t get to even drive through it. We made it to the ferry with about 45 minutes to spare. We got in line and headed across the water. We didn’t see any whales or critters other than seagulls. It only took about 30 minutes to cross. On the other side, we saw beautiful farm land and rainbows everywhere. Simply gorgeous.

We’re finding that this country that we’re living in is vast, beautiful, and holds its own unique qualities every mile that we travel. While some things may look the same as the next, there is always something that separates it from everything else. Today I had a wish that I could store every site I’m seeing like the pictures that I’m taking. There are just so many views to take in. And pictures simply don’t do them justice.

We got into our hotel this evening earlier than we have to any along the way. Our energizer bunnies are running low on umph! Tomorrow is going to be another busy day of seeing what the next bend in the road holds. It will be the last day that we’ll stay on schedule with what we planned before. From here on out, we’ll have to fast forward things a bit. We’re not entirely sure how we’re going to do it, but as always, we’ll get it done. It may just be a little more painful than we expected.

It’s hard to believe we’ve only been at this a week. I’ve gotten to the point where I’ve forgotten some of what we’ve already seen. We’ve been so focused on moving forward, reviewing hasn’t crossed out minds. I’m grateful for all the pictures and the words of these blogs. One day I’ll be able to look back and appreciate all we’ve done. However, right now, I could go for a 24 hour nap!

Nearly Heaven, August 7, 2015

It was another get up bright and early and travel until the wee hours of the day kinda day. We saw Mount Rainier and had to drag ourselves away to get to the next destination. What an amazing mountain. We had binoculars with us and someone pointed out the hikers going up the glacier. They were the size of ants but we could make out their snow trail. We had to be as close to Heaven as we've ever been before.

It was another day of taking pictures on the approach only to keep out doing each shot. We'd constantly be craning around in our seats looking for the mountain. The contrast in all the colors of green was beautiful. The deep hunter green was nearly black. The pencil thin pines that were bare of branches on one side and thick on the other were quite intriguing.

The glaciers on the mountain just didn't look real. We're going to have to find a documentary on Rainier and watch it. It's truly a majestic place. We didn't see a single critter though. Tony loves wild critters. It's a big park and full of beauty. We walked out to a water fall and it was a much longer hike than we expected. Jennifer saw a snake (well I guess we saw one wild critter), and I had to hold Tony back from picking it up and playing with it. He went after it for sure!

We finally realized we had to get out of there to head for Seattle. We drove right to the space needle and parked. It was a two and a half hour delay until we could go up or we could buy a blast pass to go right up. Of course that was the more pricey option. Because of the 2.5 hour trip North we had to take for the night for the next day's activities, we spent the additional money. The view from above was amazing.

Seattle is a very pretty and vibrant city. It wasn't as busy as I expected down by the space needle, but then again it was Friday night. I'd say Saturday is busier. . It's a really neat area of entertainment and businesses. It's also very clean and safe. There was an outdoor concert going on that was playing groovy hip music. Again, no one wanted to leave.

Because we've had so many problems finding places to stay, I had made a reservation at a park outside Olympic Park north of Seattle. All day long I kept reminding everyone of the time necessary to get there. No one wanted to listen. We are still on the road to the hotel at 11:30. We're not due in until 12:10. Another super long day. 

Tomorrow morning we see Olympic Park. We have decided to sleep in - a whopping 8:00. We have some hard decisions tomorrow because the park is 454 miles round trip. We'll have about 7 hours to see it. We made reservations for the ferry and another hotel  further North for sea kayaking for tomorrow night. Looks like I'll be vacation Nazi tomorrow, too.

The crazy train vacation won out even though I begged for a single park and some relaxation. But as Tony says, we can sleep when we're dead. At this chaotic rate, that may not be far off! We've put 2200 miles on the rental in 4 days. And don't forget the 1500 from Fancy Gap to Denver. Right now we've stayed on track with the spreadsheet I created. That's all going to have to change somehow in the next few days. We're running out of days and have to go back to Denver. We'll deal with that later. Right now, all we can think about is some sleep for tonight. Soon...

Just plain tired - August 6, 2015

It has been quite the day. We woke up at 6:00 a.m. to get it going. We had breakfast that was less than stellar at our roach coach hotel. It wasn't quite that bad, but definitely not worth $160 for a night's sleep. These west coast prices are pretty over priced!

First on the agenda was Crater Lake. It was an hour and a half drive. We ooh'ed and awh'ed from simply driving into the beginning of the park. We got out and took pictures of the deep canyon with the river at the bottom, the gorgeous Ponderosa pines, and the narrow road leading into the park surrounded by beautiful nature. By the time we actually got to the lake, we were enamored. The color of that crystal clear blue water is unimaginable!

We rode around the rim stopping at each point to take a few bazillion pictures from each vantage point. We are still amazed at how you can take a picture from one direction of something and think it's the very best only to change locations and find one that's better. Sorting through the pictures is quite laborious. But the pictures do not do the scenery justice.

After that we headed for Portland. We saw Mt. Hood from a distance as we searched for our pit stop to see Multnomah Falls just east of Portland. 610 feet of water crashing down from the top of a mountain. So beautiful. The girls wanted to climb to the top, but time just got away from us. We went into the city to get pictures of the girls. Jen wants to move west and we think maybe she found a new home in Portland. Cass says she's going to follow. We'll see. I told them if they do move, they're going to have to find a surrogate grandmother for their kids because I am NOT moving to Portland. It's far too much city for me!

We are staying in Kelso WA which is about 45 minutes from Mt. Ranier where our first destination is tomorrow. I'd really love to sleep in for the whole day tomorrow, but that's not going to happen. It will be another early to rise kind of day for the McCanns. I'm running on fumes, that's for sure. I think everyone else is, also.

I was quite testy with the front desk clerk as we checked in tonight. Another night of expensive hotel costs for less than 8 hours of stay. And they refused to give us a AAA discount, because they have so few rooms left for the night. We checked in at 11:00 p.m.!! The final straw was when I wanted to pay cash and was told it would be a $250 deposit because we may damage the room and they couldn't recover the costs. I'm sure we looked like the punk rocker party types as we strolled in at 11:00 p.m. with our hineys dragging. UGH!! Whatever.... Maybe a night's rest will give me a new attitude. Cass said maybe we need to institute a 24 hour quiet game because I was being so grumpy. Maybe so....