Sunday, June 30, 2019

Yellowstone, bears(!), and state #43: Wyoming

We had an early start to day #2 with our last run before the half marathon. A quick 3 miler around Idaho Falls. A great little trail runs right along the Falls. Michael even remembered being there as a child! :) So nice! We enjoyed Idaho Falls and would certainly stay there again if we were in the area. 






fter our run, we enjoyed some of the treasures from our giant breakfast basket at the hotel and got ready for our next adventure: Yellowstone!

A couple of hours later and we were in the park. First stop: Norris geyser basin. So many people! So crowded! No parking! Ugh! But once we found somewhere to park on the road, it was a treat to see my first geyser basin. So many crazy colors! Such crazy landscape! 























Next up was Mammoth Hot Springs. We had a nice lunch at the Mammoth Hotel Dining Room. Highly recommend. Then, we walked around the Hot springs and then headed on to our next stop.













Next up was the Grand Canyon of Yellowstone. The hike we wanted to do (Uncle Tom’s) was closed, so we just walked around a bit on the south rim and headed to Artist’s Point. There was a cool looking trail on the north rim that got you
 close to the lower falls, but it looked like it’d be a pretty serious climb back xup. But definitely something to check 
out next time.























Next up was a drive along Lake Yellowstone with a stop at West Thumb Geyser Basin. We highly recommend this one for views of the lake with these crazy geothermal features in the background. Great stuff and an easy walk. And not as 
crowded as it was later in the day. However, we thought the drive from the canyon to here was a bit of a bore. Maybe go 
the other way through the geyser basins? 














We continued along the grand loop and got to Old Faithful around 7pm. We needed dinner and were tired so we saved our last two stops for the next day (see how that turned out in post #3). 












We checked into our cabin at Old Faithful Lodge, grabbed dinner at the Firehole Lounge in the Snow Lodge, saw Old Faithful erupt at 8:18pm, had a drink at the Bear Pit inside the amazing Old Faithful Inn, and then called it a night. 




Pretty amazing day! But, to top it all off we also saw lots of great wildlife!! Bears (five of them!), elk, a coyote, marmots, and bison! Check out these great pics!!! Note: at no point did we get close to these bears. These pics were all taken from our car unlike some of the other crazies trying to get close to these wild animals. 











State #42: Idaho

We began our first day of the trip with an early flight to Salt Lake City. We were on the road to Idaho by 10:30am. We made a quick fast food stop for lunch and made it to Shoshone Falls by 2pm. The drive to Shoshone was pretty boring, but the falls themselves were beautiful with a great rainbow and the park surrounding the Falls was also great! Definitely worth a stop if you are in the area.



Then, we were headed to Craters of the Moon, but when we got into our fancy rental Passat (that uses diesel) a funny light came on that looked like a water bottle. After some research, we found out that if we didn’t add something called AdBlue within 600 miles our car would stop working. So, we called the rental company and they said just to buy 
the stuff we needed at a gas station and add the fluid 
ourselves. They would reimburse us. So, we added that to 
our list of things to do and continued on.

It was then about an hour and a half to Craters of the Moon. Another worthwhile stop. We were impressed with how nice the park looked: clean, great trails. With the advice of one of the rangers, we first stopped at splatter cones and got to look inside of those. Then, we did the Broken Top Trail 
which included a fun little cave we got to crawl into. They had lots of caves there, so if that’s your thing, definitely check it out. Lots of really cool scenery here. 













Then, it was another hour and a half to Idaho Falls, our stopping point for the evening. We got there early than expected, which was great! We had dinner at Snakebite Restaurant. We both had really good chicken sandwiches. They also had yummy waffle fries and Mike got some Idaho beer. 

After dinner, we walked to Idaho Brewing Company which was a delight. Mike got a flight of 4 beers for $4! The 
wonderful woman behind the counter even poured me a 
couple of small samples of things she thought I might like (and they weren’t terrible).




Then, it was a walk back to our awesome hotel, Destinations Inn. Each room is themed after a different destination. We stayed in Alaska complete with a rock wall behind a giant tub, murals of outside Alaska scenes and a fireplace. You also got sparkling cider and cheesecake on arrival, so we enjoyed that as well. We picked up a movie to watch from the front desk, but fell asleep within maybe 20 minutes. Long day, but full of many Idaho adventures! 



Monday, June 24, 2019

Tomorrow! Road trip!

It's time for our annual summer vacay! This year we're headed to the Northwest/Midwest to pick up 5 new states (for Alison): Idaho, Wyoming, Montana, North Dakota, and South Dakota. We'll be checking out all the fabulous National Parks in these states and seeing some other sites along the way. Here's our plan. Feel free to suggest things we need to hit along the way! :)

Tuesday: Austin to Salt Lake City flight. Head to Shoshone Falls and Craters of the Moon and then spend night in Idaho Falls.

Wednesday: Yellowstone!

Thursday: Grand Teton and then Salt Lake City to Spokane flight.

Friday: Glacier National Park

Saturday: A bit more Glacier then Missoula.

Sunday: Missoula half marathon. Then, evening in Spokane.

Monday: Spokane to Denver flight. Devils Tower.

Tuesday: Theodore Rosevelt National Park, Dickinson.

Wednesday-Friday: Two nights in Deadwood. Mount Rushmore. Crazy Horse. Badlands. Rapid City.

Friday: Late night flight Denver back to Austin.