Back to reality

So, the end of the journey has come... a bit earlier than I expected, due to having to get back to work the week before I had planned... but on the upside, Thanksgiving buffets were waiting for me.  I pretty much had to drive straight through to get back with enough time to pull work clothes out of storage and to unload some of my car.  Snowy Minnesota and boring Iowa.
Alright, playtime is over and back to life- gotta look for an apartment, pay the bills and work work work, just like everyone else :)  I had the experience of a lifetime and can also use this time to plan out future destinations or vacations.  It was a learning experience and an adventure, and I can't even believe I did it and that its over already. 
Just some fun points from along the way (I had a lot of time to think through these things the remaining 12 hrs):

Cheapest gas: $2.45- Salem
Most expensive gas: $4.91 Cali coast
Most scenic drive: Rte.1 Pacific Highway
Most boring drive: Width of Texas
Worst traffic: Washington DC
Best traffic: (Is there ever good traffic?)
Best meal: Mrs. Wilke's Boarding house
Worst meal: a cold Hot Pocket
Best hot chocolate: Dad's house
Worst hot chocolate: McDonald's, followed very closely by D.C.
Favorite city, east: Philadelphia
Favorite city, west: San Diego
Scariest neighborhood after dark: around Atlantic City
Worst roads: a tie between the dirt road in Vermont that gave me my bent rims, and Baltimore
Most polite: New England area
Dirtiest restrooms: Kimball, Nebraska
Cleanest restrooms: Lake Placid, NY (New England area in general)
Coolest restrooms: Mellow Mushroom in Denver, CO.
Hottest temp:95
Coldest temp:12
New found love: travel plazas and caffeine
New pet peeve: pick-up trucks
Favorite west coast beach: Santa Monica, CA
Favorite east coast beach: Ocracoke Island, NC
Favorite snack on the road, first month: chocolate-covered pretzels with marshmallow fluff
Favorite snack on the road, second month: huckleberry cake
Travel set back: Car repair (wheel bearing), and then the beautiful views of the Grand Canyon
Scariest weather: tornado in Alamogordo, NM
Cheapest parking: free
Most expensive parking: $27 first 6 hrs in NYC
Favorite Chinatown: LA
Least fav. Chinatown: Portland, OR
Most interesting Chinatown: San Francisco
Most beautiful sunset: La Jolla, CA
Weirdest people: Venice Beach, CA
Most expensive toll: $11- Staten Island Bridge, $7 Ohio reg toll
Best movie while on the road: SAW Final Chapter (restaurant theater)
Worst movie while on the road: Devil (drive-in)
Most snow: Montana
Favored public trans: Los Angeles
Most hated public trans: NYC
Favorite building: City Hall in Philadelphia
Weirdest building: Corn Palace in South Dakota
Wildlife sighted that I had never seen outside of a zoo before: buffalo, alligator, zebras, elephant seals
Wildlife tasted that I had never tried before: elk
Favorite National Park: ?? too difficult to choose
Greatest triumph while driving: reaching 15,000 miles without getting a ticket
Most unusual drive: 7-mile bridge in the FL Keys
Favorite trail: Hidden Canyon in Zion Nat. Park
Number of oil changes: 5th one due on my return
Total number of miles driven: 14,644
Number of pictures taken: Well over 3,000 (7 photo albums)

I would like to thank everyone for following along with at least the pictures on my blog and being so supportive along the way... I had such an incredible time and would strongly recommend doing something like this to anyone fortunate to have the opportunity.

Thanks again, and feel free to get in touch to thumb through the thousands of pics in my albums (I tried to put the best ones on this blog though).

See everyone soon, and Happy Holidays!!

Add of course, I couldn't have done this trip without
my overly reliable, favorite car :)

Awesome South Dakota

Driving through South Dakota was absolutely beautiful, even  on an overcast day.  I entered the Black Hills and made an unexpected stop at the Wind Cave National Park. 

 The Wind Cave greets you with a gusty burst of air at the entrance, giving the cave its name.  This intricate cave is filled with over 135 miles of discovered passages.  The boxwork is amazing to see covering the ceilings and walls.  This cave became National Park in 1903, but actually dates back to having been formed over 300 million years ago!  I took a brief tour down into a couple of rooms of the cave and was blown away by all of the ins and outs and different formations.  On the way out of the park I actually spotted two bison grazing on a grassy hill!

Drove to Mt Rushmore... way awesome.  It's unreal how the monument was created: the dynamite, the men suspended from above, the chisels, drills, etc.  Fascinating process. 

 

 

By the time I got up to it, the temp got so so cold but I still wandered around all of the grounds.  The Presidential Trail was closed off due to icy patches but a ranger allowed me to take the walk as long as I didn't fall on the ice and break my ankle.

I got some really good shots of the monument and froze my fingers at the same time.  Watched a video in the information center, walked by the sculptor's studio (closed), and headed back towards the car to thaw out.  On the walk back, I spotted mountain goats hanging out behind the building up front- big, white, shaggy goats :)

 

I saw the sculpted mountain just in time because as I was leaving, the fog thickened so much that I could barely make out George Washington any longer.

Onward towards the Badlands.  No way was I going to hike in the 20-degree weather so I took the incredible scenic loop drive through out the park.  Deer frolicking around on the hills... all different grassy colors rolling as far back as you could see: mostly golds, but black, reds, and purples giving the landscape so much depth.  So, I was excited when I saw two bison earlier... I encountered an entire herd in the Badlands!! They were so close!

 

The Badlands were everything I hoped it would be- a sight for sore eyes.  Warm tones that start from the field and reach back into the canyonous areas.  I was cruising from one lookout point to the next, sprinting in and out of the car to snap photos, eyes tearing up in the wind.

On the way through the National Park, I stopped for some hot chocolate in the town of Interior, population 67.  A little place called the Cowboy Corner that sells snacks, coffee, and has a dinner table where a nice older lady serves dinner to the passing tourists and hunters.  She even has a little area of blackjack and poker machines separated by a couple saloon doors, labeled "Casino", in the corner.
Now for Wall and Mitchell... so much in South Dakota, so little time left.

The Wall Drug area was so vacant during this off season, it was hard to believe it is a tourist trap!  Wall drug was open, but the surrounding shops were closed for the season.  It was cool to wander through all of the little stores- from food to gems to fudge to clothing, souvenirs, a cafe, and a chapel.  Robotic bands playing country music, stuffed buffalo and jackaloupe heads along the walls, 5-cent coffee and free ice water...  a very interesting place, to say the least.

 

Oh, and don't forget the 80 ft dinosaur off of the I-90 exit!  Its red eyes light up at night, flashing visitors in.

On the way out of South Dakota, heading east on I-90, one must stop in Mitchell to break up the long stretch of a drive.  Why Mitchell?  They have the world's only corn palace. 

That's right, a corn palace.  Since 1892, the people of Mitchell decorate this building each year with over 300,000 ears of corn, making murals and things.  It was originally done to draw farmers in to the town, and now it's become a tradition and tourist location.  Plenty of antique stores and souvenir shops thrive on the traffic of people coming to check out the murals of corn on this structure.
      I know, pretty corny ;)
but enough horsin' around... I have a long drive ahead...

Visiting the Source of all the Comments



PS Move game shot- silly!

Anyone who has been really following this blog might have noticed comments being posted after each entry by "Greg" with the Eagles icon.  Well I finally made it to visit him, my father.  He lives in Parker, Colorado, and has been eagerly awaiting my pass through the Rocky Mtn region.  I arrived late after getting through some heavy snow from Wyoming and just settled in.  We went to go see Saw Final Chapter the following day because, I know, I know: surprisingly I hadn't seen it yet.

              

Thursday was my first visit to the Royal Gorge, a huge canyon with the Arkansas River snaking through it.  I believe it when they say it's packed with people during the peak season, but I liked it empty.  Even though they don't run the train rides or do any of the wild west shows and all shops but one are closed, the feeling as if the entire park was ours and having no one run into you as you try to take a good picture was great.

 

There is an air tram that takes you across the gorge about 2200 ft over a good 1178 ft to the river, using a huge cable.  Pretty cool.  Then you can walk along a wildlife area that houses huge elk, bighorn sheep, and bison (including a white bison who just recently had a calf).

 Wander down into the old west area with a jail, old mine, sheriff, and an area where you can participate in ax-throwing.  Again, the place was all closed for the season, so it really felt like a western ghost town, which was awesome.

Next came time to walk the suspension bridge- over 1200 ft across, first built in the early 1900s.  It was amazing to see the different views over the canyon,  including the "JFK" mountain in the background (mountain that resembles the profile of JFK, laying down on his back).

The incline is the steepest rail transport that brings you down to the bottom of the gorge on a pulley system, and then you are able to stand near the river along the railroad tracks.  You feel tiny looking up at the air tram cable and the now miniature bridge you just walked across.

 

Anyone have 1200+ ft of fishing line?



After leaving the Gorge, we made our way into a couple old mining towns via a scenic byway.  Victor and Cripple Creek are little towns that kept their nostalgic feel after all these years.  Victor more so than Cripple Creek, having little shops and a beautiful City Hall and an active mining company right along side of it.  Old mine shafts still line the hillside and run down shacks here and there.

Cripple Creek is more full of the old saloons, and now casinos line the streets as well.  But it still houses the old railway that runs through Victor and also has a lot of horse & carriage usage on the streets.

And this guy's been ridin'
since the mining days!

 Went into downtown Denver for dinner at a contemporary pizza place called the Mellow Mushroom with the most bizarre ingredients I have ever heard of in a pizza place (curry chicken, tofu, feta cheese, cucumbers... to name a few), as well as the traditional toppings too.

Friday was my tour day: a tea tour and a wine tour in Boulder.  Walked through Celestial Seasonings tea company to learn about the process and different herbs and saw the packaging assembly lines such, followed by free tastings of any of the flavors.  I had forgotten how much I liked drinking tea, and found some new flavors :) 

There is also line called Fast Lane, which is a black tea that contains 110 mg of caffeine- wow.  That's just under a double shot of espresso... where was this tea back when I had to hull through the never ending width of Texas? 

Two miles down the road is the Boulder Creek winery.  A small place that takes 6.5 minutes to walk through, but really nice, smooth wines. 

 We tried all 9 on the tasting menu and I ended up buying some bottles to bring back with me (Syrah, Murphy's Blend, Zin Port, White Merlot, Viognier, and Reisling- it's not too often I find a Reisling that I like from the US!).

I figured since I have driven down the middle of hundreds of wineries across the country, it was time to stop at one (all the of ones in wine country were still closed during my passing- poor timing).  So, my touring ended here- I did a brewery tour during my last trip out to CO. 

Walked down the streets of downtown Boulder to look at all of the little shops and restaurants.  Even being a college town, the strips had little cafes, used bookshops, and ice cream so it was nice.  Played with my dad's dog, Bear, for the night and got ready for the drive ahead.

Now, wish me luck on my drive towards South Dakota... I might be in for some Christmas!

(a.k.a snow)



Limited in Yellowstone

Although I love traveling this time of year because of the lack of people vacationing in the off season, I should have thought about the fact that the snow would prevent me from getting into some of the National Parks in the mountains.  Fortunately, my aunt did a ton of investigating and there is a section of Yellowstone I was able to see: Mammoth Springs.



Palette Spring



I have never seen hot springs before, so this was so cool for me.  I was dragging my feet through shin-high snow all over the boardwalks and roads that were closed to cars.  It was so weird to be surrounded by snow and bundled up, yet the water pouring out of these colorful rock and mineral formations was hot! 

The boardwalk around Palette Spring was taken down due to the hot spring activity beneath it.  But the steam and running water was so cool. 

New Blue Spring was one of my favorites because the pool of water sitting in the top of it was practically glowing blue. 



New Blue Spring



Orange Mound and around the Upper Terrace had extraordinary views and it was quite a work-out.  You could see Historic Fort Yellowstone from there and tons of mountains.



Orange Mound



 

It was so fascinating to read about how some of the springs that were dormant for years have started up again or expect to begin activity in the future.  Further more, the fact that this is all because of volcanic activity beneath where I was walking!



Canary Spring



Next to New Blue Spring



So, although I wasn't able to make Old Faithful this time around, the hot springs and scenery (not to mention the elk coming towards my car!) made my trip worth it.  Besides, one could spend weeks and weeks in this park; all I needed was a taste for now :)