Arches!

I'm sorry, but this information is out of date.  We were at Arches National Park a long time ago, but sadly, my internet skills are such that I haven't had the time to post anything until now.  Presently we have been having awesome adventures, but you'll have to wait until I get to writing them down. 
In the small coal town of Helper, UT, I got to use the payphone at the gas station, and it was a wireless handset that looked a lot like my own phone.  In fact it was. 
We came down the passes and into the lower lands with warm sunshine beaming into the car, and turned into Arches National Park right at the heat of the day.  Red rocks reflected their ocher tones upon us as we climbed the 1,000 ft into the park, and we gaped at the sights, but drove on.  The park is a long and winding road, ending at the campsite, and we stopped first at the "Windows" and flew Danny's plane to look at the sights from aloft. 
It was a great way to spend the evening, watching the sun slowly set and redden the already flame colored rocks.  We poked around and climbed a bit, then retired to the camp site. 
The full moon blared out like a heavenly beacon in the desert, like it is prone to do.  This place is very similar to Joshua Tree National Park, except in the rock.  Here it is red sandstone, there it is granitic. 
We didn't see the comet, though it is reputed to be visible with the naked eye (in the morning).

 In this picture you can see the true nature of our souls...  Danny is obviously a relaxed lounger, and I apparently am a sexy flamenco dancing woman.
I didn't know this at the time of the picture, so I will have to get in touch with my inner soul a little bit more.  If you are confused, then look at the shadows.

 This one looks like a stern Easter Island statue to me...

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Yellowstone and Wyoming

 One of the things we have been doing while on this trip is to fly a little remote control plane around.  I should say Danny, because I haven't been too involved with this project, but merely a spectator.  The little drone is small and fragile, but has impressive capability, with video transmission live from the camera, so we can see the action as it is flying up in the air. You basically can fly the plane from the screen, if you like.  It can go up to 5 or 10 miles away, depending on the courage of the pilot, but thus far we've only gone 2000 ft away.  So we've been stopping and looking for places to fly, here and there.  In these pictures you can see the Gopro camera on the nose, which sends the video signal, and the plane ready for takeoff.

As we made our way across Idaho and towards Yellowstone, we started to climb and ended up spending the night on a high mountain pass with snow all over.

  Yellowstone was inching closer and closer.  The next morning we got up early and drove to the West Entrance of the first national park, which is open (as they say on their website) all year round.  We had the park pass ready in our hot little hands and discovered the gate to be shut.  In fact, that part of the park was closed.  How surprising!  We then detoured about 120 miles north to get to Bozeman, then another 100 miles south to get to the north entrance, where we were met with smiles and a bit of a pat on the butt to tell us to go back the way we came, after driving in the 5 miles to see Mammoth Hot Springs.  Basically, that is the only part of the park that is open after early November.  The town of Mammoth is filled with elk and sulfurous fumes, but is kind of quaint.  We questioned the locals and found that there is in fact a route that goes through the park (which we had really wanted to do) but it involved a high risk, that the road, after going 50 miles through the park and exiting, then passing through a tiny town, dead ended in a "closed" road over a snowy pass.  The closure of this road was disputable, however, and we elected to try it out.  The Cheetah was up to the task and we made fine progress over icy roads to the dry stretches of Wyoming's high country, with the final result of Cody, Wy.  Buffalo Bill Cody is the mascot (and perhaps the founder) of this town, which is a pretty little thing hiding behind the mighty Rocky mountains.

 I remember this hot springs from coming here on a trip as a kid, in the Silver Bullet, a dodge caravan.  It was in the summer of 1990 or 1989 or something like that, and very hot, with lots of obnoxious brothers and sisters.  I was well behaved, of course. 

 We also went to a hot springs (Boiling River) at sunset to sit in the water.  It was springs pouring out into the river water, so swirls of cold and warm waters mixing together.  Wonderfully pleasant and it gave us a chance to talk with some of the wolf researchers who are working in the park over the winter.  We spent the night just outside the park on a hill overlooking the town. 

 On our way through we saw some bison, and a jeep trying to push one out of the way. 

   From there we spent the night in Thermopolis, a hot springs town, and then continued over South Pass (if you remember "the Oregon Trail") and had blasting winds and snow in our face, but found a way into Utah.
Before finally attaining sunshine and the southwest, we had to cross some passes, and we ended up spending the night at one, at 8,200 ft!  Then a 9114 ft pass and down towards Arches. 

 Here we are ascending the last pass, and in the next post I'll discuss Arches and Canyonlands National Park.  Let me say that they are great.

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Road Trippin' East

 There is a lot to say, and since I am borrowing internet at the Cody (Wyoming) library, I must watch out for Buffalo Bill Cody to come kick me out.  So far we've been over the North Cascades Highway, then camped at the laser light show viewing parking lot at the Grand Coulee Dam, for day one.  It was nice and snowy as we crested the pass, going by the North Cascades Institute, and lots of snow and clouds.  The clouds followed us over the pass and we had to fight the somber feeling and some rain for a few days. 

 Here is the grand coulee dam at night.

 The next morning bright and early we woke up, drove down the coulee and to dry falls.  This is where the Ice Age melting dug out a giant canyon and had the biggest waterfall ever.  Ever ever.  Danny stood on the edge and I stood on the railing to get a shot.

 Kind of a cool structure for the roof at the parking lot.

 Then we went into Idaho and found a tank just east of Boise, as we worked our way over Highway 20.  We did a bunch of sneak camping in the booneys, finding a spot that nobody was going to look and then parking, setting up the simple camp by taking some things out of the car, and folding the seats down and getting in.  Easy and a bit cold.  Still, it has been a nice time. 

 

 The sparse accommodations...

 Onward we trudged, or rolled.  The desert seemed to stretch forever, we almost gave up hope.  Others, as you can see here, have given up hope.  But we persisted! 

We got to Craters of the Moon national park, in Idaho, and found some awesome lava.  I expect to see more of this when I get to Hawaii, but this stuff is 2,000 years old.  The stuff on the Big Island is much younger and more worn away.  its neat to see the different types of plasticy molten rock.  There were some lava tubes we explored as well, and nice textured walls. 

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