*** AUGUST ADVENTURES 2007***
Here is the story of my August trip out west. I didn't start keeping a journal until I got to Utah which I will type up and send in my next message. Enjoy.
A few days ago, I returned from a two+ week tour of our grand United States. The odometer on my new car now reads 6,500 miles. I drove through 14 states: Michigan, Wisconsin, Minnesota, South Dakota, Wyoming, Utah, briefly in Colorado and Arizona, New Mexico, Texas, briefly in Mexico!, Oklahoma, Missouri, Illinois, Indiana and back to Michigan.
I was with a friend for the first few days. We took the SS Badger across Lake Michigan from Ludington to Manitowoc. This giant ship was built to take railroad freight cars across the water in the 1950s. Now it's a passenger ship that carries cars and trucks across as well. On the other side we spent the night in Manitowoc and drove on to Madison, Wisconsin - passing many dairy farms on the way, including Land-o-Lakes. We stopped and had lunch at Himal Chuli, a Nepali restaurant on State Street in Madison run by my former Nepali professor. (I am a proud UW 1989 graduate.) It was great to visit the Union and have Wisconsin ice cream while gazing out at Lake Mendota.
We stayed that night at the campground at Devil's Lake State Park - after getting very lost in the woods during our little trek - in the dark... The next day we drove all day, finally stopping at the Badlands National Park campground near Rapid City, South Dakota. In the morning, we toured the Badlands, Mount Rushmore and the Black Hills, and gave the Sturgis Bike Rally a brief once-over on the last day of the - Harley motorcycles galore - extravaganza - not at all what I had imagined... It was very commercialized. Those bikes are so loud they scare the wildlife, and they were all over the highways testing my driving skills. That night we were in Buffalo, Wyoming in a tent at an RV park, and the next day after touring Yellowstone National Park, we met my family in Jackson Hole, WY.
>From there my friend flew to visit her brother in Las Vegas, leaving me with my family in Teton Village, near Jackson Hole. Every year, like Dick Cheney, my family vacations in Wyoming. Air Force Two was parked at the airport for all to see, meaning Cheney was there with us somewhere - during a time of war.
My family and I stayed in a condo in Teton Village for a week. I played and played with my adorable nieces who speak three languages fluently and currently live in Paris, France. We toured Teton National Park and Jackson Hole, shopping, hiking and visiting our favorite places. We know the area well.
The highlight of those too few days was climbing Disappointment Peak (11,618 feet) with my father - an avid climber in his youth and incredibly fit and fast still. !! Our guide took us on ropes through places we would never have ventured on our own. There was one narrow cave-type vertical hole that took us to another level of the rock. Our guide, Gary Wise from NYC, shimmied through it like it was a mile wide - and he is a big guy. My father and I were slower and painstakingly careful, concentrating and spending time feeling for the perfect hand and foot holds in order to hoist up through the dark narrow space. That was exciting.
It's called Disappointment Peak because in the early days when climbers were attempting to climb all the Teton Peaks, including the Grand Teton, a team headed up a new route which led them to a peak just in front of the Grand. It was a disappointment because the whole way up, you think you are on the Grand. It looms behind another peak which is a disappointment once you realize you'd have to start all over again to get to the Grand.
Just when we thought we had another half day to go - the summit was in front of us! We were on top with incredible views - and drop-offs to the glaciers below - all around. The Grand Teton towered just beyond, a long long reach away. We had left the car in the parking lot at 6am that morning and were finally back at the car by 7:15pm that evening.
The other highlight of the visit was the mama moose who hung out in the yard of the condo with her son. They came every night to munch on the beautifully landscaped garden. The surrounding bushes and exotic shrubs must have been tasty. I slept in the living room on a cushion on the floor and in the middle of the night, outside the dining room window I saw the perfect silhouette of a moose going by. I watched them for a long time at close range, inches away, from the other side of the window. A moose's life seems a good one. They are big animals - more the size of a camel! We had noticed something in the yard that made us wondered.. My nieces and I looked up moose droppings in a book at a bookstore which did not look anything like buffalo droppings. Was there a buffalo roaming the property too?
Sincerely,
Heather O'Neal
Of Global Interest Adventure Travel
The Eighth Street Trekkers' Lodge B&B
Ann Arbor, Michigan
(734) 369-3107
ofglobal@aol.com
http://www.ofglobalinterest.com
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