Monthly Archives: August 2016

Before we get to Debbie and Kerry’s home in Houston, we wanted to see something our son-in-law told us about near Amarillo.  You drive along this small road for about 9 miles with nothing to see but this……..

Scenery prior to arriving at Palo Duro Canyon

Then all of a sudden there it is and you understand why they call this the #1 State Park.  This is Palo Duro Canyon State Park.

View of Palo Duro Canyon from Visitors Center

It rained most of last night so all the hiking trails were closed and even a portion of the driving road, but Jim still managed to take some really pretty pictures.

View of Palo Duro Canyon from Visitors Center

Palo Duro Canyon State Park

Palo Duro Canyon State Park

Vistas of Palo Duro Canyon

Since our time in the park was limited, we decided to see some of the other sights in the area rather than waiting until tomorrow.  Around here, no matter what the weather report says, it could always be different.

Our first stop was the RV Museum which turned out to be in the oldest Winnebago dealership in Texas and really fun.  It had the first “camper” designed in 1921 created by Ford called the Lamsteed Kampkar.  It came fully equipped and mounted on a Model “T” Ford chassis.

There were too many to detail in this blog, but he also had the first Airstream which I think looked a lot like the ones you see today (no slam intended) and the 1976 FMC owned by Max Factor, Jr. of the Max Factor Cosmetics family which, as you can imagine, was top of the line for the time.

Our last stop for the day was the Cadillac Ranch advertised to be a “roadside sculpture allowing for personal creativity, but bring your own spray paint”.  I was thinking local artist’s works displayed on the bodies of old cars.  What I saw was, well you decide.  Is this what Amarillo calls art?

Cadillac Ranch – Amarillo, TX

We finished the day by seeing the movie Ben-Hur.  Spectacularly done to rival the original but extremely intense.

We leave Monday for our trek to Houston with only driving and one night stops.  I guess this is the last post for our trip.  That is unless something really interesting happens.

Over the past 2 million years there have been 3 volcano eruptions in the Yellowstone Park area shaping and creating the geothermal features that the park is noted for.  Instead of getting caught up in the rush of people who usually enter the park mid morning, we left our RV at 7 a.m. and headed for the Granddaddy of all geothermal features, Old Faithful.  On the way, we just couldn’t resist stopping at Beryl Spring.  The early morning cold temperature and heat coming from the cracks in the earth made it look like something out of a horror movie.

Beryl Spring

Beryl Spring

Geothermal features along roadway in Yellowstone

Sight as we drove

We arrived at Old Faithful in plenty of time to get front row seats to have a perfect picture position.  We had to wait over an hour, but it was worth it.  There were at least four false starts, and then we knew the real thing was coming.  Without having something to give you perspective, there is no way to show the size and power of this gushing water spewing into the air.

Old Faithful beginning of eruption

Old Faithful erupting

Old Faithful erupting

The next stop in the Caldera (what they call the volcano area) was Midway Geyser Basin.  The pictures get progressively more impressive.

Water running into Yellowstone River at Midway Geyser Basin

Prismatic Pool at Midway Geyser Basin

Opal Pool at Midway Geyser Basin

Designs in pool at at Midway Geyser Basin

Grand Prismatic Spring at Midway Geyser Basin

Grand Prismatic Spring at Midway Geyser Basin

Grand Prismatic Spring at Midway Geyser Basin

Excelsior Geyser Crater at Midway Geyser Basin

The West Thumb off of Yellowstone Lake had more to see.

West Thumb Geyser basin with Yellowstone lake in backgound

Abyss Pool at West Thumb Geyser Basin

Black Pool at West Thumb Geyser Basin

This Mud Volcano area was really different than any other area we saw today.  The last volcanic eruption was 664,000 years ago and had a force 1000 times greater than Mount St. Helen.  The entire Caldera area is sitting over the volcano which provides the immense heat.

Dragon’s Mouth Spring at Mud Volcano

Churning Caldron at Mud Volcano sight

In 1995 there were 500 earthquakes that increased the temperature in this mud pool from 150 degrees to 170 degrees.  This looked like a giant pot of mud boiling on a stove.  Pretty impressive photography for a amateur to get the bubble just as it flared.

We only spent a short time at Mammoth Springs.  We had started out early and I was beginning to feel my injury so we only drove the upper terrace where we took these pictures.

Mammoth Springs – Yellowstone

Mammoth Springs – Yellowstone

Tomorrow we have to leave Yellowstone and we are going to Buffalo, Wyoming to an RV Park that can accommodate us for 6 days.  Its a small town with a population around 4,400 and nothing to see or do, so we will just be sitting around relaxing with nothing interesting to write, we hope.

We have discovered that we have at least one follower who is using our blog to see places and things he/she may never see otherwise, so off we went to see what we could see.  It was late when we started and the line into the park ran the length of the drive all the way back to the arch so we decided to take the roads less traveled and avoid some of the crowds.

Jim got lots of good pictures:

Cars waiting in line to enter Yellowstone

Cliff along road in Yellowstone

Coyote crossing road

Tower Falls

View from Lower Falls in Yellowstone Grand Canyon

Lower Falls Yellowstone Grand Canyon

Grand view of Yellowstone Grand Canyon

Yellowstone River in Grand Canyon

Lower Falls in Yellowstone Grand Canyon taken from Artist Point

Different colors in rocks at Grand Canyon

Yellowstone River

Mammouth Springs – Yellowstone

Buffalo crossing the road

Elk in grassy area at Mammoth Springs

Cancel all the plans for today.  At 6:50 a.m. this morning I tripped in the RV and had a nasty fall requiring an ambulance ride to the hospital 55 miles away to find out that I fractured my collarbone at the shoulder.  It’s like fracturing a rib or toe.  It just has to heal by itself.

“And that’s all I have to say about that.” Forrest Gump

It was mid-afternoon before we arrived  and we could hardly wait to see Yellowstone National Park after all we had read about it.  Since we have a Golden Pass for seniors that allows us to enter all the National parks for free, we decided to go into the park and see a few things right away.

We are  staying in Gardiner near the North Entrance of the park which is also the place with the Roosevelt Arch (that’s Teddy you know).  which shows the date it was made a National park.

Here are some of the pictures Jim took:

Roosevelt Archway at north entrance to Yellowstone Park

Vista inside the north entrance to Yellowstone

Elk grazing in Yard at Mammouth Springs

Yellowstone River flowing through the valley

Main Street in Gardiner, MT

Yellowstone River from bridge on main street in Gardner, MT

Rock formations along road in North Yellowstone

We arrived in Butte Montana and found our KOA RV Park is located right next door to the Visitor Information Center and it’s an easy walk from our camp site through some bushes.  This turned out to be convenient because we signed up for Trolley Tour of Butte to start the day and all we had to do was walk there from our RV.

Tour of Butte, Mt in Trolley

It turned out the 22 people on this tour was us, another couple who lives 6 months in Venice, Florida and six months in Michigan, and 18 people having a family reunion.  You can imagine we were a lively group.

We had no idea, but Butte is basically all about mining and has been since 1880’s which is very reminiscent of Houghton, Michigan in the UP that we visited last year.  Butte took over in copper production as Houghton was ebbing its production, using its open pit mining technique became safer and was used until 1982.  At its peak, Butte was a city of over 100,000 people including mine workers, families and all the ancillary services needed.  Today, Butte has a population of around 33,000.

Landscape of Butte from hill near Berkeley Pit Mine

We started our tour at the Berkley Pit which was originally an underground mine that converted after WWII to open pit and functioned until 1982.  This was once the largest truck-operated open pit copper mine in the US.  After the underground pumps were shut off, the pit began to fill up creating this lake.

There are stories of wealth, power and corruption during the early 1900’s and big beautiful mansions that were built during that era but my favorite sight on the tour was the World Museum of Mining with over 50 structures including the 100 foot headframe of the Orphan Girl Mine and a re-creation of a mining camp.  We were able to walk to the top of the headframe, or gallows as they are sometime called and actually see how the ore got out of the mine and how the men and supplies got in and out.  There are 7 of these headframes around the city as a reminder of the town’s background.  Our tour guide told us that this symbol is used on T-shirts, jewelry and some people actually use it as a tattoo, which seems like a bit much to me, but oh well.

Re-creation of a mining town in Montana at the turn of the century

Gallows of Orphan Mine

Cars that were used to transport, ore and supplies into mines

Skips & Chips carried men into mines

The museum sits on the campus of Montana Tech of the University of Montana where Engineering, Science and Mathematics are its main focus with an emphasis on mining.  Years back some students, after some beers I suspect, decided to go up to the highest mountain peak near the school and created a large “M” in rocks and then whitewashed them so they could be seen from the city.  Later students used their knowledge to illuminate the “M” so it could be seen at night and even put in the mechanism to only illuminate the “V” in the middle when their team wins.  We got this picture of the “M” from out campsite at night.

Just as we left the museum and campus, it started to rain with significant winds so we decided to call it day.

Yesterday the high temperature in the park was 82 degrees and sunny.  Tomorrow the weather will be pretty much the same as yesterday, but today because we have a reservation and already paid for a Red Bus Tour through the park the expected high is 62 and cloudy with intermittent rain.  Oh well.

We had to leave the RV at 7 a.m. because it is a little less than 3 hour drive to get there.  Actually Glacier Park was not on our original plan or we would have stayed closer, but lots of people have told us we had to go, so we are going.

Red Bus #80

These Red Bus Tours have been going on in Glacier since buses were available and these buses are actually second generation from 1936.  They were completely refurbished by Ford Motor Company in 1992 and look brand new.  They only hold 18 people including the driver which is much nicer than a big tour bus.  On sunny days, the canvas roof of the bus is open so its like being in a big convertible.  Our “Jammer”, as the drivers are called, was a 20 something year old college student working on a Masters Degree in Divinity with a lot of personality.

Our first stop was McDonald Lodge on the lake of the same name.  The front of the lodge actually faces the lake because when it was built there was no road access the only way you could get here was by boat.  Obviously that means its very old.

Flowers at Lake McDonald Lodge Front Entrance

Can you tell its raining and cold?  Lake McDonald is 1 mile wide and 10 miles long and 400 feet deep in the middle.  It’s average water temperature is only 55 degrees but that’s because the bottom stays around 45 degrees even though the surface temperature may go as high as 65 degrees.  Doesn’t sound like a good swimming lake to me but we keep our pool temperature at 88 at my recommendation.

Lake McDonald from Lake McDonald Lodge in Glacier Nat’l Park

The next stop was Sacred Dancing Cascades.  Notice how blue the water looks.  This has something to do with minerals from glaciers rubbing stones together.  Way too much information for me with my minimal geology training.

Sacred Dancing Cascades – Glacier Nat’l Park

Down below you can see the cascades and above you can see the clouds we were about to drive through.  Putting in these roads through the park took 26 years because they wanted to minimize the impact both to the topography and visually.  You can see none of the road is visible but runs all along the side of the mountain.

Bird Woman’s Falls in McDonald Valley

Each stop was a higher altitude until we reach Logan Pass which is a starting spot for many of the high altitude hiking trails.  The place was packed with people even in this weather.  We were somewhere around 9000 feet high and it was rainy and very cold with a stiff wind.  The temperature had to be in the 30’s or lower with the wind chill.

Logan’s Pass – Glacier Nat’l Park

Snow still hanging on at this altitude.

There were some cyclists in the Visitor Center who had cycled up this high and were trying to get warm.  They were unable to get warm saying they were shivering so hard getting up there they could barely peddle.  I assure you, we didn’t spend long up there because most of us were too cold to care.

Our final stop in the park was at a lower altitude and warmer and well worth the look.

Falls at McDonald’s Horse Bridge

One final stop before we got back to the RV was closer to home and also worth the stop.  The Bison Range was established by Teddy Roosevelt because the bison population had dropped to fewer than 100.  He allocated government funds to buy the land and house the remaining herd.  It know has more than 500 on this range alone is no longer considered endangered.  It has also become home to white-tail deer, mule deer, pronghorn antelope and bug horn sheep.  Because it was close to dusk, we got some really good pictures.

Bison at National Bison Range – Missoula, MT

Countryside at National Bison Range

Mule Deer feeding near the river at National Bison Range – Missoula, MT

National Bison Range

Pronghorn Antelope – National Bison Range

Stack of Antlers collected at National Bison Range – Missoula, MT

Now home tired but happy.

Just in case I haven’t mentioned it, I want you to know I will probably never be able to buy another peach in the grocery store.  Remember those peaches Jim picked in Washington, better than I have ever tasted, EVER!

Jim picking peaches at Hanson’s Orchard – Green Bluff, WA

We moved to Missoula, Montana on Monday and found a city of approximately 115,000 with a college and University but most of the students are gone.  Driving into town, I told Jim this looks like you would imagine Montana to look with evergreen covered mountains and wide open spaces.  Looks exactly like the set of a western!

Today we traveled east to see an honest to goodness Ghost Town, Garnet, Montana.  After we finally saw the sign and turned in, we came really close to aborting the trip and coming back to the RV.  The road leading to the town abruptly changes from asphalt to graded rocks and dirt with an abundance of washboarding.  Although it only lasted for just over 6 miles it seemed like an eternity.  Just before reaching the town we came upon a photo turnout.  I know the camera can’t do it justice, but is this not beautiful?

Garnet Range’s remote location made “placer mining” the perfect method for this area because there were very few tools needed.  Everyone was looking for gold in 1865 and all that was required here was a gold pan, and rocker and some hand tools. By 1895 the town consisted of 4 stores, 4 hotels, 3 livery stables, 2 barber shops, a union hall, a butcher shop, a candy store, a doctor’s office, and 13 saloons, plus a school with 41 students.  Over the years the mining went from gold to quartz to silver back to gold but by 1942 the post office was closed because the mining had just played out.   Remains of this town are now owned by the Bureau of Land Management and the Garnet Preservation Society and together they have salvaged several buildings scattered in a valley and built on various levels on the side of the mountain.

Hotel in Garnet, MT

One of the original 13 saloons now the visitor’s center

General Store – Garnet, MT

Jail in Garnet, MT

Upper class home of the time

MG checking out the outhouse

luxury accomodations – 3 holer

Honeymoon Suite in Garnet, MT

It was the best preserved “ghost town” I have ever seen and totally authentic.  As we were leaving I heard a wife say to her husband, “See everything you want to see, because I’m never coming back here.  I guess the hike down into the valley and back up was more than she had bargained for.

We saw several families with coolers eating lunch up near the parking lot.  I guess they knew this place was in the middle of nowhere, which we did not and it was waaaay past lunch.

After driving back to civilization for lunch, we drove to the Missoula Smokejumpers Base.

Smokejumpers at Missoula, MT

Back in 1939 someone figured out that parachuting close to the fire to get it under control was quicker, would save time and lives.  Think about jumping out of plane in 1939!  There is a quote in the Visitor Center made by someone in that time saying something like all the men who are willing to do this are crazy and unstable.

Parachute repair/repacking room

Insidethe smokejumpers plane

Today, 10% of the Smokejumpers are women and none of standards have been altered to help them qualify.  An experienced firefighter with 10 years experience can apply for Smokejumpers but they must also qualify according to some hefty physical requirements.  Their gear weighs 85 pounds and they have to be able to walk miles carrying it.  This is another branch of first responder that I never gave much thought to, but guaranteed I will now.

We even got to sit in the plane they use to drop into the fires.

Then off to the local farmer’s market that is held every Tuesday evening, the area is known for its Huckleberries and Dixon Melons, very delicious .

Dixon melon – Missoula is known for their Dixon melons