9950 (miles traveled)

We are rolling in the last 20 now on the pike from Toledo this am. Thats alot o miles. A great trip indeed!

Wall Drug

Heading home on route 80. Stopped at Wall Drug. That place is pretty weird, chaotic and fun. Stayed in Omaha after 10 hours on the road. attaching some pics from Wall Drug.

Yellowstone

So we left the Tetons yesterday and spent the day exploring the other side of Yellowstone. It was quite an experience. We saw lots of roaming bison and some amazing landscape. Today we start our journey back via South Dakota. Pics of Yellowstone below.

Paintbrush Divide

We returned late yesterday from two days of hiking a spectacular circuit in the Tetons. We climbed about 4000 feet to 10700 at Paintbrush divide. The scenery was beyond any we have seen so far. We camped about 1200 feet below in a pine valley. No more bears to speak of but there were some indignant marmots. The marmot was pissed when we set up shop and strutted around glaring at us letting us know we were visitors in his house and we were not invited. Eventually the marmot got bored glaring at us so he went to bed in a tree trunk. Then there was a trio of birds skwaking away. They would not shut up for a couple hours. Bruce was convinced there was some sort of love triangle going on. The birds in these mountains are amazing. After the hike we went swimming in a lake where we saw a bald eagle. I am posting some pics from Old Faithful and the surrounding trails and from our paintbrush hike, the Marmot and the bald eagle on the top of a tree.

Tetons, Bears, and Old Faithful

We arrived in the Tetons on Saturday night and amazingly were able to camp in the park. We went to a visitor center to get trail maps and again with the bear shpeel they tell you only here they want everyone to carry bear spray. Ok ok- We listened and got the spray and al that. So Sunday morning we are heading up to a high mountain lake called Ampitheater lake and some guy comes walking down the trail and says "Hey guys just want to let you know a couple of bears are on the right 30 seconds up the trail" So we walk 30 seconds and sure enough to the right in the field I saw 1 big ass bear. Bruce says he saw 2 but we didn't linger because eye contact is not a good thing. Sorry no pics to share- you will just have to take our word for it. We continued on with our hike the lake was amazing and these are some high peaks for sure. Monday we drove through Yellowstone and saw the old faithful complex. It was very developed and disneyworldish. Today we plan to hike a spectacular loop called Paintbrush Canyon in the Tetons. We are going to backpack and camp in Backcountry wilderness so when we got our permit we also got a bear canister. No food in trees in the tetons it must be locked in a bear safe vault.
No pics today our internet connection is to slow but I will post some soon.

Craters of The Moon

We headed toward wyoming and passed Craters of the Moon National Park and decided to stop and check it out. As it turns out lava is pretty awesome. We saw flow, tunnels, spout holes and caves. The colors were really varied and very rich. We stayed in Idaho Falls- in a hotel had some well deserved showers and today we head for The tetons.

Sawtooth Wilderness

We spent the last two days hiking a circuit in the Sawtooth Wilderness. We passed several fairy tail lakes and crossed a few high and somewhat scary passes. This circuit had several river crossings with high-ish water so we had to take off our shoes to pass. The water was glacial melt so it was damn cold. Fortunately the air was quite warm so we enjoyed the
rivers. No sign of bears yet but a whole lot of mosquitos. Some pics of the Sawtooth Wilderness below. Now we are heading to Yellowstone and the Tetons .

Bacpacking in Idaho

We made our way from washington state to Idaho an headed for the Sawtooth Mts. Idaho is amazingly beautiful. I never really thought about Idaho until I was driving through it. The whole state is mountains, lakes and pristine rivers and parks. We decided to try out backpacking at sawtooth lake. We hiked up to this glorious lake and camped beside it. Bruce was responsible for hanging our food high up in a tree to keep bears from harassing us in our tent. I guess he did a good job because we were not harassed and our food was still there in the morning. Tomorrow we plan to do another backpack overnight near Lake Petit. I am posting some pics from Sawtooth lake.

Olympic Peninsula and Yakima

We drove up to the Olympic Peninsula from Portland and camped on a misty beach. It was very grey and drizzled the whole time. The beach had huge wood chunks that looked like gigantic bones. We ate some really tasty smoked salmon and drove on to Yakima where we camped. Today we drive through Washington States wine country.