The End is Near!

So my trip is coming to an end :( I picked up Aimee in the RV at the Jackson Hole Airport on Monday June 11th. It’s a little difficult to find a parking spot with a 32 foot RV towing a car! But, if you are going to park an RV then the little airport at Jackson Hole is one of the few places you probably could get away with it. After picking up Aimee we headed to Grand Teton RV Park in Moran Junction just east of Teton National Park. The website made it look like a great RV park to stay at. Lesson learned, it was an RV park amongst a junkyard. The owner had snowmobiles, a dump truck and an assortment of other things parked around the property. It was rate 3 W’s by Woodalls, I decided that I needed to look for 4 or 5 W’s from now on! (The KOA here in the Black Hills is rated 3 W’s, but is much, much nicer. So much for Woodall ratings!)

The next morning Aimee and I drove up into Yellowstone to see Old Faithful and other sights in the Southwest section of Yellowstone. After visiting Old Faithful we headed north to Firehole Canyon drive, on the way we got stuck in an 45 minute traffic jam! We literally turned off the engine and waiter for…. a herd of 300 bison to pass. We got a lot of pictures! At the end, I had already put away my camera, when one bison crossed in front of our car and stopped and stared right at us! It was only after the park ranger on horse said to us that was a Kodak moment if I ever have seen one, did I realize that I missed a great shot. After the herd passed we headed up to Firehole Canyon to do the drive, when as I was about to take the turn a park range closed the gates on the road! Man just my luck. So we headed up the road to a visitor center to use the restrooms and to give the herd time to get off the road before we headed back to our RV. Unfortunately we didn’t leave enough time. On the way back we were stuck in another back up that lasted closed to a half hour. You thought NoVA traffic was bad!

Since we decided we really didn’t like our RV park we cancelled our third night and got a spot at Flagg Ranch RV park, just outside the south entrance of Yellowstone. Since we had to break camp on Wednesday we decided not to go into Yellowstone, but to check out Teton National Park around Flagg Ranch. We did a short hike along the Snake River, which was not real exciting other than we constantly were on the look out for Grizzly Bears! Luckily we didn’t come across any!

Flagg Ranch was a nice place to stay. It was amongst the Lodge Pole pines next to a river. That night we saw a mother Moose and her baby grazing in a field just 25 yards from the RV park! It was a pretty cool sight to see and she didn’t seem to care that me, Aimee and 10 other people were watching.

The next day we broke camp and drove the RV into Yellowstone Park, since we would be spending the next two nights at Fishing Bridge RV in the park. After parking the RV in the visitor lot we drove up to the Grand Canyon of the Yellowstone to see Upper and Lower falls. Lower Falls was magnificent. After seeing the falls we did a hike along the south rim to Uncle Tom’s trail and descended 328 stairs to see Lower Falls up close! Aimee had a little difficulty climbing back up the stairs due to Asthma, but she was a trooper and made it to the top with no real complaints! We drove to Inspiration Point along the North Rim get another view of the canyon and also did a hike based on some tourists recommendation to the Brink of the Lower Falls.

After doing our tour of the Canyon we headed back to Fishing Bridge to set up the RV so I could be back to Mud Volcano for a ranger led tour, which was something I decided I really wanted to do. The tour was a little too long for the information expunged by the ranger, but I guess it was worth it.

Friday we went up to see Geyser basin. I think it was the best thermal area in the Park. There were sections were it was just a wasteland with bubbling mud pots, steaming vents, and emerald hot springs. It was definitely worth the drive. As we headed towards Mammoth Springs Aimee indicated that she would like to go to the Grizzly Nature Reserve in West Yellowstone, since I had gotten to do pretty much everything I wanted to do and was curious about West Yellowstone, I agreed. It was definitely worth heading that way, since along the way we came upon a bunch of cars parked on the side of the road. A sure sign that animals were nearby! It was awesome; two very large Elks were grazing 50 yards off the road. As we sat there they seemed curious about our car and headed directly towards us. One crossed the road just in front of the car and the other came up timidly stopped looked at us and all the other cars, turned slowly and walked away down the road. It got blocked by a car that had just parked across the road from us. It move down a piece crossed half way across the road, stopped and looked frighteningly at two carks blocking its path. It then jumped up as it crossed between the two. What an awesome sight! t and I figured that the Elks may have been curious about our car because we had Barley in the back seat and it could smell her. By the way Barely went a little nuts, so I had to nuzzle her with my hand. Seeing those elk made the trip over to West Yellowstone worth it, since the Grizzly park wasn’t that great.

Saturday morning we broke camp again and headed back to an RV park in the Jackson Hole since Aimee had to fly out the next day. After I dropped Aimee off on Sunday, I drove the RV clear across Wyoming to the Black Hills of South Dakota. If was rough going since I didn’t get much sleep the night before and once you leave the mountains the drive is very uninspiring; just plain boring!

Today I got up early took a tour of Wind Cave, drove along a very windy and interesting road through Custer State Park up to Mount Rushmore. I hadn’t plan on going to Mount Rushmore, since I saw it was a kid and how much better can it be to see in person than in a picture? Well it was definitely worth it! Seeing it up close you really feel the size and magnificence of it! I was lucky that all the lower decks of the parking garage were full and only the top deck, which was accessible directly from the road, was available! As I drove onto the top deck, I remembered that I had the bikes on the roof! Close call!

When I was in Yellowstone I saw a news piece on the Crazy Horse Memorial near Mount Rushmore. It’s to be a huge granite monument to Crazy Horse that will dwarf Mt. Rushmore. I decided I had to see it. They have been working on this since 1948 and just finished the face in 1998. The plan is to depict Crazy Horse sitting on his horse point off to the horizon. As the lady said that I followed into the Gift Shop, it’s not going to be finished in my lifetime!

Tomorrow I get up and head home. I plan to try to make 1700 miles in 3 or 4 days. I may post a final blog on my trip when I get home. Hopefully I’ll add some pictures. Thanks for following my trip!

Pictures from NoCA to Craters of Moon

As promised some pictures from my last week of travels; from Northern California to Craters of the Moon. This is Trinidad Beach, CA:

This is the longest road I have ever been on without seeing a single sign of people, 100 miles of nothingness between McDermitt, NV and Jordan Valley, WY. Soutwestern Wyoming is devoid of the living!

A view of the top of the Sawtooth National Recreation Area (SNRA) at the top of Horton Peak:

And the old ranger satation on top of Horton Peak:

A nice view of the Sawtooth Mountains coming down from Horton Peak:

Here's a picture of Lake Alturas Lake

<- This is a picture of Redish lake in the SNRA.

At the end of my 1700 foot climb up a dirt logging road I was greeted by single track into a burned out wilderness. The signs said enter at your own risk; trees may fall at any moment and risks of flash flooding.

Some of the hills were so scorched that two years later nothing was still growing.

And two thousand years later not much has grown at the Craters of the Moon National Monument......

Ketchum and the SNRA!

First, thanks all for replying to my previouse post! It looks like the cluster map is working now.

Warning! This is a long posting since I haven’t had Internet for a while.

On Monday I arrived in Boise at the Meridian-Boise RV Park. I was quite tired after my long and boring drive through northern Nevada and southeast Oregon. I missed my turn for the RV Park and found myself in a traffic jam! In Boise, Idaho of all places. Anyhow after settling in I needed to go grocery shopping. I had asked the lady at the RV Park front desk if there was grocery store nearby and she said very nearby, just turn at the Starbucks and you’ll see Winn-Co foods. I did as she said, but I didn’t see any Winn-Co foods and I ended up in Boise rush hour; traffic wasn’t moving! I started to take side streets to avoid the traffic and eventually after a few right and wrong turns, I ended up at the back loading docks of Winn-Co. I was saved. Now all I had to do was shop on an empty stomach. I ended up buying a bunch of junk food that I could have done without.

The next day was calling for rain all day, so I decided to take a drive north up state road 55 to Cascade Lake state park. I had thought of camping there instead of Boise, but I am glad I didn’t; it wasn’t that great. After eating lunch at a parking lot for the boat launch and talking to Aimee about her plans of meeting me at Yellowstone and our camping plans, I headed back towards Boise. On the way back I took a detour through Garden Valley and down state road 21. It was a beautiful and very windy route back to Boise.

On Wednesday I took the RV to Lithia Ford for its 15K mile service. Barley got to hang out with me for 2.5 hours in the customer waiting area. It was a very nice waiting area; I think the best one I have ever been in. Barley enjoyed it quite a bit, because many people stopped to say hello to her. After getting the RV service I had to decide if I was going to stay another night in the hopping (sic) city of Boise or risk driving to Sun Valley in a high wind warning. I decided to take the risk and if it got too bad I would just pull off and find a place to stay. Luckily the wind was at my back most of the way and I made it to Sun Valley by 4:00 pm.

My home for the next 4 nights would be a Forest Service camping spot just 8 miles north of Ketchum (Sun Valley). It has no hookups, so I would have to live without any connection to the world for the next 4 days; other than my trips into Ketchum, which is a very nice resort town. I really like the spot, it’s just off the road and each camping spot is secluded by groves of Aspen trees!

On Thursday morning I drove into town to check it out and get information from the Visitor Center. It was very quiet for a resort town. On the way back to the RV I stopped at the Forest Service Visitor center to get some information on Mountain Biking. They were very helpful; Ketchum and the Sawtooth Recreation are has many mountain biking trails to explore. I took a ride after lunch on the Chocolate Gulch and Fox Creek trails. I found out how out of shape I have become. Fox Creek had a very sweet downhill! It reminded me of the Colorado trail ride I did two summers ago just outside of Breckenridge, Colorado. I think that this place is turning out to be the best spot for Mountain Biking on the trip! Plus I am enjoying the seclusion of my camping spot. It’ll probably get a little less secluded this weekend, when all the other campers arrive.

Today – Friday was an excellent day. Barley and I took a hike to the top of a Mountain in the Sawtooth National Recreation Are that I can’t recall the name of. It was a 2800 foot climb to the peak. It was an awesome view from the top! A 360 degree view of many of the mountains in the Sawtooth Range. On the way up the trail we kept coming across an animal track that I figured was a small Mountain Lion, since it’s paw print was much smaller than Barley’s. After finishing the hike we took a ride further north into the Sawtooth, stopped by Redfish lake which was beautiful and had several campsites you could stay at. Right now I am composing the remainder of this blog on the curb outside Starbucks, since they closed and my minutes with T-Mobile haven’t run out. Okay, so that didn’t happen, I lost my connection.

Well I have a free connection now outside another coffee store in Ketchum. Its Saturday evening and I am headed to dinner. Today was another good day! I woke up late since I stayed out late last night in Ketchum to listen to a band. I ran out of steam at 11pm and headed home. For some reason I decided to check my car tires for chalk marks and low and behold both passenger wheels where marked. That has never happened to me! So I went into a bar and asked for a glass of water to go! I washed the marks off and drove home, safely. After rolling out of bed and taking Barley for a short walk, I got my bike stuff together and drove back into the Sawtooth National Recreation Area (SNRA) to ride a trail a guy at the bar told me about. It was sweet! The ride started on higway 75 and then turned onto a gravel road that I climbed for 1700 feet over an hour or so. At the top it turned to single track and basically headed back down hill through the burned out forest. The downhill was a lot of fun, but it ended quickly and I thought that sucked to do all that climbing and only get a short downhill! But, wait after a short climb I was greeted with even sweeter downhill. It was great, as good as if not better than Douthat in Virginia. When I thought I was done, the trail started climbing again and then some more sweet downhill. What a great ride!

Hope to post some pictures when I get to Yellowstone, where I’ll have free wi-fi.

Is anyone reading my blog?

I'm not sure anyone is reading this blog, since the cluster map I added hasn't recorded any visits. It may be that the cluster map isn't working, so if you have visited, please post a comment.

BTW Since my last post I visited Lassen Volcanic National Park for 3 days, spent one night in Winnemucca, NV and I am now in Boise, Idaho. I'm getting the RV serviced tomorrow and then head off to dry camp north of Sun Valley for 4 nights, where I'll have no Internet access.

Lassen Volcanic national park is supposed to be a mini Yellowstone, but it was too early in the season since most of the trail were still closed due to snow. In fact the park didn't open until Memorial Day due to snow, and last year they didn't open until July. I did take a 2 hour hike up a trail, but had to turn back because I lost track of the trail in the snow.

The drive from Lassen through Winnemucca to Boise was very boring. It's basically desert the whole way! At one point along the way from Winnemucca to Boise there was a section of road where there were no services for 100 miles. You don't want to be low on gas on that road! I swear there wasn't a single curve in the road for over 30 miles. I was worried I would fall asleep at the wheel. I would have pulled my hair out from boredom, that's if I had any hair! Today it rained all day, so Barley and I just drove around Boise National Forest for 6 hours. It is actually it's the first rain that I have encountered since Austin, TX 4 weeks ago!

Well, I may abandon posting to this blog, it no one is actually reading it.

Please post a comment if you are.

Thanks.

No TV!

So for the first time on the trip I have no access to TV. It's pretty pathetic that I really felt the need for TV, but I think it's turning out to be a good thing. It's giving me some time to think and to drink a little too much. I am at an RV park just out side of Lassen Volcanic National Park. I arrived today in the early afternoon.

The drive over here from Fortuna was quite interesting. Crossing the coastal range in a 32 ft RV towing a car made for a slow trip. There were many 6, 7 and 8% grades over the mountains. When I reached the Trinity river things smoothed out, but the road remained very twisty! It was nice too get away from the ocean, since the cold fog went away and I was greeted with the Sun for the first time in 4 days!

I am now officially heading east! Guess that means that my trip is at least half over! Good bye West Coast, I'll miss you. Tomorrow I plan on hitting Lassen Volcanic National Park; not sure what I'll do the next day. After that I head through Nevada to Idaho. I hear there is good Mountain Biking there!

Well time to get back to drinking!

Aimee bails out!

Yesterday morning I dropped Aimee off at the Oakland Airport so she could fly back home. She missed her friends and family. It’s just Barley and me for the next 3 weeks or so. Since we left Bryce, we have visited Las Vegas for just one night – a quick stop over to break up the long leg between Bryce and Malibu; Malibu for 4 nights, which included a Warner Brothers Studio tour, a lunch on Rodeo drive, a drive up to Santa Barbara, and a walk along Venice Beach; Yosemite for 4 nights, two nights in Santa Cruz; and one night in San Francisco at Candlestick RV Park, which sucked and was the most expensive RV Park of the trip, $69 a night!

I really have enjoyed most of California. Staying at the beach at Malibu park was really cool, in both senses of the word. We didn’t spot any stars, but did see a few dolphins swimming in the ocean. It never seems to get warm when you are close to the Ocean in California. Glacier Point in Yosemite has been the most beautiful spot on the trip. From this vantage point you can see the entire Yosemite Valley, Half Dome, Nevada Falls, Yosemite Falls, and others I can’t remember the names of. I did get a good 4 hour hike one day while at Yosemite. I hiked to the top of Yosemite Falls and then continued to Yosemite Point for lunch and a cell phone call to my parents.

The RV Park we stayed at just outside of Santa Cruz in the town of Felton was situated amongst tall California Redwoods. Felton and Santa Cruz have a very strong hippie feel to it. Our last morning in Felton I got a quick mountain bike ride in on the University of CA at Santa Cruz property. It was a real nice ride amongst the redwoods. When I got to the top I came to a sign that warned that this was Mountain Lion territory and to remain very aware. This freaked me out some and I thought of turning back, but a rider came along so I nonchalantly asked him if there were some good trails around, he said all over the place. I followed him for a while on the fire road, when he realized I was right on his rear wheel he picked up the pace. I wasn’t surprised, since most guys do this when they didn’t realize you were right there.

I got bored riding the fire road, so when I saw single track I cut off the fire road and headed out into the woods. I noticed a group of riders hanging out on the trail to the right of me as I took the split to the left. I kind of figured that the trail made a big loop and returned to the starting point. After riding for a while I came upon a group of riders riding in the opposite direction, so I figured this was the same group hanging out at the split and that this confirmed my intuition. Eventually I came to a point in the trail where I thought I was back at my starting point, but then I saw a car going by on a paved road that I didn’t notice was there when I started I got back on the trail and continued. However, I kept noticing that road to the left of me as I continued on the trail. Crap! This trail isn’t looping as I thought, so I decided to bail out and hit the road, figuring it would go back to Route 9 where I started the ride. My time was running out since I had to be back by 10:30 am to clean up and check out of the RV Park.

After riding the road for a while, I thought it best, to just retrace my path back to the beginning. All was going well, I kept noticing landmarks that I had passed on my way out. Boy were there a lot of turn offs on the trail! I kept questioning if I was going the right way, but then I would notice a landmark and would feel more confident. Then I cam to a point in the trail where I wasn’t sure where to go, luckily there were two riders stopped at a turn off point. I told them that I had gotten a little turned around up here and asked if they could tell me how to get back to Route 9. They told me I had several options, the coolest of which would be to head down the trail and take the second left, which would bring me down a wicked down hill directly to Route 9. That was excellent since I only had 40 minutes left to get back and I had been out for 1 hour and 20 minutes. They were right, the downhill was pretty wicked, actually it was a little too much for the new timid me, but I got down it without crashing or dismounting the bike. It turned out to be a huge short cut, because I got back at 10:05.

After Santa Cruz, we headed up to Candlestick RV Park, arriving at just after 1:00. It was cold and foggy, just like Malibu. I didn’t want to sit around all afternoon so I convinced Aimee to go for a drive into downtown San Francisco. She warned me as we were driving in that traffic might suck and we would have a hard time fining parking, since we had the bikes on top of the car and couldn’t use a parking garage. She was right! After driving around for 1.5 hours we decided to head back to the RV Park and find a place near the park for a bite and a drink. We got off the interstate near the park and started to drive through the neighborhood. It’s not the sort of neighborhood you want to drive around! I think we saw a gang hanging out near a liquor store completely covered in graffiti. We decided to high tail it back to the RV Park. Back at the RV park I asked the check in guy, was there any place good nearby to get gas and food. He said go down the street to Bay Shore Dr. and there are places with food and gas. I asked him if it was safe and he said during the day it’s fine. We decided that we would order Pizza Delivery and that I would go to the nearest place and get gas. While I got gas, I decided we made the right decision.

After dropping Aimee off at the Airport, I went back to the RV park, took down our site and drove north to Fortuna, CA to see the famous California Redwoods. This morning Barley and I got up and drove south to visit the Avenue of Giants, which is the old stretch of US 101 that goes right trough groves of immense redwoods. On the way back I decided to take a detour that would bring me along the coast, back up to Fortuna. It was a really cool road! It wound its way up a very narrow road, barely two lanes wide, trough redwoods and up many switch backs up and down several hillsides. I kept expecting to see the ocean, when I noticed I was low on gas! I could head back or keep going, I decided to keep going. I really didn’t expect the detour to be as long as it was! I kept going up and down hillsides until I came to a Y in the road, an actual Y! I don’t know if I have ever seen a sign indicating a Y in the road. Luckily there was a sign that pointed me in the right direction, but it was 30 miles to the next town and I wasn’t even sure it would have gas. The road eventually came upon the ocean; it was a sight to behold! Waves crashing on rocks to the left and grassy hillsides with cattle grazing to the right and not a building in sight! This was terrific! But, I had the sinking feeling that I would come upon a road close sign and would have to turn back! This wasn’t an unreasonable fear since it had happened along the Avenue of Giants earlier.

The road eventually turned away from the coast and began to do it’s switchback thing up the hillsides and the road to much rougher. I couldn’t get the sinking feeling out of my mind that I would run out of gas and would get stuck out there! I figured I could take my bike off the roof and ride to the nearest town, but that would mean leaving Barley in the Car. I finally came to the town I was expecting and a sign that showed I only had 5 miles back to Fortuna! Yippee, I was saved! A little melodramatic, I know, but it was good to back!

Bryce Canyon

We’re about to leave Bryce Canyon, actually Cannonville, Utah, which is a bustling community of 150 souls. It has a little store and a motel. The post office is a little room inside the tiny Town Hall. Aimee said it is reminiscent of the Andy Griffith show.

Prior to coming to Bryce Canyon we spent 4 nights in Moab, Utah. I got to ride the famous Slick Rock mountain bike trail! It’s supposed to be the most technically challenging and physically demanding trail in this mountain bike mecca. It was definitely physically challenging, all the short steep down hills followed by the very step short up hills sapped my energy. I got a really early start; I was on the trail a little after 7 am and was only 1 of 3 out on the trail. I started with the practice loop, because the sign at the trailhead warned of the technical difficulty and suggested that newbies try the practice loop first before hitting the main trail. After completing the practice loop and discovering that it was within my technical abilities, I hit the main trail. I soon came upon two other guys on the trail, I passed them and cranked my way up a very steep uphill. While resting at the top, they passed me by. I soon came upon them when the first guy stopped and said to his buddy there are few 4 foot drops ahead, let’s watch this guy do it. I was a little apprehensive of 4-foot drop offs, but proceeded anyways. It was really a series of 2-foot drops offs, but I cleared them with ease. For the next two hours on the trail I didn’t see a single sole; it was very serene. I did get a little concerned that I took a wrong turn, because after I passed a turn off, I expected to seen another one in 2 tenths of a mile, but it was a very long time coming. I finally came upon two other riders ridding in the opposite direction, I asked them if the were riding clockwise, they said yes. This was very good since I was riding counter clockwise.

As I got closer to the trailhead, I began to come across many mountain bike riders. It was very nice to get out early and avoid the throng of riders! I did receive a few complements on my riding abilities, which was very nice! The slick rock trail was very enjoyable, not too technically demanding. I’d do it again, given the chance. Next time in Moab, I’d like to do the Porcupine Ridge trail. It would be better to do it earlier in the year since it’s longer and it gets hot out there quick!

After the slick rock ride, I was back at the RV by 10:30 as a I promised Aimee. After a quick shower, we went out and took a tour of Arches National Park. It was pretty cool to see all the arches. I don’t know what all the hub bub is about delicate arch, because I think the spectacles and Landscape Arch were much cooler.

The following day, Aimee drove to Telluride and I stuck around the RV park. In the morning I did a short two-hour ride from the RV park out into the desert toward Arches National park. I ran into a fence with an opening that declared I was at the Arches national park boundary and that no Mountain Bikes were allowed! The bastards! It was a friggin desert with nothing around. Anyways I found a bunch of riding to do just outside the park boundary.

The next morning we got up and drove to Bryce Canyon. On the way we drove through Escalante Grand Staircase. It really isn’t something you want to do in an RV! There are many steep upgrade and steep downgrades. The RV was whining like a teenage girl! At one point the road was barely two lanes wide with thousand foot drop offs on both sides and no guard rail!

Yesterday we drove through Bryce Canyon National Park. After a quick tour, I had Aimee drop me off and I did a one and half hour hike through the Hoodoo’s. It is much better to see them from below, than from the viewpoints just off the road. It was very cool. The Indians believe that the gods turned people to stone right where they were working.

Today we drove to Zion. It’s not quite as cool as Bryce, but definitely impressive. I hike up to Angel’s point but chickened out just after Chicken out point, since the trail was barely a foot wide with 6 thousand foot drop offs on each side. There was a chain to hold on to, but that wasn’t enough for me! I really didn’t think I was afraid of height until this point. I was actually more freaked out about freaking out than actually being freaked out. I didn’t want to freeze up on some ledge and have to have someone come and talk me down. So I turned around and came back down the mountain. I was a little ashamed, but was alive!

Abandoning Angels point gave me the time to do the river walk and wade up the Virgin River, which winds it’s way through thousand foot tall and 20 foot wide box canyons. That walk was definitely worth the hike! I’ll try to post some pictures soon!