The Dakotas

So much happens in a day it is hard to keep up! We all have gained a new appreciation for the Great Plains. On our way through western Montana we stopped at Pompey's Pillar.  We happened to hit the very weekend they were honoring William Clark because it was on July 25, 1806 that Clark carved his name on this famous rock, the day that the Corps of Discovery arrived there.

On to North Dakota…we had never heard of Theodore Roosevelt National Park, but now recommend it as a must see for those traveling through this part of the country.  It is as much about the man TR as it is about the beauty of the grasslands and the little Missouri Badlands.

We rolled into Custer, SD a bit late without reservations and were a bit worried as the popular Custer State Park was showing no vacancy on their website.  Amy found a number of private campground options, but we would need to stop and ask as the offices were closed. As we creeped through town we saw a lit-up cross above an open sign at a small RV campground called French Creek.  They had a spot for us! What great folks…very hospitable and kind to the weary traveler. We could spend two weeks here visiting all of the great places.  Yesterday we visited Wind Cave National Park and took an hour and a half tour through the cave.  They have found over 240 miles of cave all within a one square mile area and estimate they have only found 5% of the cave based on air volume exchange data. The most unique feature is the box work formations. Wind Cave is also a primary bison reserve.

We also visited The Mammoth Site in Hot Springs. The area was once a sink hole with an artesian hot spring that attracted Mammoths as well as other animals who got stuck in the hole and died.  So, far they have found the remains of 60 mammoths and several other species such as the giant short-faced bear, a very rare find. The boys are having breakfast at the moment and are discussing how the short faced bear might have gotten stuck and died in the hole…it's awesome!

Today we are off to see the Crazy Horse monument, Mount Rushmore, and a drive through Custer State Park.  We are sure to have more to report after today's adventure.

Montana and Wyoming

On our way across Montana (July 25) we stopped at the Madison Buffalo Jump State Park and learned of Native American hunting ingenuity. To get the bison all moving in the right direction (towards the cliff) a couple of young boys would dress up like another animal and start running ahead of the leader of the herd.  Keep in mind that bison can run up to 30 mph! Thanks, Mike and Stephanie, for the tip to stop in and see one of these amazing sites.  We made another stop at the Museum of the Rockies in Bozeman. The museum featured some of the finest dinosaur fossils in the world…Jackson was in heaven to say the least.

We drove into Yellowstone (July 26) under sunny hot skies which prompted a swim at Firehole falls then onto a few geysers and, of course, Old Faithful. We broke up our visit to Yellowstone with a couple of days in Jackson Hole.  The Tetons and Snake River Valley were as beautiful as ever.  We must have taken 50 photos of the mountains and 50 more of the bison! So much wildlife  everywhere in this wonderful corner of the US.  Driving to our campground at Gros Ventre in Grand Teton NP we saw pronghorn antelope, moose, and bison all at the same time! The boys enjoyed swimming in Jenny Lake and in the Gros Ventre River…this is becoming a theme of our trip…how many natural swimming holes can we find. What they did not enjoy as much was the mountain bike ride we took.  At a bike shop in Wilson I asked about local trails suited for a 9 and 11 year old who have done some moderate trails and would enjoy about 2 hours of riding.  Let it be know that the Teton Pass trails are a bit more difficult than that.  They stuck out the 5 hour ride not without letting me know they were not having fun anymore.  Other fun in Jackson included visiting with Kevin, a college buddy of mine who lives in JH and watching the shoot-out on the square. 

As we headed north (today) we took in the rest of the main sites in Yellowstone including the Grand Canyon of Yellowstone, Upper and Lower Falls, and Mammoth Hot Springs.  Some facts I learned this week are  that Yellowstone (almost the entirety of the park) is one big volcano that has had three major eruptions in the past.  Also, moose will dive down up to 18 feet and stay there for up to a minute eating underwater vegetation. God's handiwork abounds in this park and we never ceased to be amazed at the wonders of His creation.  I think we will come back here (on the shoulder season!) and spend more time exploring.  

Don't forget that you can see many more photos of our trip on the Picasa link on the right side bar.

From Asa's journal...

Today we took a long bike ride on an old train track in Idaho.  There was a two mile tunnel at the very beginning. It was pitch black.  We had to use head lamps.  Later we saw lightning fast ground squirrels.  They were cute!  At another tunnel that we were going through, I stopped to fix my headlamp.  Right when I was going, I heard a "honk, honk" and I thought it was a train.  I bolted out of the tunnel and it was a shuttle bus!  On the way back, we saw two deer.  One was on the path and the other was in the tunnel.  We got real close.  When we got back to the parking lot, we had to keep going because we parked two miles away!  But it was all down hill so we went up to 20 to 30 mph.  We coasted back to the motor home and got in after we packed up the bikes and left.  Then we left to eat at Huck's grill.  I had a cheeseburger, fries and a huckleberry milkshake.  Jellystone RV Park in Missoula, Montana was our campground.  Then it was time for bed.

Biking the Hiawatha Trail on Idaho/Montana border

Back in the U.S.

Visiting with Mary and Katie

We finally have a minute to give an update.  We finished up our time in Port Hardy with a second trip to Cattle Island.  This time we camped overnight since the kids decided they wanted to "build shelters and sleep outside, set up stores and gather their own food."  Jackson was successful in catching a spring Chinook which we cooked up over the fire, but the kids ended up sleeping in the tents with us.  Asa said in the morning "I'm glad the adults came along."  Scott and Dianne planned a beach potluck for us the last evening so we could see some more friends.

Chemainus murals
We then headed down Vancouver Island.  We stopped in Chemainus to see the murals before making it to Victoria that evening.  Conrad and Magdalene graciously let us stay at their place even though they had Anna and Christina and their children visiting also. It was so good to catch up and be a part of the family.  We caught a ferry from the island to Anacortes, Washington and made our way down to Kent.  And that's when the honeymoon ended….

We got to our motor home bright and early on Friday morning in an absolute downpour.  Rain like we haven't seen in years.  They began to attach the towing mechanism from the Jeep to the motor home and realized the tow kit on the Jeep was missing 2 brackets.  No one in the Seattle area had the missing pieces.  Jerry got the number for the original owner of the Jeep in Anchorage and sure enough he had all the pieces.  The second owner had not been interested in buying them and had neglected to let us know about them.  Anyway, our options were to wait until the special order could come in on Monday or drive down to Wilsonville (Portland), Oregon and pick them up.  Which is what we elected to do.  Jerry left for the 6 1/2 hour round trip while the boys and I stayed behind and loaded up the motor home from the camper van.  Jerry made it back by 4:30 pm (before closing time) so that they could install the towing and we could be on our way.  Because of the delay, we had to cancel our plans to see Craig in Kamloops which was disappointing but we'll catch he and Barb later for sure.  

Saying goodbye to the van!

The trouble continues
The following day started with a rush to switch over the California plates to Alaska plates before we hit the border of British Columbia.  Unfortunately, the plates were put on with a theft resistant screw.  Jerry got ingenious since stores did not carry a screwdriver to remove that kind of screws.  He bought a hack saw and got just enough of an indent to use a regular screwdriver!   We met Scott and the girls to transfer the camper van to them.  That process had it's own set of challenges, too many to mention; but, Scott kindly offered to take care of them and allowed us to carry on back to the U.S. We were a little downhearted and as we travelled, this song came on the radio.


It was such a good reminder that we are just "pilgrims passing through" and that this life is bumpy at best!  Here's the link to our theme song for the year.  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l1p-QfgkLow So, with the trouble we had getting started, I deemed yesterday our first official day on the road!  It was a better day.  We made it across the state of Washington and to Coeur d'Alene for the night.  We stopped at a neat state park called Ginkgo Petrified Forest and really enjoyed the Eastern Washington landscape of sagebrush and desert.  The boys decided that would be a great place to live and ride go carts!  People are always interested in seeing our Alaska plates.  The funniest comment so far was "you can drive all the way to Alaska?"  But in all fairness, maybe I wouldn't have known that 5 years ago either!!!

Fresh peaches and cherries!

Day one.  Thanks for the shirts Gail!

Across Washington

Officially on the road

Signpost Forest, Watson Lake

We are officially on the road!  We are so thankful to our friends and family (that one's for you, Cody and Sara) who helped us in the last homeless days before we left.  Our trip down the Alcan and Casiar Highways went well.   We even enjoyed another lunch at Buckshot Betty's in the Yukon with fond memories of our stop there a year ago with the Fritzels. We stayed in Tok, Teslin, Stewart and finally Prince Rupert to catch the 15 hour ferry to Port Hardy on July 12.  The ferry was built in 2009 and was more like a cruise ship.

Kitwanga, BC

The weather has been spectacular and we have enjoyed the non-stop views of mountain ranges and wildlife which included lots of bear (black and brown), moose, fox, grouse, whales and eagles. Our only mishap was needing to sleep in the pop-up van/Jeep for 2 nights, which we hadn't planned on.  But, that's to be expected in the summer with no reservations!  We were amazed at how well the boys adjusted to adversity "we love sleeping in the Jeep" even though they've never done so.

Aboard the Northern Expedition

 Having lived in Port Hardy from 1994-1996, it has been very special connecting with friends and visiting some of our favorite places on northern Vancouver Island.  You can link to our Picasa web album on the right hand sidebar to view more pictures from our trip.

In the week to come we will be heading south and picking up the motorhome in Washington by next Friday.  So, this may be our only post until then due to the lack of internet and cell phone connection.

Paddling to Cattle Island

San Jo Bay, Vancouver Island, BC

This is a test of the phone message blogging function...it works!

It's been a while since we have blogged anything, but the next few months should be worthy. We are embarking on a 48 state Road trip.

Chitina & McCarthy

On Sunday June 28 we processed the 21 Copper River Red (sockeye) salmon that Jerry dipnetted for this weekend in Chitina!!! It was quite the trip. We left on Thursday after lunch and met one of Jerry’s friends from work over there. We decided to pop the top on the camper van right at the parking lot of O’Brien creek where Jerry would be leaving from at 5am. O’Brien Creek is just a mile from Chitina. I stayed with the boys there all day while they fished. A water taxi took them up the canyon a ways and dropped them off on a big schist rock. Around lunchtime I asked the guy who owned the taxi if he would consider letting us go along when he did his check up on everyone. He agreed and we really shocked Jerry. The boat guy actually dropped us off on the rock and left us there while he continued down the canyon and then picked us up on the way back. It was great! Jerry was out for 12 hours and they netted 42 reds. The limit for a household is 30, so they didn’t make the limit, but why be so greedy! They were exhausted!! They gutted the fish and got them on ice and then our friend headed back to Anchorage and took our fish with him. We were going on to McCarthy…we thought. It’s a pretty bad road. After only 3 miles, our awning on the van flew off! We decided to head back to Chitina and got a room there. In the morning at breakfast we were faced with going home or figuring out how to get to Kennecott that day. The thing that pushed us over the edge was the incredible weather we were having. So we made the decision which will have me working some extra days at the pharmacy this summer…we flew over!!! It’s 60 miles and is a 30 minute flight. They take you over a glacier and the scenery was incredible. The boys just loved it. We toured the Kennecott Mine, spent about 6 hours over there and then flew back and drove home to Anchorage. It was (and still is) like an amazing dream.

So we spent Sunday processing the fish. We smoked some, froze some and I actually canned 24 pints all by myself with mom's old canner. Can you believe it??!!! I could have used my mom but I read about 5 different sets of directions. I think they turned out. I’ll know tomorrow when we open one up!

Catching Up

So the last entry was in July...pretty despicable.

Amy and I have been enjoying our time here in Anchorage. Amy continues her work at Providence Alaska Medical Center, and I like the new challenges as I manage the Outpatient Pediatric Clinic at Alaska Native Medical Center. We are both working full time, but Amy continues to homeschool the boys, so she actually has two full time jobs. The city continues to feel like a wild place. Moose cruise through our neighborhood regularly, there were a few bear maulings on the east side of town last summer, there is a decent salmon run in the creeks that run through the city (one of which is one block from our house), and the trails through the city can take you anywhere. Anchorage is very culturally diverse and we have discovered lots of great ethnic food, but no Ethiopian restaurant, yet. One of our favorites, Yak and Yeti, serves Himalayan influenced food. The boys would say their favorite restaurant would be either Bear Tooth Theaterpub & Grill that serves you pizza while you watch your favorite flick or Chuckie Cheese's.

The summer flew by. After the Katmai trip in July, Amy's family arrived in August for a whirlwind tour. We had a great time hosting everyone. Our excursions to Denali, Palmer, Wasilla, Seward, Alyeska, and Portage Glacier were mostly cloudy and cool, but still beautiful and full of great memories. The fall was short, but nice. We did go blueberry picking on the hillside above town...no bears. The snow arrived in early October which made a nice backdrop for the moose we found on the Powerline trail in the Chugach.

It has not made it above zero over the past week. However, the cold has added to our fun this winter. We did get the boys up on skates several times and we went cross country skiing and snowboarding last week. We are glad the boys love the winter because we have four more months of it!

Katmai National Park

Knowing that we would be in Alaska for Amy's 40th birthday had me thinking about the perfect gift. She loves travel, photography and the outdoors, and I have heard her say that taking a picture of a bear catching a salmon would be a fantastic experience. After looking at several options we settled on Brooks Falls when the reds (Sockeye) would be running and the bears would be fishing.

After a short flight to King Salmon we boarded the DeHavilland Otter for Brooks Falls. This vintage aircraft bumped through the gusty winds over the multitude of lakes and rolling mountains of Katmai until it cruised into Brooks lake and up to the beach where the lodge and campground are located. After a short session with the NP Rangers about etiquette in bear country we headed to the campground... enclosed by an electric fence! We set up our tent, ate a quick dinner at the Brooks Falls Lodge, and headed toward Upper Brooks Falls.

Almost immediately we started spotting the local brown bears. We learned that if you see a ranger walking down a trail talking to his/her radio while peering into the woods there was a bear nearby. The beach was like a bear highway. The first obstacle was to get across the lower bridge. Rangers are posted on each side and open and close the bridge as the bears move through the area. Our first hike up the trail was with a man from Poland, one of a host of nationalities visiting this remote but world-class destination. Being told to make noise while hiking we bargained with our new friend to sing his national anthem and we would sing ours.

The upper falls did not disappoint. No less than a dozen bears at a time were fishing at the falls. The platform offered up-close viewing of the bears as they competed for the best fishing spot. The fighting sounded a lot like roar of sea lions. Over the next two days we would make this hike four times seeking to get the photo Amy hoped for. After talking with a few of the seasoned photographers she got the technique down. On the second day it happened. She captured the image and with tears in her eyes she said "I got it" without even checking the photo. Sure enough. After reviewing the photo, she had.

After seeing the swarm of reds in the river at the lower bridge and watching the bears catching them with ease, I turned my thoughts to renting a rod and catching a red of my own. It was quite a game. Fish while looking in all directions... reel in and move away from the oncoming bears. The craziest, but most productive fishing was at what the gal in the Trading Post called the "Meat Hole" just below the bridge. The name held true. I knew it would be interesting after I helped a woman unhook a fish as a bear streamed toward us from across the river. After the bears cleared I hooked one and was playing it when it was announced that a bear was headed toward me again from across the river. I pointed the rod tip at the fish and walked away expecting the fish to break off. It didn't. It followed me up the bank. I quickly unhooked the fish, killed it and ran up onto the lower viewing platform. The bear was not too far behind and spent the next few minutes sniffing all around the platform for his lunch.

Needless to say this was an experience of a lifetime. A big thank you to Grandma and Papa for taking care of Jackson and Asa back at home.