Yellowstone with the Degeles
My sister Bridget decided to do that Great American Cross-Country trip with her husband and kids (3 boys, 9 and under). America being a Big Place with Lots to See and Do, and she being a Working Woman who could only take three weeks off, something had to give. So, they couldn't come to Boise. They did, however, spend a weekend at Yellowstone, which is pretty close to Boise, so I went to visit them there.
The five of them (Bridget, her husband John, and their kids Andrew, Matthew and William) made part of the trip with our sister Maureen (who joined them in Tennessee and stayed until Colorado, where she lives) and all of the trip up to this point with Mom. I imagine the minivan was a bit crowded through some of those states.
I was originally scheduled to meet them in the early afternoon that Friday. However, I got a little bit of a late start, under-estimated the time it took to get there (they were camping in a more northern part of the park) and ran into construction a few times, so I was about 4 hours late. I also picked up a hitchhiker leaving Boise, but that didn't really slow me down much--I just dropped him off at a truck stop after a few hours. (He was a truck driver who had signed on with another driver to share the driving. They started from Florida, but his partner abandoned him in rural Washington, so he was stuck there without a ride or even a dollar to his name. He was trying to get to SC, where he wanted to drive for a company who was shuttling cleanup crews to and from the beach on the Gulf Coast.)
I arrived at the campsite in Yellowstone at almost the precise time that the Degeles got back from visiting Old Faithful. John recognized my car and dropped Bridget off to show me to the campsite. (I was really expecting to Yellowstone to be crowded in the summer, but other than construction traffic, it wasn't bad. It was probably worse in the southern part, around Old Faithful. There were no empty campsites, of course; Bridget had reserved them months ago.)
Madison River
Our campsite was right above the river.
I hadn't seen any of them in two years, since the family reunion in Colorado. The boys had grown a lot in those two years, as young boys tend to do. I doubt the youngest (William) remembered me, but he warmed to me pretty quickly. All three of them were really interested in my camera, and I let the two oldest take pictures with it.
Marshmallow Face
William is enjoying a S'more.
It was chilly at Yellowstone. I had expected to see some snow still on the ground, but there wasn't any where we were. (I suspect there was some further south, near the southern entrance, and at higher elevations. Mom and I did pass some on the way out, too.) Night time temperatures got down to the thirties. I'm fine with the cold (and my sleeping bag is rated to 15 degrees), but the boys got chilly at night and in the morning.
Huddled Masses
Andrew and Matthew are huddled under a sleeping bag during an evening Ranger program talking about the '88 Yellowstone fire. It wasn't terribly interesting, and Matthew was tired. But they needed to attend a ranger talk for their Junior Ranger badge, and Matthew refused to leave because he needed that signature. He whined and cried when John took him away, but they came back for the end and the signature. (The next night's talk, about the place of wolves in the Yellowstone ecosystem, was much more interesting.)
I think Bridget scheduled their entire trip to the minute. Well, maybe not to the minute, but for the three days they were there, Bridget had planned out everything that they'd do. She was flexible when things had to change, but I think she had a checklist of things that she wanted to do at every place. In the Yellowstone, it was Old Faithful (which they saw before I arrived), mudpots, animals (bison, elk, and marmots--and they saw a coyote, too). Saturday, then, was a trip to Mammoth Hot Springs, stopping by Artist's Paintpots to see some mudpots, and Sheepeater Cliffs to see if they could find any marmots. But she knows her kids, and how active they are, and how much to do to wear them out enough to get to bed.
Hot Spring
What you'd expect to see at Yellowstone, right? The power of geothermal energy bursting through the earth. The mudpots were a lot more fun, because instead of water boiling up, there was mud squirting out in jets. The pictures of them, though, are less impressive (although I posted three to flickr) because the jets of mud are hard to see against mud of the same color in the background.
Trailblazing
We stopped at Sheepeater cliff to see if we could spot any marmots sunning themselves on the rocks. That was unsuccessful (although we did see one at the top of the cliff as we were getting ready to leave), but the boys had a lot of fun hiking the trail by the river. Lots of rocks and logs to climb over, and overgrowth to push through. And Matthew saw a small snake--about the width of a pencil, and a foot long or so--but a snake!
Mammoth Hot Spring was kind of disappointing. The boys got their Junior Ranger badge at the station there (Matthew left his book in the bathroom not once, but twice!), and other than the ubiquitous ground squirrels, there wasn't much to amuse them. I was there just 5 years ago when I took a really neat picture, but it was amazing how much it had changed in that time. Jupiter Hot Springs was no longer flowing, and even the ramps around the spring had been moved. It was a long day, and the boys got fussy, so we headed back to camp. (Without John, who biked the 30 miles or so back and got back more than an hour before we did.)
Skewers
Dinner was veggie skewers. It was a mixed result. The potatoes and onions were sometimes undercooked, and the mushrooms were taken off so they didn't overcook and burn. I needed to be a bit more consistent in the size of the veggies, I guess. But they sure are pretty, aren't they?
I had been tossing the frisbee with Andrew a bit over the stay. He got hit with the frisbee once when he wasn't looking (and I was a bit further away, so I threw it with a bit more force, and it was harder than my usual throw), and after that, he was a bit skittish about trying to catch the frisbee, instead just trying to bat it down and stop it. He wasn't too bad throwing it, though. While we were throwing the frisbee after dinner, Bridget decided that the after dinner agenda was to see more mudpots. Andrew and Matthew decided they had seen enough, so they decided to keep playing frisbee with me. Frisbee gave way to my camera (they all wanted to take pictures with my camera) which lead to a walk down to the river, which in turn became trying to skip stones on the river, which itself turned into wading into the river looking for stones, and getting wet.
Deep Water
Matthew's shirt got all wet, so I stripped him of his shirt (it was getting late, and getting cold, and I didn't want him to get too cold with a wet shirt on). But they had fun, and had muddy feet when Bridget came back. More fun than seeing more paintpots, I'm sure.
Sunday morning brought a church service in the park, a visit to Yellowstone Canyon (with a hike down to the falls, and a hike back up when they had to wait for me several times), and lunch, before we parted ways. Mom split up with the Degeles here--they continued east to see friends, and Mom flew home. I wasn't planning to return to Boise (I was due in Calgary in less than a week for a wedding), so instead, I drove Mom to Billings where she spent some time with an old college friend and flew home from there. On our way out of the park, Mom and I saw:
Bear
A black bear foraging along the side of the road. We actually saw two, and there was a third elsewhere that stopped traffic, although we didn't see it.
The week between Yellowstone and Calgary needs another entry.
There are, as always, more photos on flickr.
The five of them (Bridget, her husband John, and their kids Andrew, Matthew and William) made part of the trip with our sister Maureen (who joined them in Tennessee and stayed until Colorado, where she lives) and all of the trip up to this point with Mom. I imagine the minivan was a bit crowded through some of those states.
I was originally scheduled to meet them in the early afternoon that Friday. However, I got a little bit of a late start, under-estimated the time it took to get there (they were camping in a more northern part of the park) and ran into construction a few times, so I was about 4 hours late. I also picked up a hitchhiker leaving Boise, but that didn't really slow me down much--I just dropped him off at a truck stop after a few hours. (He was a truck driver who had signed on with another driver to share the driving. They started from Florida, but his partner abandoned him in rural Washington, so he was stuck there without a ride or even a dollar to his name. He was trying to get to SC, where he wanted to drive for a company who was shuttling cleanup crews to and from the beach on the Gulf Coast.)
I arrived at the campsite in Yellowstone at almost the precise time that the Degeles got back from visiting Old Faithful. John recognized my car and dropped Bridget off to show me to the campsite. (I was really expecting to Yellowstone to be crowded in the summer, but other than construction traffic, it wasn't bad. It was probably worse in the southern part, around Old Faithful. There were no empty campsites, of course; Bridget had reserved them months ago.)
Madison River
Our campsite was right above the river.
I hadn't seen any of them in two years, since the family reunion in Colorado. The boys had grown a lot in those two years, as young boys tend to do. I doubt the youngest (William) remembered me, but he warmed to me pretty quickly. All three of them were really interested in my camera, and I let the two oldest take pictures with it.
Marshmallow Face
William is enjoying a S'more.
It was chilly at Yellowstone. I had expected to see some snow still on the ground, but there wasn't any where we were. (I suspect there was some further south, near the southern entrance, and at higher elevations. Mom and I did pass some on the way out, too.) Night time temperatures got down to the thirties. I'm fine with the cold (and my sleeping bag is rated to 15 degrees), but the boys got chilly at night and in the morning.
Huddled Masses
Andrew and Matthew are huddled under a sleeping bag during an evening Ranger program talking about the '88 Yellowstone fire. It wasn't terribly interesting, and Matthew was tired. But they needed to attend a ranger talk for their Junior Ranger badge, and Matthew refused to leave because he needed that signature. He whined and cried when John took him away, but they came back for the end and the signature. (The next night's talk, about the place of wolves in the Yellowstone ecosystem, was much more interesting.)
I think Bridget scheduled their entire trip to the minute. Well, maybe not to the minute, but for the three days they were there, Bridget had planned out everything that they'd do. She was flexible when things had to change, but I think she had a checklist of things that she wanted to do at every place. In the Yellowstone, it was Old Faithful (which they saw before I arrived), mudpots, animals (bison, elk, and marmots--and they saw a coyote, too). Saturday, then, was a trip to Mammoth Hot Springs, stopping by Artist's Paintpots to see some mudpots, and Sheepeater Cliffs to see if they could find any marmots. But she knows her kids, and how active they are, and how much to do to wear them out enough to get to bed.
Hot Spring
What you'd expect to see at Yellowstone, right? The power of geothermal energy bursting through the earth. The mudpots were a lot more fun, because instead of water boiling up, there was mud squirting out in jets. The pictures of them, though, are less impressive (although I posted three to flickr) because the jets of mud are hard to see against mud of the same color in the background.
Trailblazing
We stopped at Sheepeater cliff to see if we could spot any marmots sunning themselves on the rocks. That was unsuccessful (although we did see one at the top of the cliff as we were getting ready to leave), but the boys had a lot of fun hiking the trail by the river. Lots of rocks and logs to climb over, and overgrowth to push through. And Matthew saw a small snake--about the width of a pencil, and a foot long or so--but a snake!
Mammoth Hot Spring was kind of disappointing. The boys got their Junior Ranger badge at the station there (Matthew left his book in the bathroom not once, but twice!), and other than the ubiquitous ground squirrels, there wasn't much to amuse them. I was there just 5 years ago when I took a really neat picture, but it was amazing how much it had changed in that time. Jupiter Hot Springs was no longer flowing, and even the ramps around the spring had been moved. It was a long day, and the boys got fussy, so we headed back to camp. (Without John, who biked the 30 miles or so back and got back more than an hour before we did.)
Skewers
Dinner was veggie skewers. It was a mixed result. The potatoes and onions were sometimes undercooked, and the mushrooms were taken off so they didn't overcook and burn. I needed to be a bit more consistent in the size of the veggies, I guess. But they sure are pretty, aren't they?
I had been tossing the frisbee with Andrew a bit over the stay. He got hit with the frisbee once when he wasn't looking (and I was a bit further away, so I threw it with a bit more force, and it was harder than my usual throw), and after that, he was a bit skittish about trying to catch the frisbee, instead just trying to bat it down and stop it. He wasn't too bad throwing it, though. While we were throwing the frisbee after dinner, Bridget decided that the after dinner agenda was to see more mudpots. Andrew and Matthew decided they had seen enough, so they decided to keep playing frisbee with me. Frisbee gave way to my camera (they all wanted to take pictures with my camera) which lead to a walk down to the river, which in turn became trying to skip stones on the river, which itself turned into wading into the river looking for stones, and getting wet.
Deep Water
Matthew's shirt got all wet, so I stripped him of his shirt (it was getting late, and getting cold, and I didn't want him to get too cold with a wet shirt on). But they had fun, and had muddy feet when Bridget came back. More fun than seeing more paintpots, I'm sure.
Sunday morning brought a church service in the park, a visit to Yellowstone Canyon (with a hike down to the falls, and a hike back up when they had to wait for me several times), and lunch, before we parted ways. Mom split up with the Degeles here--they continued east to see friends, and Mom flew home. I wasn't planning to return to Boise (I was due in Calgary in less than a week for a wedding), so instead, I drove Mom to Billings where she spent some time with an old college friend and flew home from there. On our way out of the park, Mom and I saw:
Bear
A black bear foraging along the side of the road. We actually saw two, and there was a third elsewhere that stopped traffic, although we didn't see it.
The week between Yellowstone and Calgary needs another entry.
There are, as always, more photos on flickr.