NEW TRAVEL BUDDY

We arrived back in Las Vegas last Tuesday (Sept 11th) a little ahead of schedule.  There were a couple of reasons for that.  Could not meet up with sister Kris in Heber City so we cut out the extra day there.  We also learned that there was a NASCAR event starting on the 13th and traffic on I-15 during NASCAR can get pretty crazy so coming in two days ahead instead of one made sense.

While Arlyene was in LV for three weeks in August she ended up adopting a kitten that her brother and sister-in-law were fostering until her and her sister were old enough to be adopted.  Arlyene fell in love with "Peanut" and her personality and could not resist her.  Mike and Kimberly took care of her until we got back.  We picked Peanut up the same afternoon we arrived and she has settled in nicely here in the coach.  We, on the other hand, are learning to "cat proof" the coach much as we would have to make it safe from a 2 year old human.  Peanut is into everything and a real dynamo.  She eventually wears herself out (along with us) and then sleeps to store up more energy for her text terror attack.  She is a ball of laughs.  I started the engine up a couple days ago and she did not react so I am hoping she will make a good traveling companion.

So......heeeeeeeere's Peanut.

She still has her kitten fur but is developing some really interesting colors and markings.

So, we are back in Las Vegas for the winter now.  There will not be much to report in the way of travel although we do have plans for a trip in March which will no doubt result in some posting here.  More on that closer to that time.

YELLOWSTONE NATIONAL PARK

We arrived in West Yellowstone on schedule and spent the day cleaning and waiting for sister Sandy and husband Ken to arrive the next day.  I spent some time cleaning up the front of the coach which looked like it had a bad case of acne.  

Not the worst it has ever been for sure but bad enough to need cleaning.

It takes about three days to really see the park and we only had two so we had to pick the areas that would be best for Sandy and Ken to see.  Sandy had never been and Ken was here once many years ago.  Based on our trip here five years ago we chose to do Old Faithful and points in between on day one and then head for the Lamar Valley on day two.  Here are a few highlights of day one.

Many, many geysers and pools along the route to Old Faithful.

Colorful......

....and active.

This was about 20 feet high after venting for who knows how long. 

Lots of folks anticipating Old Faithful

Including the four of us.

Not much here to get the scale of the eruption but it was impressive.

Yellowstone is a massive volcano.  Here we are standing on one side of the caldera.  The other side, off in the distance, is 32 miles away.

Elevation from the edge of the caldera.

On the way to Lamar Valley

The Lamar Valley is where we saw the most wildlife on our last trip here.  But seeing wildlife is kind of like hunting or fishing.  Sometimes you "catch" something and sometimes you don't so there are no guarantees with one possible exception....you can almost always see bison and we certainly saw plenty of them.

I used my telephoto lens to get this (somewhat overexposed) picture but I was still pretty close and when he started eyeing me suspiciously I decided to make my exit.  This was a lone animal on the side of the road in a forested area. 

Antalope

 After Lamar Valley, on our way out of the park on day two, we spotted some moose on the other side of the river.

I was going to, sadly, say that we did not see any bears but that is not exactly true.  In fact, we are bringing one home with us for our new Kitty, Peanut who is not much bigger.

ON THE MOVE

Nice dinner with Larry and Linda a coupe nights before our departure.

So we are on the move towards the south with some delays along the way.  We left Sagle on Saturday, September 1st.  Yup! right at the beginning of the Labor Day weekend.  WHAT WAS I THINKING?  After a very "hairy" experience with a blocked freeway on ramp and a forced reroute through narrow streets in Coeur d' Alene we finally made it onto I-90 eastbound.  Next came multiple road construction zones, one with about a 4 - 5 mile back up while all the holiday traffic squeezed into one lane.  Like I said, "What was I thinking"?  Anyway we eventually got through the constructions zones and over Lookout Pass and worked our way to the town of Wye, MT just west of Missoula where we parked for the night Saturday.  The next day, Sunday, we had a very pleasant and trouble free drive to Dillon, MT where we are currently located.  The map below shows our route over the last two days.

As you can see from the map below there are basically two possible routes to West Yellowstone from here that are practical for a big motor home.  We can either continue on south on I-15 and cut over a little north of Idaho Falls and then north again OR we can go north out of Dillon and go east and then south.  The latter route is all two lane road and so today we decided to just drive part of it in the jeep and see how good the road is.  I had heard about a grade outside of Virginia City that was pretty steep.  It is.  According to a local trucker we talked to in the grocery store parking lot it is a 7% grade and 10 miles long.  That is a long slow grind in ar big rig and when you get to the top you have to go back down the other side.  

So on the map above you can see Virginia City about half way on the upper route.  That is a very old historic gold mining town with old store fronts and a Railroad Museum. 

The steep grade started there and the pictures below were taken after we had crested the top of the pass about 10 miles later and were looking down at the highway as it descends back into the valley.  That is as far was we went before turning around today.  I presume that rest of the road is fine.  I just wanted to check out the pass.

So we are now back in Dillon and I am debating with myself whether to take the longer, safer, route to the south or save about 70 miles and 45 minutes to an hour of driving time and go back through Virginia City.  I guess I will make up my mind in the morning. 

Unlike last year we are enjoying clear blue skies here with no smoke.  This is beautiful country this time of the year but I would not want to do a winter here.

We will be in West Yellowstone for five days and Arlyene's sister Sandy and her husband Ken will be there three of those days on their way to Bozeman.  We will have fun exploring together for a couple of days.  Then we will be off for a long drive to Heber City, UT for a couple of days and then back to Las Vegas with a stop in Beaver, UT.

So that's it for now.  Hope we get some interesting pictures to share from Yellowstone.

TIME FOR A BRIEF UPDATE

I guess it is time for a brief update to prove that we are still alive.  The reason for the lack of posts is that we have not had much of blog related interest to report.  Starting September 1st we will resume our journey working our way south via Yellowstone and other cool places.  As I write this Arlyene is five days into a two and a half week visit with family back in Las Vegas.  She is there primarily to give other family members a break in looking after their mom.  She is taking advantage of her time there to connect with others, pick up mail, and look after our resort lot etc.

Just prior to her departure Arlyene and I spent a week in the Seattle area staying with good friends Craig and Janet.  I did some business visits and we connected with friends.  It was a good time but a little too short.  I dropped Arlyene off at the airport on our way home.

Meanwhile I continue the occupation of Larry and Linda's driveway here in Sagle.  It is starting to get hot here, forecast to reach 100 here the next two days.  WAIT!  We came here partly to get away from that kind of heat!

Although there is no shortage of summer wildfires in the Pacific Northwest the air quality here has stayed reasonable.  That could be changing in the next few days but so far it is nowhere near as bad as last year where it reached it's worst around Labor Day.  A lot of smoke is working its way here from the massive Northern California wildfires.  We are starting to see more haze so time will tell.

Meanwhile I am puttering with small projects and walking as much as possible.  Hopefully we will have a few good pictures to share from Yellowstone. 📷 😊

SAGLE, IDAHO

Well here we are back in Sagle, Idaho at friends Larry and Linda's home.  As you can see from this 2017 photo, they have a nice, long, paved driveway for us to park in.  Their house is to the left in this picture.  This photo is from last year because so far this year we have been welcomed with a series of Thunder and Lightening storms and, at times, some heavy rain.  All the better to keep the fire danger down.  No complaint here.  But things got dirty on the way up here and I am waiting for better weather to start cleaning the outside of the coach.

The plan is that we will be here until September 1st at which time Larry and Linda will jump in their motor home and we will caravan down to West Yellowstone for a week.  After that they will return here to Sagle and we will continue to work our way south.  More on that as it unfolds.

The coach has been performing perfectly and passed all its routine preventive maintenance with flying colors.  I am always happy and grateful for that.  This year we hope to make an interior improvement by replacing the two recliners we bought three years ago at Tiffin which are now falling apart.  One of those "you get what you pay for" lessons.  We hope to replace them with a single, better recliner and a computer desk and drawers which will give us some additional storage space.  If successful it won't be as much fun for Arlyene because she loves nothing better than to whack me in the back with the refrigerator  door while I am using the current computer desk set up.  With the new one I will be too far away to hit plus she can take over my former space.  Win - Win. We are dealing with an Amish source in Indiana and hope to have both pieces in two to three weeks or whenever the freight company can get them here.

Wishing everyone an early happy 4th of July.  We will most likely not have much to report until then.  It will be our third July 4th staying here and it is always a lively an fun time with too much food.

Coeur d' Alene, Idaho

We are now in Coeur d'Alene where we have been since Saturday afternoon.  Since our last post we spent almost a week in McCall, Idaho and one night in Lewiston/Clarkston.  The RV park in McCall is putting in a n- ice new addition that was supposed to be done by the time we arrive - but it wasn't.  As a result the normally peaceful place was rumbling with construction equipment rolling past our site most of the day.  It is going to be very nice when it is done but not so restful while we were there.

After leaving McCall we continued north on highway 95 which is a good highway but mostly two lane road.  Still an enjoyable drive much of it along the Salmon River.  One night in Lewiston to break up the drive and then through the Palouse and up into Coeur d'Alene.  We will be here relaxing in mostly cloudy and cool weather, doing a Costco run and perhaps seeing a movie before we head out Wednesday evening to take the coach up to the Cummins facility on the west side of Spokane.  We will spend the night there so we have a nice cool engine for them to work on bright and early the next morning.  It is all supposed to be routine maintenance as the coach has been working perfectly along the way except for one or two very minor things I was able to take care of myself.  We should be out of Cummins by noon if all goes well and then on our way to friends Larry and Linda's house for an extended period.

So all is well and going according to plan so far.

Our site in McCall

Taken from behind the coach during the workday.

In spite of the construction we still had several visitors in the evenings after workers went home.

Taken at Ponderosa State outside McCall

CALDWELL, ID

After spending the night in a small RV Park in Wells, NV we headed for Caldwell this morning.  We knew that friends Bob and Charlene from the resort were also heading to Caldwell and we thought we might see them when we got here since we were both planning to stay in the same place.  To get to the RV park in Wells we had to jump on Interstate 80 and go down one exit, about a mile, to where the park was located.  This morning we backtracked to highway 93 where we could resume our northbound drive   As we waiting at the bottom of the off ramp to make our turn on 93 who should drive right in front of us but Bob and Charlene.  We ended up following them most of the way here.  When we arrived we found that the office had assigned us sites side by side.  In addition there is another couple from the resort who are here.  We have not seen them yet but it sounds like we will all be going out to dinner together later this evening.   Sometimes it is a small world.

CAMP SUCCESS - Almost....

Paved road from Ely KOA to Cave Lake State park and then lumpy unmaintained dirt road from there.  The red X is where we turned around.

Today our goal was to drive what is locally known as the Success Loop road.  Camp Success is a very remote campground reached by driving about 10 miles of unmaintained dirt road which feels like about 30 miles.  Equipped with insufficient documentation for the trip we eventually elected to turn around and go back out the way we came in.  On further investigation after we got back we found that we had apparently already done 99% of the roughest part of the road when we turned around.  The GPS in the Jeep was worthless just showing us in a blank space and maps on our phones were no help either.  So we now have a second item to do over next time we are here.  Today's drive was dirty but the scenery was just fine.  We did have to share the road from time to time with other 4 wheelers and that always required one of us to pull off the road.

Cave Lake State Park

Today was our last day in Ely.  Tomorrow we make a short trip to Wells, NV where there will probably be nothing to photograph or report unless the Burger King is something unusual.  Otherwise it is a truck stop for fuel and a small RV park for the night.

GREAT BASIN NATIONAL PARK

So we finally made it to Great Basin National Park and I have the new water bottle to prove it.  (I was tempted by the coffee cup but I already have enough of those.)  This map will give you a clue where GBNP is located.  Salt Lake City is in the upper right.  The town of Ely, circled in red on the left, is where we are currently staying.

As national parks go Great Basin is one of the smallest parks we have visited.  Perhaps the smallest as far as stuff to look at and photograph is concerned.  That's not counting the Lehman Caves.  We did not go into them.  Arlyene does not do caves. 

This park is smack in the middle of a state that is mostly kitty litter.  From that standpoint it is sort of out of place.  One cool thing is that you can drive to just over 10K feet and there is very little kitty litter at that altitude.  In fact, at that altitude all the trees are different than what we are used to from the Washington evergreen forests.  GBNP is also home to some of the oldest trees on earth, the Bristlecone Pines.  We started to hike the three miles up to the tree line where the Bristlecones reside however we did not take any water with us or anything to eat so I became concerned with possible low blood sugar issues.  Combined with the time of day we elected to turn back and the trees were another hour up the trail according to folks coming back down.  That just means we have to go back prepared for the hike.  I think we will.

Today the projected temp in Las Vegas was 105.  At 10K feet we enjoyed a cool 68 and a auroma of the trees was wonderful.  As National Parks go GB was not crowded at all.  There is not even a gate to go through to get in.  No fees.  What a bargain.  On the other hand it is really not on the way to much of anywhere unless you have already gone out of your way.