GrumpsReport

A very full day. Exhausted after visiting THREE (count ’em) THREE national parks! Capitol Reef so far my favorite. Had the park to myself, got to see all the major sites including the Petroglyphs, Capitol Dome, Grand Wash and Capitol Gorge. All spectacular!

From there headed to Bryce Canyon by way of Rt 12 (Scenic Byway, All American Road) and Grand Staircase Escalante National Monument. Wow, totally unexpected!

Finally, got to Ruby’s RV Park early so decided to go ahead and tour Bryce. With the sun setting it was particularly beautiful…

Some pics:

(RATS! The internet here at Ruby’s is insufficient to post photos and it’s too late to set up Starlink! Sorry…will try again tomorrow!

Ok, here are the pics I wanted to share of Escalante, Capitol Reef and Bryce Canyon…enjoy! And because photos are inadequate…put it on your bucket list(s) to BE HERE in person!

On the way to Capitol Reef…

The Grand Wash…always subject to flash floods..

The petroglyphs…

Capitol Gorge

Grand Staircase Escalante – it goes on for miles and miles! Stairs and deep gorges…

Climbing out of Escalante towards Bryce Canyon…

Just one image of hundreds! It’s everything it’s reported to be…

Onward to Zion next!

So, the government shutdown meant that my 7AM reservation to enter Arches was superfluous. There were no park rangers or attendants anywhere. That said, I arrived at the entrance at 7AM just before sunrise, and was treated to a largely empty park, a perfectly cloudless dawn, and more wonders:

Delicate Arch from the closest vantage point I could get to with Hudson.

The Devil’s Garden

Balanced Rock

And again, the words and photos simply can’t capture the magnificence of these National Parks.

Onward to Capitol Reef tomorrow!

Dropped son off at Provo (International) airport in the morning and then headed south towards Canyonland, Arches and Moab, Utah.

I’m out of adjectives to describe how magnificent these national parks are. Have a 7 AM reservation to get into Arches National Park tomorrow morning so am going to truncate this post and just share a few photos:

Mesa Arch – packed with people, this is the best I could do.

Dogs not allowed so this is just off the road.

One of the many, MANY, vistas in the Park!

Weather turned beautiful again today. And the drive was lovely. Got to Sundance and hardly recognized the place! After all, it was 50 YEARS AGO that I was a ski instructor there working for Robert Redford. (The staff there were still reeling from the Memorial held for Redford just a few weeks ago when he passed away.) Sundance is now a big time resort – no surprise…it’s location was always great and the skiing always good.

From Sundance we drove into Provo. Hardly recognized Provo either! We drove around looking for a place to park the RV and finally turned up a residential side street and parked in front of “The Nelson Family’s” house. I walked up and rang the doorbell and Mr. Nelson answered the door. “Hi,” I said, “I haven’t been here in 30 years and was wondering if we could park our RV out in front of your house for a couple of hours while we walked around the BYU campus.” In classic Utah-speak, Mr. Nelson replied “You bet! Have a nice visit!”

And so we walked around BYU. UNRECOGNIZABLE from the last time I saw it. And sadly, some of the statues were covered in shrink wrapped plastic with signs that read: “Artwork protected against vandalism.” Sad.

The other notable thing about BYU is that as we passed Cougar Stadium, there were loads of television trucks there from Fox as the “Big Noon Kickoff” show is to be broadcast there tomorrow. BYU is still undefeated and now ranked 15th in the nation so it’s a big deal and probably explains why the RV park where we’re staying is packed solid!

The other thing we had to do was get the oil changed in the RV! It needs to be changed every 6,000 miles and CruiseAmerica said it was due. We pulled into a Jiffy Lube and, with six inches to spare on either side and maybe 6 inches overhead, we made it into one of their two bays and were in and out in 1/2 an hour!

Tomorrow my son heads back East. We’re right next to the airport so that’s convenient, but it will be sad to see him go. Hudson will be particularly sad as he has been receiving an inordinate number of hugs and belly rubs for the last several days!

I, on the other hand, will head to Canyonlands, the first of the Big 5 grand national parks in Utah and will be staying the night in the town of Moab, not far away.

Onward and upward!

Crack of before dawn rise for the boys. Foggy and rainy and not looking too promising for the trip through Yellowstone. First stop was at Gardiner to get fuel ($3.59 a gallon – have been paying $2.69-$2.79). Then to the North Entrance to Yellowstone where a not so friendly Park Ranger checked my America the Beautiful Pass and said, “Due to the government shutdown I’m unable to scan your pass but in any case you needed to present it with a current i.d.” (Gee, thanks) Oh well, no doubt he’ll get his back pay and probably didn’t have anything better to do today anyway…

Onward to the Grand Canyon of Yellowstone (picture above). Magnificent, even in the rain. Along the way we encountered a traffic jam caused by a herd of buffalo taking their sweet time crossing the highway in front of us! I know I keep saying this over and over again, but words can’t describe the beauty!

From the Canyon we drove to Old Faithful. Unfortunately, the timing of the next eruption was over an hour away and our itinerary wouldn’t permit us to hang around for it. But we were able to catch the scene, taking photographs of each other without any people in the background! That’s how much we had the Park to ourselves.

On the way back to the RV we noticed a bunch of people standing in front of it looking at what we thought was Hudson in the Driver’s Seat. Rather, they were looking at three huge crows that were sitting on top of the RV and picking the rubber seals out from the driving lights on the roof! (Don’t ask me why….)

From Old Faithful we made out way south to Grand Teton National Park. The majestic mountains to our west were covered with clouds for the most part, but still beautiful nonetheless.

We of course had to stop and take the obligatory photograph of the famous Moulton Barn on Mormon Row just north of Jackson. You can just see the Tetons in the background.

Then into Jackson where we also took the obligatory photos of the antler arches on the Town Square and in my case, stopped in to Teton Mountaineering for a new hat (my old one from years ago is starting to get a bit ratty!)

After a heart stopping bbq at a local restaurant in town where we were able to have Hudson join us, we drove another hour south to our KOA campground in Etna. It’s only a few months old – was nice to have everything new like the showers, laundry, toilets…

Tomorrow we push on to Provo, Utah.

Out of the north of Montana to steps from Yellowstone. The scenery the whole way is gorgeous, but nothing to compare with Glacier. It took us six hours, but we made it to Livingston by early afternoon and I spent the day updating these posts, organizing pictures, and wandering up and down the river bank (the Yellowstone River) where our RV sits as I type this.

Bears galore around here (son managed to step in what he thought was bear poo but which turned out to be dog poo). He was NOT a happy camper especially since there IS bear scat right behind our rig and we (including Hudson) managed to avoid stepping in THAT pile!

To Yellowstone, Teton National Park and Jackson Hole tomorrow!

Both a disappointing day and a fabulous day. As many of you know, the way to see Glacier is to drive the “Going to the Sun Road”, a 50 mile trip from West Glacier to St. Mary at the Eastern end of the Park. Knowing in advance that the road is impassable in spots to RV’s our size, I rented a Hertz SUV from Kalispell airport, where I had retrieved my son the day prior. We got there at 8AM on the spot, transferred cameras, etc. and of course dog, and headed back to West Glacier to the western entrance.

When we arrived we were confronted with a sign that said, “Going to the Sun Road closed between Avalanche and Rising Sun.” Of course, we had no idea where these were along the road so we had to stop and consult a map. To our dismay, Avalanche was a spot 15 miles in from the West Entrance, and Rising Sun was a spot 5 miles in from the East Entrance at St. Mary. GROAN! The whole middle of the trip was closed to us, and given the snow I experienced driving over the Continental Divide the day before, I understood why.

Undaunted, we drove the 15 miles to Avalanche. We were not disappointed. The weather cooperated and it was a magical drive. We practically had the whole road to ourselves and were able to turn out frequently and take some fabulous pictures (too many to choose from here).

It didn’t take long. We had the whole rest of the day so we queried a Park Ranger who was working along the road and asked if it was worth it to drive around the south end of the Park and up the East side to St. Mary (a trip that was 100+ miles each way!) and enter the Park for the 5 miles or so it was open from the East side.

We decided we had to do it.

Here are just 2 photos of the dozens we took. The first of the drive in from the West side. The second (to prove the 200 mile out of the way trek was worth it) on the 5 mile journey from the Eastern entrance.

Needless to say, we lucked out with the weather, and these shots were taken with an iPhone! There’s no doubt I’ll have to come back again and do that whole road! The pictures, of course, don’t do justice to the magnificence…sigh….

Left Three Forks early as I needed to cover a lot of miles to get to Kalispell airport in time to pick up my son who arranged to fly out and meet me, and join me for 4 days of the trip. It started out overcast but soon it started to snow and a couple of serious accidents slowed my progress. By the time I got to Flathead Lake the weather was gorgeous…that’s how it is out here. You can experience all four seasons in one day. The photo, however, attempts to show what it must have been like for the pioneers coming across the plains as they saw the Rocky Mountains arising on the horizon.

I made it to Kalispell airport 1/2 hour before his plane arrived. We stopped at a supermarket and got two huge ribeye steaks, two of the biggest spuds I think I’ve ever seen, and some broccoli, then made our way to the RV park in West Glacier where we had the whole place to ourselves. Nestled in pine trees at the foot of the mountains, it was a serene place. And the SMELLS! Hudson went crazy! We actually broke out the bear spray that evening as there were warning signs everywhere, and we could imagine getting a visit during the night.