Snap... and Our National Park Tour Begins

Snap your fingers and just like that we’ve been home from Costa Rica for 3 months already.  The time has passed quickly between visits with family and friends.

We were also treated to a night at the Toronto Symphony Orchestra.  Mike’s cousin Mark and his wife Leslie both play for the TSO; so one night way back in June, we took my folks with us; had dinner with Mark and Leslie at the Old Spaghetti Factory and then off to Roy Thompson Hall we went to watch the TSO perform Mahler 8 - Choir of a 1000.  It was a great experience for our first time and we had a great time with Mark and Leslie.

I’m still having issues with my right heel; and after a month of physio and an ultra sound, it turns out that my bursa on my Achilles tendon is inflamed.  I’ve tried a few “home” remedies, a Strassburg sock (for 6 weeks); a ten day regime of naproxen and then a ten day regime of Advil; and nothing.  So my next step is waiting for an ultra sound guided cortizone shot (which may or may not help).  This appointment probably won’t happen till the end of the year.  If this doesn’t work, not sure what the next step is.  But it’s been a year and a half of pain and it’s not been a lot of fun.

The rest of the summer has just flown by and we started to plan our National Park Tour.  We looked into buying a pop-up camper, but our Escape can only pull small trailers and the price that people were asking for their 20 plus year old pop-ups was outrageous.  So we started looking for a tent on-line and found a great cabin tent with a screened room attached - perfect!

We decided to do a trial run, so we headed up to Powassan, near North Bay, Ontario.  Mike’s uncle used to own Wassi Lodge and a bunch of his family headed up for a few days.  Lots of reminiscing; as it had been close to 20 years since some of the family had last been there.

A few days after coming home from Wassi Lodge, we were getting ready to head into London for dinner/cards with Ken & Rosie.  Got into the Escape, turned the key… and nothing!  Tried the key again and again and still nothing!  Called Ford assist and they sent out a tow truck.  The reason we bought a brand new vehicle was to be done with tow trucks and mechanic bills.

Turned out that our starter was pooched (and we only had 19,000 km‘s on it); and it took until the following Wednesday before we had our SUV back again.  The timing for this turned out to be perfect (if you can call having your vehicle crap out on you on a Friday of a long weekend perfect).  At least we were at home and not on the road.  With any luck, our new starter will last a long time.

With all the equipment working, we loaded up our Escape and started our National Park Tour (NPT for future reference).

Monday and Tuesday we were in bee-line mode and just wanted to get across the country; so we stayed in motels.  Both had hot tubs which we used - what a great way to ease away many miles of driving.

Our first destination was the Badlands in South Dakota.  Very beautiful; and very similar to Bryce National Park - minus the reds.  It was also very windy; and the only place that we got out; had us fighting the wind.  We were holding onto each other and even then had to push through.

The next stop was Mount Rushmore.  (Please click this link to see our pictures).  That too was pretty cool to see.  We didn’t actually go into the parking lot; but we still managed to get some pretty nice pictures.

We spent 2 nights at Custer State Park; and took full advantage of the area to drive around, and be wowed and bedazzled by beautiful scenery all around. 

This is also where we stared to see the first of the wild life.  So far we’ve seen a Prairie dog colony; Big Horned Sheep; Prong Horns (Anteloupe); Deer; Wild Burros; Coyote; Elk and the best… a herd of Buffalo.

On Friday we left Custer State park and made our way to Yellowstone National Park.  We arrived at dusk on Friday night, only to find out that most of the closest campgrounds were full.  Headed back in the direction of Cody and found a campground alongside the highway.

We re-entered Yellowstone on Saturday and have been busy driving around for the past 2 and a half days.  The scenery here is absolutely beautiful and the wildlife abundant.

Sunday, we came across the Buffalo herd for the second time.  They were spread out over 3 groups; and it just kept getting better and better.

The first group, you could take some pretty nice pictures with zoom; the second group were very close to the road; and got some great pictures and the third group… the Buffalo were walking right beside our car!  There must have been a half dozen or so; and you could have reached your arm out the window and patted them as they walked by!  How cool is that!

We talked to a local woman at the second group and she told us that over 600 calves were born in the Spring… very encouraging. 

And so far, of all the geysers that we’ve seen Old Faithful was pretty impressive.  They have benches set up all around, and there must have been well over 400 people waiting to watch it erupt.  My guess is the water was 15-20 feet high; but it only lasted a minute or so.

The weather has been a lot colder than I expected, especially overnight and first thing in the morning.  In fact on Sunday morning when we woke up it was a balmy 2 degrees celcius (around 34 Fahrenheit)  BRRRR!!!!!  Ended up getting in the SUV pretty quickly, turned on the heater and started exploring again. 

We ended up buying hooded sweatshirts and both had them on when we went to bed that night.  Having our heads fully covered certainly helped, that and it only went down to around 11 during the night… much better.

This morning, we headed to West Yellowstone, Montana, and from there, went into Idaho.  Well, the whole car was in Idaho, before we u-turned and went back into Montana.  Filled up the tank; and stopped at the McDonald’s to use their free internet.  And then back into Wyoming.  So far this trip, I’ve been in 4 new States, South Dakota, Wyoming, Montana and Idaho.  Brings the total of States that I’ve been in to 36.  With more to come.

I started writing this blog early this afternoon, and got interrupted by rain.  We had a chance to use the screened area of our tent, but it was coming in there too.  Back into the car we went, hoping to find the herd of Buffalo again.  We were successful!  After watching for almost an hour, one of the big bulls crossed the road and within a few minutes a bunch followed.  The big guy came back across the road and started grunting, within a few minutes all of the herd had crossed.  And we had a birds eye view of all of it!  Nice way to spend a rainy afternoon.

Stopped in at one of the visitors centre for supplies and ended up having dinner at an old fashioned diner… food was okay.  On the way back to our camp, we took a couple of driving tours.  On one of them, we had a big old Buffalo walking towards us… he was right in the middle of the road.   Stopped the car and just watched to see what he would do.  He just kept on walking, while Mike took a video. 

Overall it’s been an amazing NPT so far.  We leave here on Tuesday morning, and the next destination is the Grand Tetons, which you can see from Yellowstone Park.  Who knows what sights await us.

Click here to take a look at our pictures.