Yellowstone

+486=8359
I have a lot of photos from Yellowstone. We enjoyed the wildlife and finally saw a bear. He was right next to the road so got a nice view.

Yellowstone ranges from 6800 to about 9000 feet elevation so there was snow in a lot of places. Here is Gary looking out of the trailer at the snow in the campground. We were thankful to not be in a tent, burrr.

Geyser Basin in West Thumb, near the campground. Lake Yellowstone and the snowy mountains that we drove over to get to Yellowstone.

The rivers were all near flood stage. That made the waterfalls spectacular. Here is the Grand Canyon of Yellowstone.

Had to include a photo of Old Faithful.

Castle Geyser. The eruption lasts much longer than Old Faithful. We were watching this geyser and looked toward Old Faithful and it started its eruption so we were watching both at the same time. What a spectacle.

We saw 2 big herds of bison. There were lots of babies. We counted 13 at one time. Last time we were in Yellowstone it was September. Things are much different early in the season than late.











These guys are huge.

Big Horn Mountains, WY

+408=7873
I thought this would be just a long travel day so I expected to get lots of knitting done. Well, there was beautiful scenery all day. We went from rolling hills to snow covered mountains. Lots of antelope along the freeway too. Here we are looking at the Big Horn mountains ahead, covered with snow.

At last we made it to the top. We followed the Crazy Woman Creek to the top and the Ten Sleep Creek down the west side. Not really creeks, the rivers are swollen, nearly to the top of their banks.

Anybody want to play in the snow? It was 58 degrees so the snow was soft.

The peak at the top. It was beautiful scenery. We are spending the night in Cody, WY. A small thunder shower just went thru but the sun is out now. Only a couple more hours in the morning to Yellowstone. We will be there 2 nights. I doubt we will have wifi since we won't even have any hook-ups in the campground. We expect to be home Monday unless Hayden and Lilly convince us to spend the night there Monday.

Black Hills

We had a great day today. Beautiful blue sky after all the rain. I have wanted to see bears but never have had any luck. Today we went to Bear Country where you drive thru animal habitats. We saw lots of bears. They are all brown bears but some are black. We would have to stop to let them cross the road in front of us. It was wonderful to see all the animals.

They have a nursery for the babies born here. There are 26 of them. Very entertaining and cute.

Isn't he sweet. They play and sleep, just like toddlers.

Here are the cougars. Go COUGS.

The hump on their shoulders is a huge muscle that helps them run fast and pounce on their prey.

How do these elk hold up that rack? Magnificent animals.

On to Crazy Horse. When we were here 23 years ago the Indian wasn't recognizable. Progress but doubt it is finished in our lifetime. We ate our lunch with this view today.

The model of what is to come in the foreground and the mountain in the background. We will have to come back in another 23 years to see how it has progressed. Tomorrow is a driving day on the way to Yellowstone.

Badlands/Mt. Rushmore

+297=7465
Yesterday we traveled thru the Badlands to Mt. Rushmore. We started out in the rain. The rain and wind gave Gary a tense morning. Those storms did materialize. However, as we arrived at the Badlands the rain quit and we were able to walk to the view points as well as in and around the formations. We had lunch in the trailer because of the wind, but this was our view out the window.

Because of the rain all the grass is green. It was a beautiful contrast to the red in the dirt.

Hope you can see it in the photo. These are the yellow mounds. It was only a small area, but beautiful.

We parked the trailer between Rapid City and Mt. Rushmore. We decided to go up late in the afternoon so we could stay for the evening program. We got to take a trail towards the sculpure and see the presidents from a different, closer view.

Here you can see blue sky. We were thankful we took our rain clothes because there were showers. It was nice to have a few hours here. I hadn't thought much about Mt Rushmore, the mountain, before it was carved. We also saw a film and the museum.

The evening ranger program was in a 5000 seat amphitheater. It seemed nearly full. It was a patriotic theme and well done. At the end of the talk and film the ranger invited up all past and present military personnel. There were a lot of people on stage. Then they lit up the mountain and we all sang the national anthem.

Mitchell, SD

+290=7168
We started the day with a wonderful breakfast with the Boharas at The Origional Pancake House. We left their delightful, relaxing new home about 1:00, crossed Minnesota and made it to Mitchell, SD. We got parked, and then toured the Corn Palace. We had expected to drive in thunder storms today but didn't encounter any. Once we got parked and looked at the weather channel, we found out that we can expect storms tonight. Hope they don't develop into severe thunder storms.

Minneapolis/Victoria, MN

We have spent the past 2 days visiting Bob, KDiane and Ryan Bohara. They live in Victoria, MN, a subarb of Minneapolis. We have seen several parts of the area. On Saturday as we were crossing Minnesota Gary drove thru a thunder storm and downpour. We have been fortunate with the weather. This was our first storm while we were driving. For Fathers Day we went to see Cirque Du Soleil. It was fabulous. The costumes and make-up in addition to the acrobatics and music. they don't allow photography.

We were under the big tent. It is near the airport, we could really hear the planes take off.

We have had a great time with Ryan. He has quite a sense of humor and keeps us in stitches.

Across the street just happened to be the Mall of America. Ryan likes the amusment part so he and Gary went on a couple of rides. I enjoyed watching from the ground. After that we went to dinner Bubba Gumps. Carol, I thought of you, wish you were here.

We enjoyed LEGOland. These are huge characters made from LEGOs.

Ryan and Hayden, wish you were here.

LEGO Woody and Gary.

St Joseph, MO

We came to St Joseph, MO because Gary's Great Great Grandparents left there with a wagon train headed for Oregon in 1855. There are several museums here where we spent the morning today. Here is a wagon fully loaded, ready for the Oregon trail. Heard interesting stories from the Lakota Indian at the visitors center.

St. Joseph is were the Pony Express started, headed for Sacramento, CA. Letters were $5 per 1/2 ounce and took 10 days. The Pony Express lasted 19 months and was put out of business by the telegraph. The company that started it went bankrupt. Go figure. We went to the River Park to see the Missouri River. It was up over the stairs to the shore and is expected to go 9 feet higher. I-29 that follows the Missouri River in Iowa is closed because of flooding.

We found a happy surprise today. We were headed to Winterset, IA to shop at the Fons & Porter Quilt shop. Turns out it is in Madison County, the county that was the focus of the movie, Bridges of Madison County.

We saw 2 quilt barns but it is not organized here so we were just lucky to see them.

Here is 1 of the 6 covered bridges in Madison County, we only got to see 2.

St Louis

I have these photos in backwards order so bare with me.
First I want to say that the Quilt Museum in Paducah was wonderful. You can't take photos because of copyright issues so I don't have anything to share here. The word museum is a bit of a misnomer since their oldest quilt is 20 years old, but awesome quilts none the less.

We left Kentucky, on thru Illinois to St Louis. This morning we went to see the Cahokia Mounds. It is the largest prehistoric Indian site north of Mexico. Nice museum and grounds. Someone important was probably buried in this mound.

Last evening we went to the Gateway Arch in St. Louis. Here is a photo from the top, 630 feet high. We rode a tram to the top (inside the arch).

This morning in the daylight I took this as we were leaving town. Nice puffy clouds. We were concerned about weather today. We were suppose to get into thunder showers on the way to Kansas City but were fortunate to miss the storm. Tonight we are in St Joseph MO. More about that tomorrow. +589=6395

Nashville, TN to Paducah, KY

+176=5806
We went to Nashville to see what it is all about. We got there Sunday afternoon just as the CMA Festival was ending. Lots of people in town. The only show was the closing concert with many name artists so it was sold out of course. We went downtown and listened to several bands in the bars on Broadway. Monday morning we walked through the gardens of the Opryland Hotel. It covers 9 acres. Big waterfalls and bigger trees.

On to Mammoth Cave. It lives up to its name. Very different than the other caves we have been in. Huge rooms that are difficult to photograph. We went through some very tight spaces.

We arrived in Paducah, KY this afternoon. It was too late to visit the National Quilt Museum (will go there tomorrow) so went to a very large quilt shop, Hancocks of Paducah. I looked at most all their fabric and finally decided on a little to purchase as they were closing. We then went downtown. This is the confluence of the Tennessee and Ohio Rivers. There is a lot of barge traffic here.

There is a flood wall along the river. They have beautiful murals painted all along that show the history of the city. A very interesting city.