The Long Run Highlights

Our campsite in Greek Creek Campground

On September 5, we hit the road for what I have called The Long Run. This segment of our 2014 travels took us from southwestern Montana to southern Illinois, where The Du Quoin Township High School Class of 1964 is holding our 50 year reunion. I haven't been back to Du Quoin since 1966. It should be interesting  to see my classmates and the town I grew up in.

Leo keeping the Rockies in their place.

Since we had plenty of time to get to Illinois, we took a leisurely pace and hit some sites along the way. One of the highlights actually occurred the evening before we left Greek Creek campground. While Leo was doing his watch-keeping out the window of our trailer near sundown, he notified me of an intruder in our yard. Usually this is a squirrel. When I took a look, I found he had hit the mother-load.

I case the video isn't clear enough for you to tell, that is a cow moose with her calf in our campsite.

Our first stop was in Red Lodge, Montana where we spent a couple of days in a campground in the Bear Tooth Mountains.  From this base we made a run up the Bear Tooth Scenic Byway. And when I say "up" that is exactly what I mean. The traveling CBS journalist Charles Kuralt once called it “the most beautiful drive in America.” The Road itself is the highest elevation highway in Wyoming (10,947 feet) and Montana (10,350 feet), and is the highest elevation highway in the Northern Rockies. Here is what we saw from the top.

While we were in the area, I also visited the Little Big Horn Battlefield National Monument.

Monument at the top of Last Stand Hill

 The monument at the top of Last Stand Hill lists the names of the fallen soldiers. Their remains lie beneath the monument. Throughout the battlefield, white stones mark the locations where soldiers were killed.

View from the top of Last Stand Hill looking toward the Little Big Horn River

While many of the stones are on Last Stand Hill, they are also found scattered across the landscape of the Little Big Horn Valley, showing the extent of the battle.

From Red Lodge we moved on east to Rapid City, South Dakota. Part of my planning was to stay north as long as possible before turning south toward Texas, with the hope of enjoying some nice fall weather. Well...

Snow in Rapid City, SD

Fortunately the snow in Rapid City melted away in a day and I visited Mount Rushmore and Crazy Horse Mountain.

 There is still a little work to do to get Crazy Horse Mountain to look like the model.

 I also hit a great steakhouse.

From Rapid City we continued east on Interstate 90 to Sioux Falls, then on into Minnesota. We spent a night in Blue Earth, MN for two reasons. First, the fairgrounds in Blue Earth provides RV sites with full hook-ups, with the first 24 hours free. Sure beats staying in a Walmart parking lot. Second, the fairgrounds is protected by this guy...

Ya' Just Gotta Stop, Right???

From Blue Earth we pushed on along I90 into Wisconsin. It was here that we began our turn to the south. We stopped off in Wisconsin Dells, only to find that the summer season is now over and finding an open restaruant in downtown was a challenge. My choices were a Mac'n'Cheese place or the Dells Distillery.  I choose the Dells Distillery. Imagine my joy when I found that their specialty (and only thing on the menu) was tator tots. Ever being the adventurous traveler, I ordered the special of the day with a local brew.

Yep, that's a bed of tator tots covered with cheese, sloppy joe and sauerkraut. I don't recall what they called it. Must be a Wisconsin thing. From the Dells I headed to Edgerton, WI to spend an evening with my sister-in-law Karen and her husband Dave. Their kids, Rob, Colleen and Susan joined us for dinner along with Susan's husband and Colleen's husband and some of Karen and Dave's grand kids. I haven't seen Rob, Colleen and Susan since they were kids themselves. It was a treat.

To cap off The Long Run we continued due south through the center of Illinois to arrive at my hometown of Du Quoin.  The Long Run has lived up to its title. We have traveled 1,686 miles since leaving Greek Creek on September 5. Today I marked the end of The Long Run by driving by our old home place. It's still there and looks like home.

The Du Quoin White House

 

Moose Creek Days

We are now about halfway through our stay in Montana. As I’ve often heard, the scenery here is spectacular.

Moose Creek Flats campground

Gallatin River behind our campsite

Unfortunately, we’re not going to see as much of it as I had hoped. In order to stay within my budget, I must avoid commercial RV parks, where overnight rate can run $35 to $50. Instead our travel plans for the summer have been based on stays in National Forest campgrounds, averaging $7 to $10 per night. As we have been traveling further north, it seems to become harder to locate campgrounds that will accommodate a trailer as large as mine. When I bought the trailer, my research indicated that a 31 foot fifth wheel would work. However, as we have traveled this summer I have found that many National Forest campgrounds  maximum length  restriction are 24 feet or less and those that can accommodate large units may only have a few sites for them. So, we have been moving less frequently than we had planned and been  making day trips to see of much on the countryside as we can from our base.

Our base for the past two weeks as been in Moose Creek Flats campground, which is adjacent to the Gallatin River about 10 miles north of Big Sky, Montana.

Our campsite on the bank of the Gallatin River

We will be leaving here tomorrow, but will only be moving about three miles north to Greek Cheek campground (which has a site that can accommodate my rig) for ten more days. Then we will start working our way east. My plan is to stay north as long as possible before turning south for Du Quoin, Illinois at the end of September. That should give us a chance to experience some real fall weather.

The area around Big Sky truly lives up to its name. At night here the stars blanket the sky and, since we are far from light polluting cities, the Milky Way and shooting stars are clearly visible. The town of Big Sky itself is interesting in that it is a ski resort that seems to have been built within the past twenty years or so. Everything seems new and all of the buildings have a rustic architectural style. Even the grocery stores look like houses. This is cool from the outside, but makes the inside layout really strange.

Grocery Store in Big Sky

Big Sky, Montana Post Office

Big Sky Chapel

Soldiers Chapel and Cemetery

Since we are staying in Montana until early September,  I plopped down my $70 for a non-resident fishing license and have been fishing most days, weather permitting. There is a hatch of spruce moths here most mornings and that gets the trout rising to dry flies. It’s been many years since I have fished dries and it took me a few days to get accustomed to seeing the fly floating on the surface.

My first Montana Rainbow Trout (about 10 inches long)

At first I though my eyesight had deteriorated to the point that I could no longer see the fly. But after a couple of days and a few larger flies, I’ve found that that tracking the fly on the surface is a skill that returns with practice. I’ve had some success, though I enjoy being on the river whether I catch fish or not. The cool nights (temps in the 40s)  and the mild days (temps in the 70s) beats the heck out of the triple digits in Texas this summer.

After five days of rain, today is the first day of sunshine we have had for a while. The rainy weather curtailed the moth hatches and also caused the river to turn milky for a few days from runoff in one of the tributaries that is impacted by an old mining operation. With the rain stopped, the river is clearing. As I’m sitting here getting this post ready to go, I’m beginning to see some moths flickering past my window, So, its time to put the computer away and grab a fly rod.

Baked Potato Anyone?

As we rolled north from Jackson Hole, our first challenge was crossing Teton Pass. This is the most white-knuckle drive I have encountered so far in our travels. The climb across the pass begins at Wilson, Wyoming at an elevation of around 6,400 feet. The peak is about 10 miles  toward Victor, Idaho and 2,000 feet up from Wilson. To get there, most of the drive is a 10% grade.

Until this trip, the steepest grade I have encountered was 7%. The road is good, but on the downhill side construction brought the traffic to a stop and alternated through a one lane section. I was very glad when we reached Victor, Idaho on the western side of the pass. I’ll do my best to avoid this type of mountain crossing in the future.

View from the top of Teton Pass

Before we started full-time RV traveling in 2012, I had lived in the Dallas, Texas area for over 30 years.  There is nothing rural about Dallas. When we moved to the D/FW Metroplex in 1981, the population was just over 3 million. By 2012, it had grown to 6.6 million. Even South Fork, which looks like it is a ranch on TV, is actually a house in a subdivision. For years, my commute to work could easily take over an hour in each direction. I always felt that Dallas is a good city to live in, if you want to live in a city.

But for the first 20 years of my life I lived and grew up in the rural Midwest, in Indiana and Illinois. So, when I’m traveling and find myself in farm country I get a comfortable “at home” feeling. That’s what it was like driving from Jackson Hole, Wyoming into Idaho.  The large rolling fields of wheat and potatoes reminded me of the field of corn and soy beans in Southern Illinois and Indiana. We stopped roadside several time to step out and soak up the views and smells of farming around us.

Idaho potato field with wheat and Teton Range in the background

This is farm country

 Our stay in Idaho has been in Riverside Campground in the Caribou-Targhee National Forest, near the town of Island Park. Island Park is an interesting place. It has a population of 286 and claims to have the longest  Main Street in America.  Main Street is also U. S. Route 20 and the city limits follow the highway. In most areas, the city is only 500 feet wide. But it extends about 33 miles along the highway from north to south. It seems that the business owners along the highway incorporated the city in this way to circumvent Idaho’s liquor laws, which prohibit the sale of liquor outside of city limits.

The campground is along the bank of The Henry’s Fork of the Snake River. I’ve been surprised that has not been full during our stay. While it gets busier on the weekends, during the week it seem to be 80% vacant. I’m not complaining. We have a choice site within about 100 yards of  river bank.

About 10 miles downstream from our campsite, the Henry’s Fork lows over two falls, named Upper Mesa Falls and (surprise) Lower Mesa Falls. As I told the nice Park Ranger Lady at the visitors center, these falls are about the prettiest sight I have seen during my travels this summer.

As we are wrapping up our stay in Idaho, we took a day trip to West Yellowstone, which is a small town at the western entrance to Yellowstone National Park. At the edge of town we can across a gathering of mountain men. This Mountain Men Rendezvous turned out to be a gathering of folks engaged in mountain crafts and trapping to sell their products. I’m sure my kids and grand-kids would have enjoyed it. Especially the Indian Chief who will teach you how to throw a tomahawk (which he called a Hawk). He will also pose for a photo for $4 ($5 with smile).

"Hawk" throwing Chief.

Now…on to Montana.

Grand Teton and Yellowstone

The Leos are wrapping-up a two week stay in Grand Teton National Park. Tomorrow we will hit the road, heading for Idaho and the Henry’s Fork of the Snake River. Since I don’t know what the internet connectivity will be like in that area, I thought I should get a post done before we go.

Our route from Woodland Park, Colorado to GTNP took us through the central part of Wyoming, traveling from southeast (Cheyenne) to the northwest (Jackson Hole). I’ve often heard that this part of the country is sparely inhabited, but until you drive through it is hard to appreciate what that means. From Cheyenne we traveled interstate 80 until we reached Rawlins. The most striking part of this drive for me was the absence of trees.

Wide open spaces in Central Wyoming

For as far as I could see in the rolling hill terrain, there was not even a shrub in site. Then when we turned off the interstate at Rawlins and headed north, we not only saw no trees, but we seldom saw another vehicle. This is truly a vast empty area. I found it to be beautiful in its contract to the mountains we have been traveling through for the past few months.

When we arrived in GTNP, we headed to the largest campground in the Park, which is Gros Ventre (pronounced "Grow Vaunt") Campground. The campground has 300 campsites and is about five miles from downtown Jackson Hole. As one should expect in this area in July, the campgrounds are heavily used. But Gros Ventre covers a lot of ground, so campsites are well spaced and we didn’t feel crowded at all.

Our campsite in Gros Ventre campground

The location has been great for exploring GTNP, Jackson Hole and Yellowstone National Park, which is 55 miles to the north of our campground location. And the views for the Teton Range is spectacular.

Teton Range as seen from Kelly, Wyoming

 The Gros Ventre River borders the campground and is a tributary of the Snake River. There are lots of fishermen working the river, but I have seen no one catching fish. Once again, the price of non-resident fishing license ($92) is keeping my off the stream. I’ll be spending my license budget in Idaho and Montana. But there is still plenty to do here even without fishing.

We have taken several day trips around GTNP. In addition to the scenery, we have seen two moose, a large herd of antelope and  a lot of bison. In most cases we find that when a wildlife sighting opportunity comes along we are sharing it with a crowded and generally don’t have a chance to park to get any pictures. The exception has been the bison, which are often close to our campground.

On Saturday, we took a drive up to Yellowstone. While the southern entrance to Yellowstone is only 55 miles from our campground, Yellowstone is HUGH! We drove the loop that covered the southern part of the park, which includes the Lewis River, Old Faithful, the Geyser Basin, Yellowstone River and Yellowstone Lake.

Geyser Basin

Yellowstone Grizzly eating grass beside the road

We left our campground in GTNP at 10am and got back at 6pm, logging 278 miles. Along the way we saw more bison (though not as many as in GTNP), a bull elk with a rack as big as my truck brush catcher, two adult grizzly bears and one grizzly cub.

One of the things I found startling was the extent of the 1988 forest fires. Throughout our drive inside Yellowstone, we found that we were driving through land that has been burned over by the fire. New growth trees sprung up after the fire and are now 12-15 feet tall. Traveling alone the Lewis River we could see where the impact of the fire was still clearly visible.

 The fire burned over 700,000 acres and I think we spent the whole day driving around it.

Lewis River valley still showing the impact of the 1988 fires.

OK…so I started this post on Wednesday, July 30, but it seems I had used up my data plan for the month of July, so I was unable to complete it. We have now moved on to Idaho, staying on the Henry's Fork of the Snake River. We have no data coverage in our campground, so I have driven to town to get this posted. I'll get another done in the next few days and post it when we come to town again. Till then, we're chillin' in the mountains.

Happy Mid-Summer

We're now wrapping up a month long stay in Woodland Park Colorado and getting ready to strike out north toward Grand Tetons National Park and Yellowstone. Our truck is in the shop getting an oil and fuel filter change, so I'm confined to camp for the day. Seems like a good time to do a Post.

The highlight of our stay here was last week when Maggie and Jonas joined us for a visit. They flew into Denver late on Tuesday evening. We made it back to the Diamond Campground in Woodland Park about midnight and were up at 6:30 Wednesday morning to hit the Dream Stream.

Ready for an epic day.

Also known as Spinney Mountain Ranch, this three mile long Colorado tailwater section of the South Platte River is nestled in the windswept high mountain plain of South Park.  Flowing out of Spinney Mountain Reservoir, meandering through prime big trout habitat, the river eventually flows into Eleven Mile Reservoir. To maximize our potential for success on the river during Maggie and Jonas' visit, I engaged Ben Davis, a fishing guide from the South Platte Fly Shop in Woodland Park for a half-day guided trip. I told Ben my goal was to put my beginning fly fishermen on some fish that would encourage them to hit the steams again in the future. Ben did not disappoint.

.

The Dream Stream

By the end of our outing Maggie, Jonas and even I had "fish on" and in the net.

Does she look pleased?

Number One

Number Two

Mine was the smallest, but it was the first of the day.

By about 2:00 in the afternoon we were tired, happy fly fisherman. Thanks to Ben for making the day a success for everyone.

On Thursday we headed to the main attraction in the area, Pike's Peak. Since this was the third of July, no seats were available on the Cog Railroad, so we drove the Pike's Peak highway.  So many pictures were taken that I have set up an album on Snapfish.com that can be accessed by clicking this link.

We started our day with some World Cup Soccer, followed by
a good breakfast at the Hungry Bear in Woodland Park (I think it was quite considerate of them to name the restaurant after me). Then we headed to America's Mountain. It's a good thing we went on the 3rd because I heard later that on the 4th of July, traffic was backed up for miles just to get on the Pike's Peak Highway.

Up we go

It took about an hour to climb the mountain. As expected the views were spectacular.

Quite a view

Jonas takes good pictures!

On Friday, Maggie and Jonas spent the day in Manitou Springs, enjoying the tourist atmosphere and catching another World Cup game in one of the local establishments. Leo and I took a nice long nap back at our base. There was a fireworks display for the Fourth in Colorado Springs, but we opted to wait for the Symphony Above The Clouds in Woodland Park on the Fifth.

By Saturday the new fly fishers were ready for more, so we headed to Eleven Mile Canyon. Here the South Platte River has cut a wide canyon through the granite mountainsides creating excellent conditions for fishing, hiking and rock climbing. It's also a great place to take pictures.

"we don't need no stinkin' waders!"

 
 On Wednesday Ben had provided waders for Maggie and Jonas. But their absence Saturday didn't deter these new converts. Jonas borrowed mine, which he could fit into three times over, while Maggie opted to wet wade. Fish were hooked, but none were landed. That's why we call it "fishing", not "catching". But as we know from experience, you don't have to catch fish to have a great day on the river.

South Platte in Eleven Mile Canyon

It's beauty like this (and high temps in the low 80s) that bring me to the Rockies in the summer.

Tumbling waters

After a nice afternoon on the river, we topped of the day with the Symphony Above The Clouds, complete with the Colorado Springs Philharmonic playing the 1812 Overture accompanied by a full six gun 105mm howitzer battery from Fort Carson...and fireworks. 

 

The week wrapped up on Sunday when we took a stroll through The Garden of the Gods in Colorado Springs before Maggie and Jonas caught their flight back to God's Country (Texas).