Coming Home

7/12/2010
Got up and ate breakfast and dressed for church.  Could not find a Methodist church in Gunnison.  Looked for others on the net but could not find one that stated what time services were, so we finally decided we would get on our way and look for a church on the way.  What we didn't know was that the next 60 miles took us over Monarch pass.  After driving up and down over  11,300 feet of elevation,, the Lord had both Esther and I on our knees.  I drove both up and down.  Brakes didn't get hot and I probably never got over 35 mph.  Esther once again tempted fate,on the way up  by asking me if I didn't think it was beautiful.  I gladly pulled over to let her take photographs.

However coming down, she paid closer attention to how close to the edge I was and stopped talking about its beauty.  At the bottom of the pass, we found our first church, but by that time services were over.  We once again settled by listening to the Family Hour on radio.  After the pass, we still had several miles of windy roads through the canyon.  Finally we hit the flatlands of Colorado near La Junta and we both cheered when we reached the Kansas state line.  We are spending the night outside of Garden City, KS at the RJ RV Campground.  Thanks to good directions from the campground attendant, we made it safe and sound after a false start when we tried to use the Garmin to get us there.  The Garmin would have had us stay in a nice residential neighborhood in Garden City   We hope to be in Enid early tomorrow afternoon

7/13/2010
We  started the morning by buying cheap diesel at 2.99 per gallon.  Then we headed for home.  The road was straight and there were not any mountains.  Hooray!.  we stopped at Bryan'ts corner for lunch beside the road and had our last meal on the road for sometime.  We cheered once again when we crossed the Oklahoma state line even if the roads did get worse.  As we got closer and closer to Enid we watched the price of diesel fall, from the high  at 3.42 in Torrey, UT to  Walmart in Enid for 2.56.  After spending about 1 1/2 hours backing the 5th wheel into Esther's drive-way so we could open all the slide outs so her  granddaughters could spend the night, we learned that the electrical socket she had available to hook up to was sharing the line with her air conditioner in her front room.  It didn't take long to learn we weren't going to be able to keep the air in the  trailer running without sacrificing the air in the house. Sorry girls, but we will have to find a time when we don't need the air for you to be able to spend the night in the trailer. .     Esther took me to the Walmart   It must have been close to three weeks since we had made it to a Walmart and I was really beginning to go into withdrawal.  Afterwards we made it to the  cheap diesel and filled the truck.  Now that we had all the necessities completed, we started thinking about catching up on the journal and finishing the blog.

It was a great trip that neither of us will forget.  We hit 13 National Parks in a little over 30 days which was the biggest problem.  Our enthusiasm started waning somewhere around number 8.  Though there aren't any we would give up, we recommend taking it a little slower and resting a lot in between so you can really enjoy them.  Each has it's own special place in our hearts and we wouldn't want to have missed them.  We just should have taken more time to smell the roses.

Black Canyon of the Gunnison

7/10/2010
Today started with a birthday text from Katie followed closely by a call from JJ and Shawn.  Esther treated me to breakfast and loaded me down with gifts.  A wine glass from Glacier NP, a t-shirt showing each of the Utah National Parks we visited, a Huckleberry Chocolate bar from Crater Lake, and a clip to hold both money and credit cards so I wouldn't have to tote the entire billfold around. a CD titled "On the Road Again" which pretty much describes our life for the last 30 days.  After breakfast out, we connected the trailer and were out of the campground by 10:15.  We put the Black Canyon of the Gunnison into the GPS and headed north on 191.  70 easy miles on I70 was followed by another easy 70 miles on US 50.  Esther was at the wheel as soon as we left I-70 and so earned the right to navigate truck and trailer up the narrow winding road (347) leading to the visitor center and park entrance.  We verified that we wouldn't have any trouble navigating around the south rim drive with the trailer attached.  By the time we reached the visitor center and took several pictures of yet another canyon, we decided we had seen enough.  We stopped at one of the scenic outlooks before coming back down the mountain (2000 feet).  This time I guided the truck and trailer down the 6 mile trek and then drove into the Gunnison KOA.  This National Park got the short end of our attention, but being number 13 has it's drawbacks, one being we just didn't care to see another canyon after seeing canyons for the last five.  We did get a  few pictures which will show a significant difference from the other canyon pictures we have.

The road to Gunnison was beautiful as we passed the Blue Mesa Lake and the Gunnison River.  Both have their own description of beauty. We arrived at the KOA and were put into a nice wide pull-thru site.  We fixed a quick skillet dinner.  Esther made me a chocolate cake for my birthday which we ate with a scoop of ice cream and then we started working on this blog.  I think we are both ready to come home and plan to set the GPS tomorrow for Enid.  Though we intend to find a church to attend first.

Canyonlands National Park

7/9/2010
After moving the camper to the new site, we headed for Canyonlands National Park.  On the way in we decided to take a look at Dead Horse Point State Park.  We have some nice pictures taken from the visitor center.

From there we headed back to Canyonlands.  Our first stop was Mesa Arch.  There we took a 1/2 mile round trip hike to see the Mesa Arch.  Other than most of the hike seemed to go up, it was a pleasant walk and gave us an incredible opportunity to photograph the view into the Buck's canyon and Colorado river.  There were several hikers their and one offered to take pictures of Esther and I.

 Mesa Arch

We then went to the Green River Overlook.  This gives you a view of the small canyons carved into the main canyon floor.

We then went to the Grand View Point Overlook.  This give a magnificent view of the Colorado river as it winds it's way through the canyon below.  It is backed by the La Sal mountains.  What a view!

We then headed back to camp where we grilled the strip.  I had more problems with this as the fat around the strip kept catching fire and burning the steak.  It was well charcoaled, but the interior was done right and we both enjoyed it.  Esther added corn on the cob and a salad.  While Esther did the dishes, I dumped the holding tanks to get them ready for our trip to Black Canyon of the Gunnison National Park. For dessert, Esther made her world famous strawberry, banana, and chocolate syrup ice cream sundae.  It was then time to get our journal caught up and hopefully post to our blog.

Arches National Park

7/09/2010
On the way to Moab, we saw an entrance to Canyonlands National Park.  Since we didn't have this park on our initial list of parks to see, and since it was so close, we decided to add it.  When we checked into the KOA at Moab we asked for an extra night beyond our reservation.  They said we could stay, but would have to change sites.  They also told us it would take about 2 1/2 hours to see Arches and 3 to 4 to see Canyonlands.  We decided to get an early start to see Arches and then come back to change sites at 11:00 am, their checkout time.  We got around quickly and left for Arches shortly after 7:30am.

The sky was blue and beautiful.  Our first pictures of the balanced rock showed an incredible blue sky.  The interesting thing about Arches is there are so few arches you can see from the road.  But we took pictures of some wonderful rock formations like the Three Gossips and the Sheep rock.  I have one picture of Skyline Arch and I had to walk a little to get it.  We were told you can see a couple from the Windows Overlook, but we opted to bypass this to get the picture of Skyline Arch.  By this time it was getting late and we needed to head back to the campground so we bypassed the Windows Overlook.

Balanced Rock

The Three Gossips

The Sheep Rock

Skyline Arch

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Capitol Reef National Park

7/7/2010
We ate a quick lunch in the camper and then headed for Capitol Reef National Park.  We got within about 12 miles of the park and found a nice RV Park.  We got setup and decided we had enough time to drive into the Park.  However, the sun started to set quickly.  We did get pictures of Chimney Rock and The Castle.  We started on the scenic route but had to turn around because it was just getting to dark.  At the beginning of the scenic drive is a nature preserve where we saw three deer, but it was to dark for pictures to turn out good.

On the way back we started looking for a place to eat but found every place we had seen on the way closed.  We finally found a place which was still open, but we had to eat outside as they had already cleaned up their dining room.  They brought us menus and we both decided we weren't hungry enough to pay $20+ per person, so we left.  I scrambled the last three eggs while Esther nuked the bacon and fixed toast.  It was just about the last food we had in the camper, but it was good.

7/8/2010
We left the campground early so we could get to see Coral Reef and then get on our way to Arches National Park near Moab, UT.  We took the scenic route again, and saw more deer in the nature preserve.

 Chimney Rock

The Castle

  We stopped at a Morman's homestead and bought a peach pie.  The scenic route was beautiful but the pictures we took just did not do justice to the many shades of colors that you could see in the rock formations.  On the way back I stopped to take some pictures of the barn on the Morman's homestead. 

 Barn at Morman Homestead

 In the Nature Preserve

 One Room School House

We then went back to the campsite, hooked up the trailer and were on our way to Moab, UT.  The GPS guided us to exit 180 on I-70 which leads to UT-191.  This is the road you take into Moab.  However, at the end of the ramp, it directed us back on I-70 heading west back to Green River.  Knowing this had to be wrong, we pulled into a filling station.  There we confirmed that most GPS's mess up at this exit.  Supposedly it is because they renumbered the interstate, but this doesn't make a lot of since to me.  We headed south on 191 and found the KOA.  We checked in, went in to town as our cupboards were bare.  After hitting the City Market, we headed for Old Geezer's Meat Market where we bought an expensive rib eye and strip.  We were assured at the KOA that though the meat was more expensive, it was worth it.  Since we had snacked for lunch, we were both hungry and started the grill as soon as we got back.  We split the Rib eye which I cooked to perfection (Thank you very much).  Esther contributed a baked potato and a very good crisp green salad.  It was the best meal each of us had had in a long time.  We then did a couple of loads of laundry which we hope will be the last we have to do on the road.  Needless to say, we were both dead tired from our active and full day.

Bryce Canyon National Park

7/7/2010
We left early for Bryce Canyon National Park and arrived by 9am.  It was only about 90 miles from the Glendale KOA.  We grabbed a shuttle which took us to each of the scenic overlooks.  This was a
really great deal.  The shuttle ran about every 10 minutes so you could get off at one of the overlooks, take pictures and then catch the next shuttle to the next site.  We were able to cover the highlites to Bryce Canyon National Park in about 2 1/2 hours.   Our first scenic stop was at Bryce Point where we looked down into the canyon from an elevation 8300.  The canyon displayed the typical formations you see when you see pictures of Bryce Canyon.

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Our next stop was Inspiration Point.  Elevation was 8100.  Mostly more of the same with a few iteresting formatios.

Our last two stops were Sunset and Sunrise Points.  Both of these were beginning to remind us of what we had already seen.  Below is a picture of Sunset Point and the one below that is of Sunrise Point.

Zion National Park

Got an early start toward Zion National Park.  Took a picture of the KOA Campground to be able to show the difference between Las Vegas and Bend, OR.  We checked into the Glendale KOA which is about 30 miles from Zion National Park. The KOA was not the best we had stayed at, but the view was wonderful with coral rock formations which could be seen from our campsite.

After setting up we drove to Zion.  The most amazing thing in Zion is a 1.1 mile long tunnel which we drove through.  This tunnel was build in 1930.  They are doing road repair from the end of the tunnel to almost the visitor center (about six miles).  Esther had to contend with roads with no surface to roads that had been scrapped down for new blacktop while also contending with a very narrow road, switchbacks, and Larry complaining about how close to the edge of the road she was.  Like a trooper she got me down to the Visitor center where we got some of the prettiest shots we took.  Driving through the tunnel was interesting because about three times the tunnel has a window opening to view rock formations outside.

Taken through a window in the 1 mile tunnel

By the time we left Zion the sun was setting and we drove to Mt. Carmel, UT which is on the road back to Glendale.  There we found a diesel station and restaurant.  Too tired to cook, we opted to share a 1/2 lb burger and a few fries.  I added a piece of coconut cream pie which I ate, and Esther brought home a piece of Strawberry rhubarb pie

Los Vegas National Park

7/3/2010
We  know Las Vegas isn't a National Park, but we need some rest and it was sort of on the way to the next National Park

Probably the hardest part of today was getting out of the KOA at Yosemite.  We got up early so we could be in Las Vegas before 5pm, but a couple of dead-ins and wrong turns put us leaving just after 8am.  Esther was a pretty good director in getting me backed out of the ,mistaken turns I took.  The drive was pretty uneventful until we got to the desert where we watched the thermometer rise from 92F to 110F.  Luckily I heeded the sign that instructed us to turn off the air conditioner in order to keep your car from overheating.  We saw a lot of cars beside the road that must not have heeded the sign.  Esther did the major part of driving today as when I started out I found the haze difficult for me to see through.  I did take over close to vegas and drove thru Death Valley and into Vegas proper.  Traffic was a little dicey coming down the strip to get into the KOA, but we made it in to our site by 6:00pm.  The KOA is basically a parking lot with water, electric, and sewer connections.  No tables, No grass.  We are parked right behind Circus Circus.  We walked thru the Casino before heading to the strip.  We ate mexican at a food court in the Riveria.  Afterwards I watched Esther give the Riveria $40 and Esther watched me give them $20.  After making our obligatory contribution we made our way back to the campground.

7/4/2010
Happy 4th of July.  Since we didn't want to get out in the Las Vegas traffic, we watched a church service on TV.  We then fixed a late breakfast in the trailer and then walked the strip down to Treasure Island.  There Esther watched me lose another $10.  Esther played a long time, but ultimately made another $40 contribution.  We came back to the trailer and napped.  It was very hot and by the time we got back to the trailer we were both hot and tired.  After a long nap, we fixed a traditional 4th of July picnic - polish sausage dogs, macaroni salad, cantaloupe, and all the trimmings.  We were disappointed to learn there were no planned firework events, so we watched "A Capital 4th on PBS and the Boston Pops on CBS.  All in all, a relaxing and pleasurable 4th.  Esther and I had earlier bought matching blue shorts with an American Flag and red Tshirts with an American Flag on it.  We got several comments about how patriotic we looked.  AS Esther would say, "We looked cute".

7/05/2010
We got up early because we decided we would take advantage of a $25 all-day buffet, and knowing us you know we wouldn't miss breakfast if we had already paid for it.  However breakfast tasted like it had been on a buffet.  Imagine that.  Eggs were cold.  But the sausage and bacon were good.  Gravy was cold but tasty, and the sweet rolls and croissants were wonderful.  We decided to hit the casino before the smokers arrived.   I lost $10 right away and Esther won a little.  We then went to the gift shops for souvenirs.  I opted out, but we found a towel and a souvenirs glass for Esther.  Since I was carrying the camera we went to the strip for pictures.  It was then back to the buffet for lunch which was pretty good.  BBQ chicken, fried shrimp, fried chicken and of course a round of desserts.  We then went back to the Casino where Esther won enough to offset some of her losses on Saturday and Sunday.  I decided it was more prudent and fun to watch Esther win than Larry lose, so I napped and watched Esther win.  At four we decided it was pie and coffee time.  You have to get your money's worth on deals like this.  But they didn't open till after 4:30pm so dinner needed to be delayed.  We went back to the camper for a short rest before returning for dinner at 8:00pm.  Dinner was good also.  I had standing round of beef while Esther worked on shrimp.  Of course there was another round of desserts.  We left stuffed, but sure we had gotten our money's worth.  We then took the camera back to the strip where we took pictures of the strip and Circus Circus lights
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Yosemite National Park

6/30/2010
We got a late start this morning heading toward Yosemite which was probably good as we missed rush hour traffic.  Though we still had to contend with normal California traffic and drivers.  We took 101 until we got to I580 east.  I was a little leery when I learned it was taking us toward the Richmond Bridge/Oakland.  Esther was ecstatic when she saw we were going over the Golden Gate Bridge.  I was petrified..  It was one of those situations where you had to decide which was more dangerous, hyper-ventilating or closing your eyes as you drove over the bridge.  Luckily we were on the lower level and I could keep my eyes pretty much on the road.  Esther however was tempting fate by saying every 30 seconds "Larry, look at this.  It's just beautiful."  After getting on the other side, I suggested we use the turnout so she could get some pictures, though my main purpose was to kiss terra firma.  We discovered that our Golden Gate Bridge was actually the Richmond-San Rafael Bridge, that didn't make it any less scarier for me or any less grander for Esther.

About 1:30 we put a Walmart into the GPS as we needed bread and salad.  It only took three attempts of driving around a 2 mile square to get the correct turns down to get us there.  We found  two parking sites lined up head to head in between two rows of cars at one end of the parking lot and went in shopping.  It didn't take long to discover this was no super center.  It didn't even have bread.  Luckily, next door was a Safeway which would have over charged us $9 if we hadn't asked for one of their cost saving cards.  We went back to the trailer and ate lunch in the 5th wheel.  2 hours after we started looking for the Walmart, we backed the trailer back into one of the main driving lanes and were able to maneuver it back out to the highway.  Now we just needed some diesel.

We did finally arrive at the KOA at the south entrance of Yosemite around 5:35.  We met a nice guy and his son camping next to us from Naples Beach, FL  He was driving his aging father around in the father's motor home viewing National Parks.  They are headed to Yellowstone after Yosemite.  We have decided to skip Great Basis as well as Lassen Volcanic National parks in order to spend the 4th of July in Las Vegas.  We have reservations here thru Friday, and reservation in Vegas beginning Saturday and lasting thru Monday night.

7/1/2010
Got a late start to visit Yosesemite, but made up for it by coming back late.  Esther made lunch for us to take with us as we assumed we would be gone most of the day.  We started our sightseeing by taking a steam railroad ride through the Sierra Nevada's on the Yosemite Sugar Pine Railroad using the rails laid  by a lumber company.  We learned mostly about how the area had been clear cut and how it had grown back.  They told us a lot about the lumber company and its failure in the depression.  The railroad is now owned and operated by the National Park Service.  We got to ride in a open car made of split redwood log for the bench seat and back.  There was one on each side.

We then entered the park proper at the south entrance and went to the Mariposa grove of Sequoyah trees.  These are the largest living thing on our planet.  We took a tram tour which was narrated by the National Park Service over headphones.  One of the first trees we saw has been named the "Bachelor and  Three Graces".  This is a grouping of four trees, one which is standing by itself (the Bachelor), and a small grouping of three trees (the Graces). These trees are all huge and gives you a sense of proportion of the role humans play in this world.  These trees live to be over 2000 years old and grow to a height of 300 feet.  They do not live the longest as some pines live for more than 3000 years nor are they the tallest as their Redwood cousins can reach 350 feet in height.  But they are the largest in volume with some weighing 2 million pounds.  These trees are resistant to fires, disease, and insects.  But they have proportionally a small root system and under heavy winds or heavy loads of snow, can be tipped over and their roots pulled out of the ground.  The center of the tree is dead and is used to provide strength to the tree, but is not needed for it to survive as long as the tree doesn't fall over.  That is why the trees you can drive thru lived so long, and why trees that have had their centers burned out still live.  One of these trees can absorb 100 gallons of water a day.  Needless to say, they need to live in a very wet environment.  The tunnel tree that you see pictures of so many people driving through fell over in 1968 during a heavy snowstorm.  Another tunnel tree is still there but was built for driving a horse a carriage thru, not an automobile.  It is now used by visitors for pictures.  There is another tree called the periscope tree because it has been hollowed out by fire all the way to the top.  You can step into it, look up and see blue sky.

 

I turned the driving over to Esther as it was nearing my nap time and because we needed to go over the mountain to the western entrance of the park.  The roads were sharp and narrow and though there was lots of signs about road construction, we saw no one working.  It took us a little over an hour to get over the mountain.  Once there, our first amazing sight was going through a tunnel that must have been 1/2 mile in length.  As we emerged from the tunnel, we got our first glimpse of the Bridalveil Falls, the longest waterfall in Yosemite dropping more than 600 feet into the Mercedes River.  The view of the falls encompassed all the granite walls of the "dome" which surrounds the Yosemite valley.  We drove a little further where we could walk to the base of the falls.  Would be a great walk during hot days, because the water spray really would feel good.  We had a beautiful rainbow at the base of the fall.    Our next stop was Upper Yosemite falls.  It doesn't drop as far as Bridalveil falls but still impressive.  Right next to it is the lower Yosemite falls, which looks tiny compared to the other two.  Though we got to see the lower Yosemite falls, we found no place to take a good picture.  We then drove to "El Capitan" which is the worlds monolith of exposed granite, standing over 3600 feet above the Yosemite valley floor.

 Bridalveil Falls

Bridalveil Falls at the base

 Bridalveil Falls runoff which feeds the Mercedes River

 Upper Yosemite Falls

By this time it was nearing 7:30 pm, sun was beginning to set, and it was beginning to get dark, so we headed back to get back over the mountain before it really did get dark.  As we started our climb, we discovered all those places that said "road work ahead" were now manned and so we were stopped two times and then lead by a pilot car through the debris. It seems that they do the road work after six to limit the number of cars that are impacted.  However, this made us take twice as long getting back over the mountain as it did going.  Esther was exhausted when we finally arrived back at the KOA at 10pm.  We had planned on having a Mexican dinner around 8:30pm, but didn't get to the restaurant until after 9:30.   We ended up with tacos from Taco Bell.  Not quite what either Esther or I had hoped for.

7/2/2010
Today was a maintenance day.  We fixed breakfast, wrote out postcards and birthday checks.  Went to look for a sign.  It has been the second time we have found a sign carver shop without a person present.  Guess he took off for the 4th weekend.  After not finding the sign carver, we headed for Corsegold, CA for diesel.  Found it for 3.09 which is low for around here.  Only problem is that they wouldn't take Discover so we had to pay cash.

We then headed for Oakhurst, Ca to find a birthday card.  We went into a Grocery store that indicated from the outside they had cards.  When we went in, I asked Esther if we needed a cart.  Eighty dollars later,I didn't need to ask again.  After finding our $80 birthday card, we headed for the nearest post office so we could get it on it's way before the 4th weekend.

Then it was back to camp to wash the weeks laundry.  Planned to get into the Hot Tub while we waited on the clothes to wash, but found it much to murky for my taste and decided to sit by the pool instead.  After half an hour it was back to the laundry to move the clothes to the dryer.  This time we went back to the 5th wheel to sit in the sun in our loungers.  After another 45 minutes it was back to the laundry where we hung and  folded.  We then went back to the 5th wheel to put away our clean clothes.

We wrote the journal for yesterday to get caught up and loaded the pictures shot yesterday to the computer.  We decided to wait until tomorrow to post our journals and pictures of Yosemite to the blog because of the WiFi here in the park.  We think it will be better in Vegas.  Esther fixed corn and salad for dinner and I grilled chicken breasts. 

While Esther did the dishes, I went to put away all the stuff we had pulled out while here so we could get an early start tomorrow.  Afterwards, we sat in the loungers watching the sunset highlight the trees, watched our new neighbors set up camp, and ate strawberry chocolate sundaes.  Life is good.