2000+ Miles down and ???? To Go

Hi again bloggers, it's the weary travelers here. Today was a bit quiet. We left Sheridan Wyoming this morning after visiting one of the western stores and completing the transformation of my cowboy cabbie husband into a real cowboy!!! He now has a great black Stetson, some George Strait jeans and a new shirt, all to go with his 5 ft walking stick he got in the Grand Tetons. The only thing left is the boots, but he's drawing the line there, no boots. Dockers just stand out too much in Montana and Wyoming. Cowboys everywhere! Anyway, he looks so cool, I love it !! I have a picture we took of him yesterday, but it's before the jeans and shirt.

We are in Cheyenne, Wyoming tonight in a Holiday Inn. We decided to get a nice room tonight after spending a rough night last night in a local motel in Sheridan. It was so small, I actually took a picture of it! I will post it tonight.

Today we traveled the North/South length of Wyoming. It was a very pretty drive and we saw lots of pretty scenery and lots of wild antelopes in the plains. Cheyenne is a big town and we drove around and around looking for a room for tonight and finally spotted the Holiday Inn. We had a great steak dinner in the restaurant here at the hotel (why not, right? after all we are in Wyoming) and now are going to stretch out and enjoy being still and not moving in the car!

We have traveled over 2000 miles as of tonight. It sure doesn't feel like that, but we have taken a week to do that much. It's not so much each day. We actually have taken it easy each day and not knocked ourselves out at all.

Tomorrow we plan to cross into Nebraska and see the little towns of Gandy and Stapleton which I remember my grandmother talking about. Dad was born somewhere around there. We plan to be in Sioux Falls by Sunday but looks like we might make it by Saturday unless we take a down day and stay in Nebraska for two days.

We figured out that the reason we are so tired each night is that we have been in elevations from 5000+ to 8000+ feet each day since we left Nevada. We seem to hit our room and melt each night. In Yellowstone it got up over 8000 feet and here in Cheyenne we are still over 5000. We are blaming the elevation of course instead of admitting we are just getting older!

We are so happy to hear from some of you who are reading our blog. It's nice to know you are traveling with us vicariously.

Note to Kevin: This "city girl" as you put it, is able to enjoy lots of different things including open spaces. That does NOT change my love for our beautiful City of SAN FRANCISCO. You insist on using the "F" word but the name of our home is SAN FRANCISCO. Practice saying it over and over to yourself and you will get it one day, c'mon now, I know you can do it !!! LOL

Going to close now and start posting some of the pictures we took yesterday at the Little Big Horn Battlefield. We didn't really take any pictures to speak of today. Enjoy the pics!

Keep reading, we love all of you
Wayne and Colleen

A Little History Lesson for Today

Ok, Bloggers, today we have a bit of a history lesson. Can anyone tell me where the Little Big Horn Battlefield is??? What happened on that land? Well, we learned a lot about it yesterday.
It is Thursday Morning, Sept 13 right now. We are in Sheridan Wyoming and the dinky little home town motel we are staying in has a very weak and slow signal so I won't be posting any pictures today. We have lots of great pics of the battlefield but it just takes forever to get anything done here so we are going to try to just type the post and we will post the pics at our next stop when hopefully we have a better signal.
The battlefield is in the southeast part of Montana between Billings, MT and Sheridan Wyoming. On this area (actually about 5 miles altogether) was where General George Armstrong Custer and his men were killed by a contingent of the Lakota Sioux and various other plains indian tribes. There were some survivors as Custer split up his command and not all were killed on Last Stand Hill with him. There was a great little museum where actual artifacts that had been retrieved from the battlefield are on display. There are small white markers dotted across about 5 miles of battlefield where calvarymen fell. These spots are verified by first hand testimony from both indian and calvary survivors. Also, archeologists have combed the entire area and recovered bones, snips of material from uniforms, watch pieces, various ammunition and other items lost on the battlefield that day. And that day, boys and girls, was only 130 years ago. It happened on June 25 and 26 in 1876. Pretty incredible to me that such a thing was only approximately 130 years ago.

The weather was very warm and the wind was blowing real hard. We both got windburn and I felt like I was drying out all over. I got back to the room and bathed myself in moisturizer to try to get my skin back!

We are in Sheridan Wyoming now and couldn't get a good signal last night to post this blog............sorry, Kevin LOL

This morning we are going south through Wyoming and planning to then go east through Nebraska then cut north to be in Sioux Falls South Dakota by Sunday. We get to see Nicole on Monday the 17th.

We will post yesterday's pictures of the battlefield tonight when we get a better signal. We also took a picture of this tiny tiny room we are in, I couldn't believe it is so small!!! I had to get a picture.

Note to Lisa: thanks for the email and comments on the blog. I hope all is well with you, I miss talking to you! We have not had cell phone signals
since we left Yellowstone. I am hoping it will get better today.

Note to Cathie: Thanks for your email too. It's fun knowing everyone is following our adventure! I answered your email last night but it didn't actually go through until this morning. I hope you got it.

Note to Kevin: No, we won't get too tired and we are driving very carefully (Wayne is doing most of the driving LOL) . We can't wait for the trip with you. I can't let myself think about it, it is so exciting to think I will actually get to see the inside of Graceland! Wow!

Another Note to Kevin and to Mom: Do you remember exactly where Dad was born? I remember he and Grandma talking about Gandy and/or Stapleton Nebraska, but not sure. We will be in Nebraska tomorrow and thought we would look up the area where they lived.

Note to Everyone: Thanks for following our blog. We are so excited about this trip, you just cannot imagine. We are seeing such beautiful and new things that simply go beyond words. We have had incredible good luck everywhere we have gone and have no complaints about anything. (Well, this room is a bit much but oh well)

Talk to you all again tonight.......Love to All
Wayne and Colleen

and the Deer and the Antelope Play............

Yesterday was where the buffalo roam and today we saw ......where the deer and the antelope play. We didn't get a picture of the deer, but we saw them. We also saw a grizzly bear. Real exciting to see that. Up ahead there were lots of cars stopping (always a sign of a sighting of something) and people pointing. We pulled over and searched the spot the people were pointing at and there he was, a dark colored grizzly bear. A park ranger was there to keep the traffic moving and to be sure everyone who stopped got off the road. He said if they don't do that, people will stop in the middle of the road and get out leaving their car doors open and everything. Anyway, he confirmed it was indeed a grizzly. He said some people thought it was a black bear because he was so dark, but he was a grizzly. We didn't get a picture because when we got out and got into position, he had gone up a draw and was gone.

We went through a part of the park today that we had not yet been. Three days for Yellowstone is a bare minimum to spend. It's so breathtaking and exciting to see all the wildlife up close and personal. And with this new camera of mine, it is so user friendly that it adds to the fun to get such good pics so easily.

We left the park today at the northern exit and went through the Roosevelt Gate. It was a sad goodbye to a beautiful place, but we will come back again. We are talking about coming back through here again on our way back home.

We are in Livingston Montana now. We stopped travelling a bit early today. We both needed a rest and to stop moving for a while! Not sure where we will go tomorrow, but we plan to go east through Montana and see the Little Big Horn.

Where the Buffalo Roam......We Found It !!!!

Well the memory card we needed for my camera is no longer made. We wandered into Radio Shack and got the news about the card. But, not to worry, they had this cute little number on sale and we got the greatest new camera for almost nothing. I had no idea you could get such a camera for so little. We got a brand new camera, batteries, memory card and out the door for $102.00. And let me tell you this little jewel is great! It has video and is so user friendly. It's really cool.

We have now spent two days in Yellowstone and Grand Teton. We could travel the world for the rest of our natural life and not have a greater two days! The things we have seen and experienced are miraculous. Like I said before, if any of you have not been here yet, you really need to make this trip. But set aside a lot of time, at least two days, to see the park. There is so much to see, it's really incredible..

We have seen buffalo up close and personal. Once I was taking pics of this guy who was right beside the road. I was taking the pics from the car. I decided it would be safe to get out and get a little different angle and I opened the door and got out. Thankfully I looked over my shoulder because only about 20 feet behind me was his buddy who was looking right at me. Needless to say I got right back in the car!

We have seen elk too. We have one picture that isn't the best, but it's of a huge elk with antlers at least 4 1/2 or 5 feet tall. It was incredible to see. He was moving and I didn't get a real good picture, but you can see it.

We saw a wolf in a meadow. He was moving too fast to get a good picture but it was so exciting to see him. We also saw geese that were beautiful. It was so cool to see all these creatures in the wild and so close to the car. The animals don't seem to be afraid of people at all. In fact we saw buffalo stop traffic by just slowing plodding across the street. After two or three of them got across the street, a little calf went skampering after them! We saw so many buffalo that after a while we didn't even stop to look, just "oh, there's another one"...

We have met and talked to lots of nice people. I don't know if it's this time of year or what, but a big majority of the people we see here are just like us, about our age. We noticed the almost total lack of kids in the park the last two days and I guess it's because school has started and their vacations are over. There weren't many young couples with small children either, just old folks like us!

The most fun was when we got to Old Faithful and some folks told us about the webcam. They have a live webcam mounted on a tree and aiming towards the geyser. People were standing there and then calling someone on their cell phones and waving. I couldn't figure out what the heck people were waving at a tree for! So, when we found out, I called Mom and Wayne called Jim and they were able to see us live at Old Faithful! In fact, Jim even somehow saved the image and emailed it to Wayne and we had it when we got back to our room last night! Oh technology, isn't it wonderful?!!

We have had such a seamless time on this trip so far. We have had good food, good rooms, no real problems. The Boss is really with us on this trip and we are very thankful.

So, today it's Montana. We are headed for the Little Big Horn where Custer bought it. Not sure where we will stop for the night, but I will blog again if we get a signal.

Mom, forgot to tell you, I brought my pillows with me and it's really nice having them! As you know, I love these Sobekawa pillows and can't imagine sleeping without them. In order to insure that we don't forget to take them each day when we move, they have their own canvas bag so when I see the empty bag, I know I have to get the pillows off the bed. Oh, the things we have to do when the memory fades!

I have been trying to download some video I took of the buffalo but it's taking sooooooo long to download. Not sure it will work. I will get some pics now to post. Hope everyone is all well and enjoying our blog.

Note to Anonymous (Kevin?) No, we are not going to get too tired. We are looking forward to our next trip next month, you know that.!!!

Even Better than Yesterday !!!

Sorry about the pictures and no posting, the hotel's server went down just as I was in the middle of posting the pictures and had not typed a posting as yet. So, it's Monday morning now and I can finally tell you about the Sunday we had.

After we ran through all the usual words and phrases; spectacular, beautiful, gorgeous, wow, can't believe it, magnificent, isn't that great......we were left with "(gasp) OH MY GOD" After a while, we just were out of words and things to say and just held each other's hand and breathed it in. The Grand Tetons and the part of Yellowstone that we have seen are the most magnificent (there I go again) thing to see. It was incredible. We both just kept searching for the right words to describe it and we just ran out of words. There are no words to describe it well enough. In fact, we are going to come back through here on the way home and see it again.

We stayed in West Yellowstone, Montana last night. It's just outside the west entrance of Yellowstone. We plan to stay here again tonight because we are going to take the whole day and go through other parts of the park we didn't see yesterday

There was some trouble yesterday with the memory card on my camera. We had noticed before that one or two pictures were missing when we downloaded them into the computer. It started with our picture of Penny at Avis in SF, the very first picture we took. After finding out last night that we had "lost" several pictures that we took yesterday, we decided the memory card must be shot. We are hoping to find another today so that we don't lose anymore pictures.

Wayne was excited to see his first buffalo outside a zoo. Yes, he actually saw "where the buffalo roam".... We also saw some elk beside the road. When we had lunch at one of the lodges in the Grand Teton Park, we went into the gift shop and Wayne bought a six foot tall rough wood (knots and all) walking stick. It has a leather strap for your hand. It's really great. He has already used it and loves it. In fact, I took a couple pictures of him and his stick and of course they are among the ones we lost.

We can't tell you enough how magnificent this area is. The Grand Tetons and Yellowstone is a must see for everyone. I cannot believe that I have lived this long and had not seen it before this. If you haven't been here you really need to make your way here somehow. It is incredible.

I am going to post some more pictures from yesterday then hopefully when we get back tonight I can have more for you.

Oh, forgot to tell you, we are truly card carrying old people now. Upon entering Grand Teton Park, we saw the prices were $25.00 per carload. There also was something called a lifetime pass so we asked about that. It is $10.00 and gets you into all National Parks for lifetime. You have to be 62 to qualify and guess how old we are !!! So we now have a lifetime pass for seniors!! When we got to Yellowstone, Wayne flashed our card and in we went!

Note to self: MUST come back here, this is truly where God lives.

Off to another day in Yellowstone today...............more later.
Love to all
Wayne and Colleen

God was at His finest when he made Jackson, WY

We came through the most breathtaking place I've ever seen today. It is Jackson (Hole) Wyoming. The name of the valley is Jackson Hole but the actual town itself is Jackson. It is absolutely the prettiest place. The only problem was that there is some sort of bike race going on and there are NO rooms in Jackson. No, of course we didn't have reservations. That's the point of our whole trip, right?!!! After getting a bit panicky, we heard about a place called Alpine, not sure if its Wyoming or Idaho or Montana, but they had rooms! So here we are in the midst of real cowboys, moose, black bear and a knotty pine room at the Bull Moose Lodge. It is actually a nice place. We are in the dining room now since no wifi in the rooms. We just had our dinner of chicken fried steak and will now go back to our knotty pine room and get some rest!
This bike race is something else. We saw bicycle riders for miles and miles and miles. I loosely counted over 500 riders. Don't know how they get up these steep steep mountain roads, but they do.
Tomorrow we plan to see Yellowstone for the first time for both of us. We are not far from one of the entrances now. But so as not to repeat our panic of today with no rooms available, we have already gotten a reservation in West Yellowstone Montana for tomorrow night. We plan to go up into Montana and see the Little Big Horn and other sites in Montana.
We are still just absolutely having a ball. We are like a couple kids, it's really fun!
Jim and Gail, this GPS lady is really something. She puts us such at ease and we trust her faithfully to get us where we want to go. She is so cute when we get off the road, she says to make a U turn and go back!! But she "recalculates" and gets us right back on track again. Thanks again so much for loaning it to us, it's great.
Going to post some pictures now and another blog tomorrow.
Bye for now..........Wayne and Colleen

What time is it ??????

Forgot to tell you about the first thing that happened this morning when we woke up. I looked at the clock beside the bed, 6:45. I looked at the time on my cell phone, 7:45. I looked at the time on the laptop, 8:45 !!!!! What the heck time is it???? With all our high tech gadgets, the way we found out what time it was is when Wayne went up to the lobby and got us some of the continental breakfast and he asked the clerk, What time is it???

Sage Brush and Tumbleweeds !!!!

Well, I can't say we had an especially fun day today. Unless you are a person who likes sagebrush and tumbleweeds, you would not enjoy the drive across the Nevada desert to Salt Lake City, Utah. Miles and Miles and MILES of nothing but desert. Nothing taller than 2 feet was seen all day!

It wasn't all that bad really, we talked and talked and was still free and enjoyed ourselves anyway.

Note to Penny at Avis car rental, I don't know what happened to the picture we took of you. I wanted to put it here on the blog but it must have gotten deleted or I didn't do something right with the camera or something because it is just not there......bummer.

Tonight we are in Salt Lake City and going to enjoy a bit of rest. We don't want to wear ourselves out the first week we are gone and we've covered a lot of miles in two days.

Note to Gail: forgot to include in yesterday's post that THOSE BROWNIES YOU SENT WITH US WERE DELICIOUS..... That was so nice of you to do, we really appreciated it.

We also forgot to tell you about a couple we ran into at dinner in Winnemucca last night. I swear if we had let her, this lady would have told us her entire life story! She and I made eye contact and she just walked over to our table and started talking. She told us about her divorce, her depression, and how she had some friends who insisted she go to the Elk's Lodge where she met "him" and pointed over to the table where her husband, clad in his best bib overalls cut off to be shorts, sandals with dark socks, scruffy full gray beard and long hair, sat. She was wearing her best bright blue cotton blouse with plastic cowgirl fringe across the bustline. Anyway, she said he came over to ask her to dance and that was all it took. He took her right over to meet his family and the rest is history. At that point, thankfully, the waitress brought our dinners and so our new friend went back to their table where they had their dinner of chicken fried steak with mashed potatoes and gravy. Of course, I'm teasing here, they were both very nice people, it was just odd that she told us so much of her life in just a couple minutes!

Today we toured Elko Nevada looking for a ballpark named after an old baseball friend of mine, Jay Kump. Todd, you guys met him went you were there. Mom, you might remember Jay and Charlotte? Anyway, we only had to ask directions twice and we found it, Kump Field. We took some pictures since I have heard all about Kump field (from Jay of course) for so many years and never got to see it. Now I have.

Those were just about the only pictures we took today, it just wasn't one of those picture-taking-kind-of-days. I'm sure tomorrow will be better. We are heading north to Jackson Hole and into Yellowstone after that. From all we have heard, that should be a beautiful area to see.

OK, so come on bloggers, post some comments and let me know how we are doing. Let us know you are out there. We are having so much fun we wish everyone was here with us. Well, maybe not, but you know what I mean!!! LOL

Love to you all and another post tomorrow.........
Wayne and Colleen

Hello Winnemucca !!!

Hey Bloggers !!!

Here we are in beautiful downtown Winnemucca Nevada. Our day started with a delightful lady at Avis Car Rental. Penny, if you are reading this, we really appreciated all your hints, suggestions and mostly your excitement for our trip. It was fun for us to meet you and you started our first day off just right! I plan to email Avis and tell them how nice you were to us. Note to Cameron: Our new friend Penny at Avis gave us an upgrade on our reservation and we are driving a beautiful new Mercury Grand Marquis, blue in color. How cool is that!

After getting our car we went back to the apartment and began loading the 257 bags and suitcases we had packed. Well, actually it wasn't that many, but seemed like it when we started trouping downstairs with all of it.

We got over to Jim and Gail's in Lincoln around 10:15 or so and got to see Gail's mother Pat too. Gail fixed us a nice lunch and we had a great start to our vacation. They all wished us well and we left a little past noon.

Then, hold on to your hats for those that know me, you won't believe what we did next. We drove to Reno, pulled off on Virginia St. as usual, drove to the first gas station we saw, got gas and some snacks for the road and DROVE RIGHT ON OUT OF TOWN. That's right, we drove right through without darkening the door of even one casino!!! Hard to believe, I know, but true.

We drove through endless desert and finally arrived at Winnemucca where we will stay tonight. We had a nice dinner and are back in our room and a bit pooped for our first day.

Wayne got the pictures I took today downloaded from the camera, now I'm going to see if I can upload them to this blog. It's a little different on this laptop than on my computer at home so here goes!

More tomorrow.........thanks for reading.

2 More Days !!!!!

We are sure getting close now. Wayne is driving David to Sacramento today and I am going to do some preliminary packing. We are doing last minute laundry tomorrow, then it's to the road with us!

This morning I sent out a big email to a lot of friends and relatives with a link to this blog. I sure hope I can make this enjoyable for everyone.

I have to run a couple errands this morning but will wait until the fog clears and it gets a bit warmer. The weather here is just one of the most glorious things we love about San Francisco. It's really a great place to live, even with the high cost of living here.

Wayne and I want to meet lots of people on our trip and see lots of things and take tons of pictures. This is a trip of a lifetime for me, I've wanted to do this for so long. Just the freedom of it is wonderful.