First Adventure Entry. Adventury if you will.
So as to not rape everyone's facebook news feed I have decided I will post my Yellowstone adventures here instead of on fb. Hopefully people will remember to check here if they want to know how my trip is going and/or see the ten million bison pictures I am soon to be taking.
I went to bed today at 12:45, only to wake up at 2:45. Yay for 2 hours of sleep! Drove to muh momma's house and headed to Bradley. Managed to squeeze in some early morning hashbrownlove before I got to the airport (mmm...so good) Sat at Bradley and almost dozed off in the terminal because I was exhausted. I actually fell asleep on the plane before we even took off. I vaguely remember noticing we were taking off, being kinda nervous, then falling back asleep. When I woke up again they were collecting cups and garbage and getting ready for the descent.
Detroit airport was uneventful. That plane trip I had the pleasure of sitting next to an idiot who thought giving her son AN ENTIRE BAG of lollipops during a flight was an awesome idea. The kid then proceeded to scream/talk/sing/yell/make stupid noises for 3 straight hours. He didn't even cease for a minute, literally. He had one of those whiny little boy voices that is just high pitched enough to make you want to scream. I can't decide who was more annoying, him, or his mother shhhhhing him for 3 straight hours. All bad. Thank you mother of the year, maybe more sugar next time. I do manage to make friends with the lady sitting next to me, she's an old lady, she asks me about my charm bracelet and we have a polite conversation. She was from Milford, Michigan (which of course when she says Milford I immediately ask CT? Like an idiot...as if the only Milford in all the universe is the one with the beach and the mall hahaha) She compliments my charm necklace and is very nice and helps distract me from ADDSugarBoy next to us.
Finally arrived at Denver. Rushed thru the airport, which is ENORMOUS, to my gate. As I'm walking to the counter they're calling some girl's name and she steps in front of me. "Congratulations, you got the very last ticket," I hear her tell this girl. Uh oh. So I step up and am like wait, uh, I need to get on that plane. My flights were pretty close together, but now it's only 10 mins before the plane is supposed to take off. The lady types in my name and calls the other girl back from the boarding ramp thing, "I'm sorry," they inform ms. seat stealer, "you'll have to stay on standby this girl actually has the last ticket." I feel like a jerk and apologize to the girl before stealing my rightful seat back. The ticket lady then spends like 3 mins lecturing me about how I should have been there earlier, and they could have given away my seat and yadda yadda, I'm like yeah well my flight just got in and Delta like said I could connect/make it, it's not like I spent an hour like gift shopping at the airport, I just went gate to gate, I don't need the lecture but whatevs.
I get on the plane, which is way much TINY, and proceed to have the bumpiest flight I've ever experienced. I am pretty good with turbulence/flying in general, but the plane dips and dives and starts to roll to the sides, to the point that I wonder if we'll flip over. I get super ill feeling. Apparently Colorado has kinda bad air pockets, and in a tiny plane you feel all of them. About 1/2 way into the trip the turbulence ceases and I can finally enjoy myself. I make a single serving friend, an older guy who is from San Francisco who is giving a speech tonight in Bozeman. He asks me about Yellowstone and is very friendly. When we're not talking I look out the window, we're flying very low since it's such a short flight and it strikes me how much the Earth here looks like pie crust. Exactly like the edge of pie crust I think to myself, and it's such a good description that I can't decide whether I thought of it and am amazing, or if I've read it somewhere. My guess is I read it, but it's rather accurate to describe the valleys and ridges and cracks in the Earth, like they were made with a fork. This is how Alberta looked, and it will probably never cease to amaze me how beautiful it is. It's not populated at all, you don't see specks of houses or clusters of anything at all, just rolling hills, trees, cliffs, and cracks in the crust. We land, my plane friend wishes me well, tells me not to feed the bears, and I wish him good luck with his speech.
When I get off the plane I have to wait on the ramp thing for my carry on, which they made me give to them to put under the plane. People come, bags are picked up...but my bag doesn't appear. Hm. Finally the last bag is grabbed, I ask if there's any more to be brought up. Oh, the tag probably fell off, trying looking at the baggage claim, it may be there. Sweet. I have a mini panic attack and then finally spot my carry-on....but not my checked bag. I wait for a while. No bag. Finally I go to Delta, they say since my last flight was United (my first 2 were Delta) that I have to check with them. A very super much helpful guy at United waits patiently while I figure out what the name of my hotel is, so if they find my bag it can be delivered to me. He says they can't track it, but he assumes it just never made it on my plane from Denver. He informs me it'll either be delivered tonight, or tomorrow...but if it was tomorrow I won't be in Montana...so I had my fingers crossed that it'd get here tonight (it does).
I call the taxi place and get on the phone with the most helpful taxi dispatcher on the Earth, he insists on staying on the phone with me until the taxi actually comes. It starts to snow, but they call it something else here because it's like a snow/hail hybrid that only lasts a few minutes (gooba? can't remember, something like that). In the taxi I meet 3 girls who are also doing housekeeping at the Old Faithful Inn. I think one's name was Sarah, one was Sierra and can't remember the other one. Sierra has been here before, she seems funny and outgoing. She's from Oregon. Another girl is from Georgia, and the other one I think was from Cali if I remember correctly. They all seem really nice. 2 of the girls are staying where I am, Sierra is across the street at a different hotel. I check in, my room is ok, nothing special, but you can see the mountains from my room.
I take a quick nap, I have the worst migraine ever. I wake up 2 hours later and decide to explore Bozeman while it's still light out. Bozeman is AWESOME The entire place is surrounded by mountains and you can tell it's one of those places experiencing an upswing of tourists and young people moving in. There's smaller old houses mixed with loft apartments and almost everything is brick and very beautifully designed. I'm staying on a main street and there's blocks of little boutiques selling interesting things. There's a cool record shop with hand made ear plugs and vinyl and interesting handmade Montana t-shirts. Everywhere there's signs for shows and little bars where bands must play on the weekends. There's awesome places to eat outside, art galleries, and a butt-ton of vegetarian friendly dining options. The people are all very noticeably friendly. There's lots of hipster-like twenty-somethings, but they lack the pretentious attitude that makes them so annoying around New England. I see a lot of tattoos, a lot of beards, a lot of really laid back people who actually smile at you when you walk by. Surprisingly there's a lot of really cool clothing boutiques, mixing a bit of western in with brightly colored sundresses. Things I can just imagine wearing, like cowboy boots and glittery sailor shorts, skirts with huge bows, and lots of handmade jewelery. There's tons of outdoor stores, camping equipment places. Most of the stores seem to have a green/environmentally friendly type theme to them which is cool. I stop at a coffee shop w/a ton of veggie food on the menu, I get a delic pesto/tomato/mozzarella panini and vegan potato and mushroom soup.
I take some pictures of the town, enjoy the contrast of the old buildings mixed with the new, get saddened by how pathetically small and lame the mountains look in pictures, when in reality they're so very stunning, peeking out from behind all of the buildings on main street. Wander back to my hotel. The phone rings, and miraculously they have my luggage. Thank God. Get sleepy. Write this. The end.
I went to bed today at 12:45, only to wake up at 2:45. Yay for 2 hours of sleep! Drove to muh momma's house and headed to Bradley. Managed to squeeze in some early morning hashbrownlove before I got to the airport (mmm...so good) Sat at Bradley and almost dozed off in the terminal because I was exhausted. I actually fell asleep on the plane before we even took off. I vaguely remember noticing we were taking off, being kinda nervous, then falling back asleep. When I woke up again they were collecting cups and garbage and getting ready for the descent.
Detroit airport was uneventful. That plane trip I had the pleasure of sitting next to an idiot who thought giving her son AN ENTIRE BAG of lollipops during a flight was an awesome idea. The kid then proceeded to scream/talk/sing/yell/make stupid noises for 3 straight hours. He didn't even cease for a minute, literally. He had one of those whiny little boy voices that is just high pitched enough to make you want to scream. I can't decide who was more annoying, him, or his mother shhhhhing him for 3 straight hours. All bad. Thank you mother of the year, maybe more sugar next time. I do manage to make friends with the lady sitting next to me, she's an old lady, she asks me about my charm bracelet and we have a polite conversation. She was from Milford, Michigan (which of course when she says Milford I immediately ask CT? Like an idiot...as if the only Milford in all the universe is the one with the beach and the mall hahaha) She compliments my charm necklace and is very nice and helps distract me from ADDSugarBoy next to us.
Finally arrived at Denver. Rushed thru the airport, which is ENORMOUS, to my gate. As I'm walking to the counter they're calling some girl's name and she steps in front of me. "Congratulations, you got the very last ticket," I hear her tell this girl. Uh oh. So I step up and am like wait, uh, I need to get on that plane. My flights were pretty close together, but now it's only 10 mins before the plane is supposed to take off. The lady types in my name and calls the other girl back from the boarding ramp thing, "I'm sorry," they inform ms. seat stealer, "you'll have to stay on standby this girl actually has the last ticket." I feel like a jerk and apologize to the girl before stealing my rightful seat back. The ticket lady then spends like 3 mins lecturing me about how I should have been there earlier, and they could have given away my seat and yadda yadda, I'm like yeah well my flight just got in and Delta like said I could connect/make it, it's not like I spent an hour like gift shopping at the airport, I just went gate to gate, I don't need the lecture but whatevs.
I get on the plane, which is way much TINY, and proceed to have the bumpiest flight I've ever experienced. I am pretty good with turbulence/flying in general, but the plane dips and dives and starts to roll to the sides, to the point that I wonder if we'll flip over. I get super ill feeling. Apparently Colorado has kinda bad air pockets, and in a tiny plane you feel all of them. About 1/2 way into the trip the turbulence ceases and I can finally enjoy myself. I make a single serving friend, an older guy who is from San Francisco who is giving a speech tonight in Bozeman. He asks me about Yellowstone and is very friendly. When we're not talking I look out the window, we're flying very low since it's such a short flight and it strikes me how much the Earth here looks like pie crust. Exactly like the edge of pie crust I think to myself, and it's such a good description that I can't decide whether I thought of it and am amazing, or if I've read it somewhere. My guess is I read it, but it's rather accurate to describe the valleys and ridges and cracks in the Earth, like they were made with a fork. This is how Alberta looked, and it will probably never cease to amaze me how beautiful it is. It's not populated at all, you don't see specks of houses or clusters of anything at all, just rolling hills, trees, cliffs, and cracks in the crust. We land, my plane friend wishes me well, tells me not to feed the bears, and I wish him good luck with his speech.
When I get off the plane I have to wait on the ramp thing for my carry on, which they made me give to them to put under the plane. People come, bags are picked up...but my bag doesn't appear. Hm. Finally the last bag is grabbed, I ask if there's any more to be brought up. Oh, the tag probably fell off, trying looking at the baggage claim, it may be there. Sweet. I have a mini panic attack and then finally spot my carry-on....but not my checked bag. I wait for a while. No bag. Finally I go to Delta, they say since my last flight was United (my first 2 were Delta) that I have to check with them. A very super much helpful guy at United waits patiently while I figure out what the name of my hotel is, so if they find my bag it can be delivered to me. He says they can't track it, but he assumes it just never made it on my plane from Denver. He informs me it'll either be delivered tonight, or tomorrow...but if it was tomorrow I won't be in Montana...so I had my fingers crossed that it'd get here tonight (it does).
I call the taxi place and get on the phone with the most helpful taxi dispatcher on the Earth, he insists on staying on the phone with me until the taxi actually comes. It starts to snow, but they call it something else here because it's like a snow/hail hybrid that only lasts a few minutes (gooba? can't remember, something like that). In the taxi I meet 3 girls who are also doing housekeeping at the Old Faithful Inn. I think one's name was Sarah, one was Sierra and can't remember the other one. Sierra has been here before, she seems funny and outgoing. She's from Oregon. Another girl is from Georgia, and the other one I think was from Cali if I remember correctly. They all seem really nice. 2 of the girls are staying where I am, Sierra is across the street at a different hotel. I check in, my room is ok, nothing special, but you can see the mountains from my room.
I take a quick nap, I have the worst migraine ever. I wake up 2 hours later and decide to explore Bozeman while it's still light out. Bozeman is AWESOME The entire place is surrounded by mountains and you can tell it's one of those places experiencing an upswing of tourists and young people moving in. There's smaller old houses mixed with loft apartments and almost everything is brick and very beautifully designed. I'm staying on a main street and there's blocks of little boutiques selling interesting things. There's a cool record shop with hand made ear plugs and vinyl and interesting handmade Montana t-shirts. Everywhere there's signs for shows and little bars where bands must play on the weekends. There's awesome places to eat outside, art galleries, and a butt-ton of vegetarian friendly dining options. The people are all very noticeably friendly. There's lots of hipster-like twenty-somethings, but they lack the pretentious attitude that makes them so annoying around New England. I see a lot of tattoos, a lot of beards, a lot of really laid back people who actually smile at you when you walk by. Surprisingly there's a lot of really cool clothing boutiques, mixing a bit of western in with brightly colored sundresses. Things I can just imagine wearing, like cowboy boots and glittery sailor shorts, skirts with huge bows, and lots of handmade jewelery. There's tons of outdoor stores, camping equipment places. Most of the stores seem to have a green/environmentally friendly type theme to them which is cool. I stop at a coffee shop w/a ton of veggie food on the menu, I get a delic pesto/tomato/mozzarella panini and vegan potato and mushroom soup.
I take some pictures of the town, enjoy the contrast of the old buildings mixed with the new, get saddened by how pathetically small and lame the mountains look in pictures, when in reality they're so very stunning, peeking out from behind all of the buildings on main street. Wander back to my hotel. The phone rings, and miraculously they have my luggage. Thank God. Get sleepy. Write this. The end.