Saturday, September 29, 2012

Custer State Park in South Dakota

Another sunny day in South Dakota.  Today we wanted to start our day with a tour Jewel Cave, and we were lucky that we aren't early risers.  When we arrived at Jewel Cave, about noon, we were informed that they were having an elevator issue.  I guess they have an elevator that takes you 24 stories underground.  Well, the elevator broke down for the 10:30 tour, and the people were still stuck in the elevator when we arrived.  I guess we won't be going on that tour.  We decided to drive back to Custer State Park and tour the Needles Hwy and the Wildlife Loop.  We came across another tunnel by the Eye of the Needle that was 8'4" Wide and 12' Tall, and it was on a 90 degree corner.



CRAZY
 
The Eye of the Needle was at the entrance to the tunnel. 
 
And what a spectacular site on the other side of the tunnel.
 
 
It was getting towards the evening hour, so from here we headed for the Wildlife Loop, hoping to see some critters before dusk.
 
 







And then I (Steve) made an "ASS" out of myself.......


Anyway, if you ever make it to the "Black Hills" of South Dakota, you must take a couple of days and tour Custer State Park and Mt. Rushmore.  And while at Mt. Rushmore, take the mile long loop trail, it is so worth your time.

We are hooking up and moving on tomorrow.  We need to be heading South before the weather takes a nasty change, and we start seeing snow.  We hope to be in Utah in a few days, so check back.

Thanks for visiting our Blog.

Roberta and Steve

Friday, September 28, 2012

Welcome To South Dakota.......

Here it is, the last Friday of September, and we have arrived in South Dakota. We are staying just outside of Custer, right on the edge of the Black Hills National Forest. I know we have said this before about other areas, but this area is truly beautiful, especially this time of the year. The leaves are changing colors, and with the backdrop of the forest, all we can say is "WOW".   After getting our wheelhouse disconnected and setup, we decided to do a little exploring.   Good thing we didn't have our wheelhouse with us while exploring, or we would still be stuck in the mountains.  These tunnels were pretty small and the overhead clearance was not meant for tall vehicles.



 
 
After a beautiful hour drive, we made it to our destination.......
 
 
Mount Rushmore
 
Since we started our afternoon of exploring a little late, we decided to head back to our wheelhouse before it got dark.  You can't believe how many deer there are around every turn of the road.  And there are just about as many Wild Turkey's.
 

OK, enough for today.  We will go exploring again tomorrow.  Wonder what we will see....?

Check back later to find out......

Roberta and Steve

Wednesday, September 26, 2012

Close Encounters.........................

Yahoo, we got the alignment corrected on the truck, and we are back on the road.  Not that we didn't enjoy our stay in Lander, but there wasn't much to do there.  We traveled Northeast towards Sturgis, and stay in the National Forest just outside of the Black Hills for an evening.  Very nice campground overlooking a meadow.

Let me tell you, when you are up at 10,000 feet in these Wyoming Mountains this time of the year, it gets "COLD" at night.  We had every blanket we had with us on the bed that night.  The next day (today) we traveled to a small town, Sundance Wyoming,  just west of Sturgis.  After getting our Wheel House disconnected from the truck, and set up, we head for a Close Encounter.
 
 
We found Devil's Tower. 
 
If you don't remember, this was where they filmed the movie "Close Encounters of the Third Kind".  Driving to it, we came around a corner and there it was.  A strange site out here when all we saw for miles was grazing land and cattle.  The National Park is BEAUTIFUL.  There is a trail through the forest that takes you all around the Devil's Tower.  We could show you about 40 pictures, from every angle and side of this rock formation, but we will not put you through all that.
 
On our way back, we had to stop and say HI to a few Prairie Dogs.  There must have been Thousands of them.
 
 
 
We plan to stay here a couple of nights, and then head East for the South Dakota Bad Lands.
Check back in a few days to see if we made it.
 
Thanks for looking.
 

Sunday, September 23, 2012

Having a Little Truck Trouble....

Well, here we are in Lander Wyoming, just about Smack Dab in the middle of Wyoming.  Not much around these parts of Wyoming.  We are staying at a small RV Park, about 7 miles outside of town, waiting for our appointment with the Dodge Dealership on Monday at 1 PM.  I think we are the only visitors, and there are 3 permanent residences here.  It is a very quiet place to stay, but not much to do.  We might go visit the Casino tonight, just to check it out.

 
 

As most of you know, we had a tie rod end break on our truck before we left.  The tie rod end was a recall item with Dodge, so the repair was free.  After traveling 1200 miles we noticed that the front tires are wearing very badly on the outside edge.


We suspect an alignment problem, so we have an appointment with the Dodge Service Department  tomorrow afternoon.  With any luck it will be a quick fix and we can be on our way Tuesday.  We will see........

Our plan is to head up North, a bit, to Spearfish South Dakota, right by Sturgis, with a side trip over to the Devils Tower. (Close Encounters of the Third Kind)   From there we will travel South through the Black Hills, Mount Rushmore and the Badlands.  Not sure where all we will stop, but plan to try and see a bunch.

All for now.  Check back later.

Thursday, September 20, 2012

Where are Yogi & BooBoo.....?

Well, we made it to Jellystone, and on our first afternoon in the Park, we were bound and determined to find wildlife.  Most importantly, we wanted to find Yogi and BooBoo.  On our way to Old Faithful we found the Continental Divide, so we thought we better get a picture to put in our scrapbook.




Right after crossing the Divide we came across our first siting of Wildlife......"Yahoo"

 


 
 
It is amazing how people react to seeing these large animals by the side of the road.  Cars stopping in the middle of the road and people running all over the place trying to get pictures.  I  guess we are spoiled by growing up in the Northwest and seeing animals almost all of our lives.  Continuing on a few more miles we came arrived at Old Faithful.
We are amazed at how many people that have waited until school stated to travel.  There must have been 150 people around Old Faithful waiting for it to go off.  We arrive just a few minutes before it blew.

After all of that excitement, seeing Old Faithful go off right on time, we decided it was time to cool off with a cold one on the balcony of Old Faithful Lodge, with Old Faithful in the background.
Down the road we headed, still looking for Yogi & BooBoo. Just after leaving the parking lot, at Old Faithful, we come across a Bison having a snack, and just a little further down the road we see elk by the Yellowstone Lake.
 
 
 
 It was starting to get dark, and we figured we scored pretty good, for our first day, at finding some wildlife.  Continuing around Yellowstone Lake, darkness starting to take over, we figured our wildlife viewing was over.  But just around the next corner and behold, "YOGI" appears,, walking along the shoreline hoping for a fish.
We couldn't believe that we found bear on our first afternoon in the park.  We drove through other parts of the park the next day, and didn't see any wildlife that were different than the day before.  We did not see any bears though, so we were really lucky on our first day.  Even though we didn't see as much wildlife, we did see some beautiful scenery.  Yellowstone has its own Grand Canyon.

 

On our way out of the park, we said goodbye to a few of our new found friends, and out the gate we went.


 Next stop, Wyoming............................

Sunday, September 16, 2012

Glacier National Park

 
Hey all, we are outside of Glacier National Park and planning to head for Jellystone tomorrow morning (well you know us, it will probably be closer to noon). We spent two days at Glacier hiking around the park. We came upon some mountain goats and returning to our truck after one hike, we found 3 Longhorn sheep roaming the parking lot.
 


We headed out of town on Thursday, after a minor issue with our awning.  Our plan was to leave Tuesday, but we were so excited about leaving, we bent one of the awning arms, and had to wait a day for parts to arrive.  Oh Well, Live and Learn.....

Our first stop was Gig Harbor, up by Bremerton Washington, and visited the grand kids.  From there we motored to Leavenworth for a couple of nights.  If you have never been to Leavenworth, you should put it on your bucket list. 





From Leavenworth we stayed in Coeur d'Alene Idaho for an evening stop before arriving here at Glacier.  It is very pretty up here in "Big Sky Country", but I think we are spoiled with all of the beauty we have in our own backyard of the Great Northwest.
 OK, this is my first try at this Blog thing, so bear with me.

Until Next Time,

Roberta and Steve