Our Trip West

Day 62: Home

We made it home.

Here is our trip by the numbers:

15,136 miles

11 people

62 days

26 states

2 countries

Animals found on the trip:

Roadrunner

Buffalo

Giant Centipede

Elk

Barbary sheep

Bighorn sheep

wild boars

Grizzly bear

jackrabbit

collard lizard

camel

magpies

raven

pronghorn antelope

prairie dogs

mule deer

moose

National Parks - 17

Arches

Badlands

Black Canyon of the Gunnison

Bryce Canyon

Canyonlands

Capitol Reef

Carlsbad Caverns

Grand Canyon

Grand Teton

Great Sand Dunes

Hot Springs

Mammoth Cave

Mesa Verde

Petrified Forest

Wind Cave

Yellowstone

Zion

Other:
Salinas Pueblo Missions National Monument
Scotts Bluff National Monument

Flight 93 National Memorial

Mount Rushmore National Memorial

Colorado National Monument

Craters of the Moon National Monument

Dinosaur National Monument

Hagerman Fossil Beds National Monument

Natural Bridges National Monument

Petroglyph National Monument

Walnut Canyon National Monument

Minidoka National Historic Site

Chickasaw National Recreation Area

Glen Canyon National Recreation Area

Lake Mead National Recreation Area

Minidoka National Historic Site

Chickasaw National Recreation Area

Flaming Gorge National Recreation Area

Glen Canyon National Recreation Area

Lake Mead National Recreation Area

Red Cliffs National Conservation Area
Valley of Fire State Park

Garden of the Gods
Denver Art Museum

A good ending.

We are almost home. But we need to make one more stop.

Wolfe Island is at the head of the Thousand Islands. A family now lives there that we met in New Hampshire when we first moved. They have traveled the world (and still do). So if you think we had an adventure, sit down with them over a long dinner and hear some tales.

The most adventure of the day was crossing the border. I had to convince the Border Agent that traveling all the way to Wolfe Island for a single night was not crazy. Eventually she let me in.

There is an attitude that I'll call "Island Life" (that might be what they call it, but I can't remember). There is a ferry that carries the cars from the mainland to the island. It runs a round trip about every hour. But it can slow down. We made it to the dock about 15 minutes after it should have left, but it was running late so we soon saw it pull into the dock. But we just arrived in the truck lane and the dock-lady told me I would have to wait for the next boat because all the cars that were in line were not going to make that ferry. This is "Island Life". You try to make the ferry, and even if you make it to the dock, you can't quite fit. As a consolation prize, I sent the family as foot-passengers on the ferry so they got an hour head start on me.

Day 60: The Cabin in the Woods

We made a short drive to my aunt and uncle's cabin.

It was a beautiful spot. The pond is spring fed with a few bass and carp. The kids floated in row boats, paddle boat, sunfish, and anything else that was seaworthy.

At one point it looked like someone wanted to water ski behind the row boat.

In the evening we had a camp fire and s'mores. We caught a few lightning bugs. I'm a little surprised how few campfires we had on the trip. We would stay late out on the trails sight-seeing. By the time we got back to the camper, had dinner, cleaned up, showers, it was late.

Day 59: Niagara Falls

We crossed the border into Canada with no trouble. This will hopefully be the first of 2 border crossings of the day.

At a gas / bathroom stop I tried to fill up the van. In the process the gas pump rebooted. Just another oddity of this trip.

We arrived at Niagara Falls. We parked at a Parking Lot C. This had RV parking. We took the free shuttle to the falls. All of the shuttle buses have been wonderful: Grand Canyon, Bryce Canyon, Zion. It takes the stress out of finding a parking space.

We saw the falls. We saw the boats. We saw the fireworks.

Now we made the second border crossing of the day into Buffalo. We got to the campsite so late that we just parked the camper and paid for the site in the morning.

Canada was the blue team. USA was the red team.

Day 56, 57, 58: Driving

It was a short drive to Wisconsin to stay with a robotics friend for the night. They have a cabin at a lake and let us crash there for the night. They also fed us traditional brats. Yummy!

The next night we were on the Upper Peninsula of Michigan. The campsite was not my favorite. The sites did not have paved pads or even gravel pads. It was just a spot of grass to pull into. The other campers couldn't get very far off the road so it was hard to back the camper into the spot. The site was also slanted. We ended up with the camper tilted which made just walking in the camper interesting. At night everyone rolled downhill.

The next day was a drive South. At one point I was driving in the right-hand lane. Everything started to slow down ahead, so I coasted the camper to keep some distance in front of me. A sports car raced past me on the left. He must have just looked up when he saw the red tail lights ahead of him. He slammed his brakes, smoked his tires, turned right (into the space I was giving myself) and kept going into the grass. He kicked up a bunch of grass and dirt, went up on 2 wheels, and then back down on 4. He was OK.

Day 54 & 55: Corn Palace and Zoo

We had a long drive ahead of us, but before you are allowed to leave Mitchel, you have to visit the Corn Palace. I think we saw it out of season because the outside towers were not corned.

We made it to Minneapolis. There is a free zoo. It was worth the trip, but not my favorite. We try to do the Fun Free Fridays in Boston. There are a couple zoos that would normally cost us way too much, but on those days they are free. We make sure we see the animals then.

Day 53: Badlands?

The plan for the day was to drive through the Badlands and make it through South Dakota. But then life happens...

It started out with putting the wrong visitor center into Google Maps. It dutifully directed us to the South end of the Badlands, away from the Interstate. By the time we realized this we were too far down the road to turn around. So we changed plans of what we would see.

We heard the 2 year old screaming in the back. He was suppose to be listening to an audio book. But he stuck the ear bud up his nose and the rubber end came off. Luckily he still had the right nostril to breathe. And the ear bud piece has a hole in it. And he could always open his mouth. This is not quite an emergency, but he was not happy.

We made it to the visitor center. A ranger was talking to another visitor in the parking lot. When you interrupt a ranger he will readily forgive you if you use the words "doctor", "medical", and "2 year old" in the first sentence. The short version is that they did not have any medical equipment there. The best they had was paleontology tools. I had the choice of going to Wall for an urgent care clinic or Philip for a hospital. We decided to head towards Wall.

Wall Drug is a famous tourist trap. While I was at the Urgent Care trying to dig out the ear bud, the family found a parking spot at Wall Drug. We failed at removing the ear bud. Those things are slippery. So before we head to the Hospital, we walked around Wall Drug. In the back is a dinosaur. The 2 year old got a set of dinosaurs for Christmas. He named them "Joe", "Moo", "Cock-a-doodle-doo", "Meow". This dinosaur was a "Joe" (T-Rex). But he was big and scary. He was not a "Joe". We named him "Ralph".

We got to Philip's hospital. It was a 1-story building. The emergency room had 2 beds. We took the one on the right. After we arrived, they paged the doctor. He skillfully fished out the ear bud. Problem solved. But I am very thankful of the medical services where I live. There are 2 hospitals next to my town. There's Boston and Dartmouth within a short drive with world class doctors. We had to drive pretty far to get to this hospital and it is much smaller than my town hospitals.