Notes from the Road – 2012 Road Trip with George and the Dogs

"One day your life will flash before your eyes.  Make sure it's worth watching."

Unknown - saw this on a sign in Leavenworth, Washington

 

"People do not quit playing because they grow old...

They grow old because they quit playing."

Unknown - on a sign in Estes Park, Colorado 
 

Driving across the Columbia River to Astoria in the fog

our back seat

On July 14^th we took off on our annual road trip to Washington state, but with a slight detour through Colorado and Mt. Rushmore area.  A bit out of our way, but our goal is to see some new areas of our country.  We have the dogs with us, and they are being good little travelers most of the time.  Sadie tends to be a bit paranoid sometimes, and it is difficult to get her to eat when she is nervous.  That can be a bit frustrating sometimes, but on the whole they do pretty good on our road trips. 

So, our first day was going through Arizona, which we have been through quite a few times, so we were not doing much sightseeing here, our goal was just to get through it and into new territory.  We were stopped and asked if we were US citizens, part of their new immigration policy.  I’m sure a bit of racial profiling was going on, since we are white, they waived us through.  If we had been Hispanic we would have had to produce paperwork.  The schnauzers barked at the officer, but thankfully they did not have to produce paperwork either, they would have hated being deported. 

Monument Valley - I thought this looked like the Parthenon in Greece
before it became ruins, use your imagination.

Our second day on the road we were still in Arizona, but it was new territory, we were in Monument Valley.  I have to say that was a really pretty area, and certainly worth the short detour we took to drive through the area.  We also stopped at a roadside area where we saw a sign that said “See the Dinosaur Footprints”.  An Indian guide gave us a quick tour of the area.  There were indeed footprints in the rocky areas, left from dinosaurs in the mud, which later became hardened when a volcano erupted.  There were also bones and skulls.  Very interesting, and we were glad we stopped.

Dinasour footprints

I had worried about the heat that was in all the news before we left home, with fires all over Colorado, but so far we’ve had lots of rain, would like a little heat and sunshine.  Can’t imagine the fires are still going because Colorado has been very wet.  But the scenery has been mostly beautiful, and very green.  We have traveled on some very narrow roads, high up with no railing, a few white knuckle moments.  The area around Durango and Silverton were particularly stunning.

Inside the True Grit Cafe

We made a point of stopping in Ridgeway, Colorado.  That is where the original movie “True Grit” was filmed – the one with John Wayne.  We got into town late afternoon on the second day, so we opted to spend the night there.  We had dinner in the True Grit Café, which had a lot of memorabilia and pictures on the wall.  George has a good friend who is a John Wayne fan, and he wanted us to take some pictures of the area, so we did, the next day before heading out. 

 

Along the road to Aspen

Our third day we headed north toward Grand Junction.  I was a little disappointed in the scenery from Ridgeway to Grand Junction, not the prettiest of areas.  But once we turned east the scenery got better.  We took a detour off of the 70 and went down to Aspen and across the Independence pass.  Talk about narrow roads, with no railing, and up high.  We were at 12,095 feet elevation.  Road was very curvy and in places it was so narrow that when you met an oncoming car, both cars had to slow and carefully pass each other.  And of course it started raining again when we were up there.  It really poured down and we had thunder and lightning, so quite dramatic.  Sadie has always been scared of rain, and especially thunder.   She was shaking pretty hard, so I ended up holding her in my lap through that part of the trip.  She calmed a bit.  We had planned to stop and walk around Leadville, but it was raining pretty hard then, so headed on to Frisco, where we found a hotel and spent the night.  We had a good dinner in a nice steakhouse restaurant in town.

Taken from porch of Grand Lake Lodge

The next day we headed toward Rocky Mountain National Park.  We entered the park from the southwest entrance by Grand Lake. But before actually entering, we turned off and went to the Grand Lake Lodge.  That is a beautiful lodge with views of the lake.  They have cabins for rent there also, and they are pet friendly.  We didn’t spend the night there, but if I was going to go again, I would seriously consider staying there, the prices are reasonable, and it is a great location. We stopped at the visitor’s center then headed into the park.  We had not gone far when we saw cars parked along the road and people pointing at 2 moose – a mother and a baby – that were in the field.  We stopped and took their picture.

The baby moose in the park

The Rocky Mountain National Park has some spectacular views.  There are hiking paths if that is your thing, but remember that you are at a very high altitude, quite a few people in the park said they were feeling tired and having problems breathing, so hiking will be harder at that altitude.  Quite a bit of the road we were driving on was over 10,000 ft.  When we reached the Alpine Visitors Center we stopped to buy lunch, it is the only place along the way that had food for sale.  I have to say that they didn’t have a lot of choices for food, and it was a bit high in price.  We had 2 hot dogs, 1 bag of chips and shared a small apple juice and it was almost $15.  I would suggest buying some good sandwiches before entering the park, and putting them in a cooler.  There are picnic tables where you can stop and eat.  Also, be aware of the weather in the park.  We started with sunny skies, but we hit heavy rains and hail by the time we got to the higher elevations, so be prepared for anything.

Elk in the Rocky Mtn NP

While in the park we also saw elk, in several different places along the way, and we saw some mule deer.  Of course, there were chipmunks and birds, as well.  We were told that there was a possibility of seeing bears, as there are some in the park, but they are not spotted often.  If you are not planning on hiking, it is possible to see this park in one day.  The scenery is visible while driving, with lots of places to pull over and take pictures, and the animals are there, if you are lucky you will see some.

 

Estes Park, Colorado

Just outside the main entrance is the town of Estes Park, and I thought it was a delightful place, with cute shops, lots of good looking restaurants, and the Falls River runs through the downtown area, with a park area along the river.  It is quite a picturesque town.

We went on to Fort Collins for the night, we had reservations there at the Best Western.  We had dinner in their downtown area, at a pizza restaurant called Beau Jo’s.  They have restaurants all over Colorado, and are now opening places in South Dakota.  If you ever run across one of their places, I highly recommend them.  I have had pizzas all over this country, as well as others, including Italy.  The pizza I had at Beau Jo’s has to rate as the best pizza I have ever had.

Day 5 had us leaving Ft. Collins and heading north briefly and then east.  We decided to drive over to Nebraska to see a small part of that state, since we have never been there.  I have to say that Nebraska – at least the part we saw – looks just as I imagined it would.  It is flat.  Of course there are other states that have lots of flat land, such as Arizona, but what I have to say about Nebraska is – they put their land to use.  In Arizona there is vast areas of un-irrigated land – desert.  But Nebraska’s land is all cultivated.  It is farmland.  We particularly saw lots of cornfields.  There were vast stretches of road where we were the only car out there.  But alongside the road we saw tractors in the field – our farmers hard at work, producing the food America needs. 

I have been reminded the past few days that the states we are traveling through are all red states.  The signs alongside the highway and on the farmlands have all been very convervative in their views, and the hotel we stayed at in Colorado had on Fox “news”.  That was a shudder from me.  It has made me appreciate the fact that I live in a nice blue state, with more progressive views – on the whole.  And I appreciate all our mountains and our ocean, I would have a hard time living in Nebraska, or several other states we’ve traveled through.  But I have enjoyed seeing them.

George in Lusk

We did head back into Wyoming and stopped for a visit in Lusk, where we had lunch.  We were in Lusk, Ireland  in June, and now in July we found ourselves in Lusk, Wyoming.  We took a quick excursion over to Keeline, only to find it was a ghost town.  Our daughter married a Keeline, so we had to get a picture of the town and the sign for them.  Then we headed into South Dakota. 

Crazy Horse Memorial

We stopped at the Crazy Horse Memorial, which was quite fascinating.  I was impressed with what is still a work in progress, but which, when finished, will be spectacular.  I learned a lot about Crazy Horse while there.  Then we went to Mt. Rushmore and saw those carvings in the mountain, which were also quite impressive.  Since we have our dogs with us, we were limited at Mt. Rushmore, as they don’t allow dogs in the park.  George and I had to take turns staying with the dogs while the other went up to the plaza to view the mountain.  We hadn’t had the problem at the Crazy Horse memorial, as it is dog-friendly.  I don’t really understand why they would have a problem at Mt. Rushmore with dogs on leashes walking up to the plaza.  Most dogs are better behaved then most children, and as long as owners are responsible – which I believe the majority are – there shouldn’t be a problem. This is a pet peeve of mine – dogs not allowed in places, and also pet owners who don’t pick up after their animals, and ruin it for the rest of us.
 

Anyway, we ended the day at our hotel in Sturgis where we had dinner at the restaurant next door.  We have reservations here for 3 nights, so time to see the Badlands and Deadwood, and whatever else looks like fun.

Ad for Wall Drug Store

Badlands NP

The Badlands National Park has some very desolate but interesting scenery.  We drove out to Wall first.  We had to stop at the biggest tourist destination in the area – Wall Drug.  It is a famous place, with lots of roadside signs marking your way to it.  They are famous for giving free ice water, and we certainly needed ice water, as it was 109 degrees.  Then on to the National Park.  We drove through the park, first going out a gravel road to see some prairie dogs, and we also saw 2 buffalo and some antelope along this gravel road.  Then we went back and drove the main road loop through the park, stopping at different lookout points to take pictures.  There are some hiking trails – but it was 109 degrees, so we didn’t do much outside the car.  We have our dogs with us, and they had no desire to get out of the air-conditioning either.  Baxter was fascinated with the prairie dogs and the buffalo though.  We made it a fairly quick trip through the park and headed back to the hotel and the swimming pool.

For dinner we left the dogs in our hotel room and headed to the historic town of Deadwood.  We saw a mountain goat alongside the road on our way there, and some deer on our way back to the hotel.  The town itself is now mostly casinos and tacky tourist shops, but there are some good restaurants and we had a nice meal, and enjoyed looking around.

Mountain goat just outside Deadwood

The next day we decided to check out of our hotel a day early and head towards Devils Tower.  It made sense to get a hotel that direction instead of coming back here and then heading that way again the next day, since that was the direction we would be going.

We first headed back to Deadwood and then did a loop through the Black Hills Forest.  It was a really pretty drive.  Then we headed into Wyoming and to the Devils Tower National Monument.  With our National Park pass we were covered to get into this without paying another fee, so we drove in and stopped at the information center. 

Devils Tower Nat. Monument

Theodore Roosevelt proclaimed Devils Tower a national monument in 1906, making it the first national monument.  The tower is 5,112 feet tall.  There is a path that you can walk that is 2.8 miles and it goes to the base of the mountain and then all the way around.  Since it was 100 degrees the day we were there, and we also had the dogs with us, we did not take the walk.  The dogs would have been allowed, as long as they were on a leash, but the heat would have been too much for them.  So we took some pictures and then headed west through Montana. 

Little Bighorn Battlefield

We ended our day by stopping briefly at Little Bighorn Battlefield near Hardin, Mt.  This is where Custer fought a battle against the Lakota, Arapaho and Cheyenne, and where he lost his life.  It is also a national monument, so our passes got us in.  It is a large open area that you can drive through, and there are signs saying what happened in each area.  There are markers where the soldiers died and a few where Indians died.  Last Stand Hill has a memorial marker and 210 soldiers are buried around the base.  Custer was originally buried here, but has since been moved.  There is a visitor’s center, which shows an informative movie.  It is an interesting place to stop if you are in the area.

I have to say that driving across Montana was not too exciting.  Most of Montana is flat, with brown fields on both sides of the road, straight road that goes forever.  It wasn’t as bad as driving across Texas – nothing is, but it was boring.  Finally as we got closer to Butte, there were some mountains and trees, so it got better.  But we were just driving, we didn’t see anything we wanted to stop and see. 

Lake Chelan, Washington

We finally arrived in Washington.  Our first stop was the Wenatchee area where we spent the night.  Then we made the drive out to Lake Chelan.  As a child I camped there with my family.  I had fond memories of the area and wanted to see the lake again.  There is a boat that takes you to the other end of the lake and as a child we took our own boat up there.  Didn’t go up this time, but it is worth going there.  The lake is 55 miles long and there is no road to the other end of the lake, but there is a small village up there and a nice falls you can hike out to. 

Leavenworth, Washington

We then decided to head for Leavenworth, with a short stop first at the Aplets and Cotlets factory in Cashmere, to pick up some of the famous candy.  Yum!  Leavenworth is a Bavarian town in the mountains of Washington.  It is particularly popular at Christmas time when they decorate the town and have sleigh rides.  But we won’t be in Washington at that time of year, so decided to stop and visit now.  It really is a charming town, with good restaurants, and really nice shops.

Then we headed down the Columbia River, with views of Mt. Adams and Mt. Hood.  We watched the wind surfers on the river.  We were anxious to get to our cabin where we will stay for 3 weeks.  It is our home away from home and the purpose of the trip was to come here and stay, and relax.  This place is my happy place.

Dogs are happy to be at our cabin on the river

Bashia and I heading downriver

 We spent the 3 weeks comfortably enjoying our river, and watching the wildlife from the deck.  We saw a pair of snow geese and their baby, lots of ducks, a blue heron, an osprey, and some deer while there.  The dogs hung out on the deck, took walks with me up the road and even got in the water with me.  They had a good time too.  We have lots of family and friends to visit.  Quite a bit of the visiting was them coming to us and enjoying the river too.  My sister-in-law and I even decided to do a inner-tube trip down the river.  We floated 3 miles down to a popular swimming hole, where our husbands picked us up.  I think they were getting worried about us, it took us 3 ½ hours, longer than we thought it would.  We were tired and bruised when we got there.  There were many rapid areas where we hit rocks with our bottoms, and some areas you couldn’t float through because the water was too low.  I had never gone that far down river on a tube before, so it was an adventure.

Baxter enjoying the beach

After our stay at the cabin, we took off for the Washington coast for 5 nights.  George’s family lives there, so we always stop for a short stay to visit everyone.  We got a cute little cabin there in town and spent the week visiting family and eating wonderful seafood.  His cousin Dean gave us 5 crabs that he had caught and he also cooked us dinner one night – fish tacos – my favorite.  The dogs enjoyed out treks to the beach where they could run free, and smell all the smells of the seashore.  The beach has always been a favorite place for them.

 


View along the northern stretch of Hwy 1

After all our visiting, it was time to head home.  We were already at the beach, so decided to head down the Oregon coast on 101, and then pick up Hwy 1 in California.  It is a more scenic drive, although certainly a lot slower.  Especially since I was always saying “pull over, I need a picture”.  George is a very patient driver and pulls over whenever I see something worth shooting.  He did say that he would never again complain about how straight and boring Interstate 5 was, after driving the VERY curvy Hwy 1.  It did take us an extra day to get home, but it was worth doing, as the scenery is spectacular.  We only went as far as Bodega Bay on the northern stretch of 1, then turned inland and picked up the 5 so that we could get home. 

So now we are home again.  When we drove up our street the dogs sat up and got big grins on their faces.  They couldn’t believe we were home again.  It was good to see our home.  Our daughter had been coming over weekly to take care of the place, so we knew everything was okay.  We had a stack of mail to go through, empty cupboards to restock, and clothes to wash.  So that takes care of another adventure.