View from the Road: Mega Trip Part Four

Will this be the final installment in the View from the Road series?  We can only hope so.  Let's see how far we make it!

I left you with our ninth day arrival at Glacier National Park!  This was the crown jewel of our National Parks destinations.  Troy had never been and I had never heard of it.  Sounds like the makings of a wonderful time.

Stone skippers

Beautiful mountains

Snow melt and waterfall

Kind of scary taking this picture because we had just seen a Grizzly bear by the side of the road

Looking for mountain goats

They insisted that the water was the perfect temperature for bathing suits.  They got out feeling like ice cubes...

But they loved it!

Now here's the part of the series where I give you advice should you ever dare to take a multiple National Parks trip.  #1) Google the weather for each park before you leave your house.  Had we known that the nights were going to be in the 40's/30's, we would brought sleeping bags.  (Luckily we were able to borrow his parents'.)  And if we had known the days were going to be so chilly in the mountains, we would have packed more than one long sleeve shirt and one pair of pants...  #2) If you plan on camping inside of a park, make a reservation.  Make a reservation a month in advance.  If they don't take reservations, get yourself a camping spot as soon as you can, preferably when the park opens.  Otherwise you may find it getting dark and then find out there are no more available camping spots in the whole park.  Then you will find yourself asking a local Indian fellow if you can camp on his property.  #3) And finally, find out what the park is like before you decide to drive across the country to see it.  You may find that you get there and almost all the park is for hiking, which your little fellow travelers can only do limited amounts of.

There are probably more things that I could advise you to do, or not do.  So if you ever find yourself wanting to take a similar kind of trip, feel free to ask me what I think.  

On day ten we did another tour of Glacier and headed back down the lovely state of Montana.  We spent the night in a lovely "log cabin" since it started raining.  We woke up on day eleven and made our way back into Idaho, headed for Twin Falls.  Along the way we made a couple of stops.  The first was at Craters of the Moon National Monument.

Walking up a cinder cone

Our second stop was at a natural hot spring in Carey, ID.

It was like hot bath water, but the kids had fun.  The cool wind blowing on you when you got out sure helped to cool you down.  It was a good time.

We spent the following five nights in Twin Falls.  We spent time with family.  We ate good food.  We saw a double feature at the drive in movie.  We went to Boise.  We saw a play.  We played tag.  And we only got these photos to prove it happened...

Orry lost his second tooth!  

Went shopping with Chessidy

Ate great food with this handsome man

Played at Aunt Nicole and Uncle Trent's house

Big helper

Drive thru movie buddies

It's sad, really.  But what can I say.  When you are having a blast, you sometimes forget to take a picture!

On the 16th day we left Idaho and began our journey home.  I will leave it here for now and make you endure one more post about this trip.  We ended up hitting one more National Park and I dare say it was the best.  We also saw more friends and family.  Tune in again for the conclusion!  And lot of thanks for journeying with us so far!

View from the Road: Mega Trip Part Three

And on the sixth day...

We headed out with some of Troy's family to meet the rest of Troy's family in Yellowstone!  You heard me.  A family reunion!

As luck would have it, for one reason or another, we were all able to meet in Yellowstone for the weekend.  Some of us were just vacationing, but others were moving across the country.  Some of us were meaning to make a trip here anyway, while others were free and along for the ride.  And a ride it was...

We headed out of Twin Falls, Idaho and started making our way to Grand Tetons National Park.  Along the way we stopped at Massacre Rocks State Park in Idaho.

Cousins!

Our pioneer picture...  

Where is Isaac in that last picture, you might ask?  Well, sadly we lost him while fording a river.  And pretty soon we will lose Annie to Scarlet fever.  Troy will then be unsuccessful at shooting any deer with the tiny pellet gun we have and so the rest of us will slowly starve before the game is over.  Come on.  It's the Oregon Trail.  I just couldn't resist.

Back to the subject at hand.  Wyoming.  Beautiful Wyoming.  I just love this state.  If I could marry a state, it would be Wyoming.

These were as big as our faces!

See!

My baby and the Grand Tetons

View from our van

A storm was actually blowing in as we arrived at the Tetons.  Our plan was to camp in Yellowstone for two nights.  The weather reports had it raining in Yellowstone both nights.  Fortunately for us, we never had any rain.  Just beautiful sights and the people we love.  What more could you ask for?

This massive beast walked right in front of our car!

Old Faithful (still pretty faithful)

Our campsite

Unfortunately I didn't get a single photo of our big family in Yellowstone.  But lucky for us someone else did and shared the photo with us and I will, in turn, share it with you.

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We left Yellowstone on the eighth day of our mega trip.  We said a quick "see ya later" to some and a "good bye for now" to others.  Montana was waiting and so we headed north.  The eighth day was spent driving out of Yellowstone and into Montana.  We had our first experience staying at an RV park/campsite.  It was pretty good.  It was so good, in fact, that if you ever find yourself traveling on state highway 93 headed north to God-knows-where, here is the link to the place where we stayed.  I would recommend staying there.

On the ninth day we woke up and drove into Glacier National Park.  At this point I feel like there should be a fanfare of trumpets and a choir singing Hallelujah.  It was a long nine days, but we finally (and safely) made it to our destination!

And I'll pause for now because my bed is calling me and I know that my kids will be up at their normal time, too early...  Stay tuned!