Driving to Mount Rushmore... And More Driving

We woke up today in beautiful Montana and after a breakfast of diced potatoes and bananas, we started our longest drive of our trip. 

Of course, Montana had gorgeous scenery on our way out. We then headed into Wyoming and would ultimately end up driving through South Dakota. We made the most of our drive by eating delicious cheddar and sour cream potato chips and Michael studied pilot stuff while I drove!

After 7.5 hours of driving, we made it to Mount Rushmore at 4:30 pm! Mount Rushmore was cool, it was very large and it was interesting seeing the monument in person as opposed to pictures, in movies, etc.

But in all honesty, the best part of our day was cookies & cream ice cream after we viewed Mount Rushmore! 

We found a place to grill dinner and are now still driving (it's 9:45 pm) to Byre Lake to set up our tent and fall asleep. 

Tomorrow we will be in Oshkosh! We're waking up at 5 am tomorrow to make it to AirVenture before the first air show at 2:30!

When we reach Byre Lake, we will be at 1,952 miles and about 38.5 mpg.

Biking in Bozeman

We knew immediately when we were in Bozeman. It was awesome. Like Montana's own version of flagstaff. It was lively, had lots of great places to eat and an inviting college mountain town atmosphere. Ready to eat, like we always are, we stopped at the Pour House for their happy hour special and "famous burgers and nachos." 

The blue cheese burger was excellent but the "bozeman's best nachos" were no Arizona  or California nachos. 

Afterward, we walked the shops on Main Street and talked to a few people about their thoughts on Bozeman. This blonde chick said "there's only two seasons here, winter for 7 months and summer for 4 months." I think she forgot that there are 12 months in a year! haha 

Another guy at the bike shop was "imported" (as he said) from Brazil by his wife. He loved Bozeman and showed us a few bike trails to hit up. 

Before heading to the trail we drove around the university campus. Not a bad looking place to go to school. 

Then we headed out to ride grassy mountain trail. . . Little did I know (michael) what a ride It would be. I thought it was about a 7 mile loop. It ended up being a 17 mile loop with 11 miles of it climbing a steep fire road. Beautiful views though. 

I left for the ride alone (Kelsey stayed at the trailhead to do her own style of riding)  at 1800. Sunset was at 2100 so I had 3 hrs. 2 hrs in I was still climbing but figured it has to go down at some point. It finally started down but I wasn't sure it was the right trail as there were no signs. It was generally heading in the right direction so I kept mobbin the singletrack. 

30 min from sunset I still wasn't back yet so I checked the gps to find no signal so I kept riding. Then I got a flat tire.

I changed it out and got going again racing the sun. Those last 20 min of downhill was on the most exciting, scenic, and carvealicious track I've ever ridden. I popped out at to the car at 2058 just in time. Totally worth the work. I got the adventure I asked for. 

We quickly found our campsite, set up, ate brats and rice and went to bed. It was a long great day in Bozeman. 

Tomorrow, Mt Rushmore and Byre lake.

1238 miles and 39mpg. 

Beautiful Yellowstone!

We arrived on Thursday night and it was absolutely beautiful as soon as we arrived, and we even saw a few deer on our way in.

We decided to make some chili dogs and soup before we went to bed. We slept in 34 degree weather that night, which we were both a little unprepared for, and it got a little chilly, but we made it! 

We woke up to make breakfast, and then took a bike ride down to Yellowstone Lake! This lake is giant! It is literally 1/10 of the park size and is 410 FT at its deepest point.

Afterwards, we checked out the visitor center to find out where we could see buffalo, and pick up some bison bars and Yellowstone Roadblock beer from the general store.

We made our first stop of the day at Old Faithful! While we were waiting on a boardwalk, the fattest chipmunk we've ever seen came right up to me (Kelsey) and posed for a picture! It was adorable, but he was hanging out there because there were hundreds of people waiting to see the geyser go off. We decided to take a walkway to the less crowded side and got a great view! Old Faithful was a lot more impressive than we thought it would be! It shot up probably 100 FT for a few minutes!

We then took a trail and hiked to Overlook Point, passing some more geysers and hot springs on our way there! It's amazing to think all of these are natural formations. Some of the water was so clear and such a deep blue, they seemed unreal!

Our next stop was Gibbon Falls, which was a pretty cool waterfall, and then we moved onto the Artist Paintpots! These were awesome because they literally look like giant, bubbling pots of paint! This trail had some more hot springs that were green and blue, and small geysers that exploded every few minutes just a foot or two high.

Then we visited the Grand Canyon of Yellowstone and it was amazing!!!!! It looks exactly like a miniature version of the Grand Canyon, but with tall waterfalls! 

We were able to hike 600 FT down to stand at the base of where the waterfall started! 

By this time, it was about 5 o'clock so we decided to head back to our campsite. As I said, I really wanted to see some buffalo and we finally saw one! It was probably 100 yards away, but we were so exited to see it! However, we didn't realize we were going to drive right by one (only like 30 FT away) about fifteen minutes later, and then get stuck in stop-and-go traffic for almost an hour because of a herd of buffalo! 

It was so fun and exciting seeing baby buffalo! And so many of them! There were at least 50 to 75 bison in the herd, and they were literally just crossing the street whenever they wanted, and one even came within a few feet of our car! I thought it was going to come right up to our window!

We also saw a huge bull elk, just standing right by the road and eating, on our way back to camp, which just topped off one of the best days of our trip so far!

That night, after some much-needed showers and doing some laundry, we ate Ramen and chicken pasta by the campfire slept in 31 degree weather in 50 degree sleeping bags... So I slept in a sweater, hoodie, light winter jacket, denim pants, and two pairs of socks, and Michael slept in something similar. We didn't even get cold :) 

We said goodbye to our Yellowstone home this morning after we slept in until 9:30. We packed up and are now heading to Bozeman, Montana! Of course, we didn't leave Yellowstone without seeing a herd of elk :)

We are leaving Yellowstone at 1,057 miles and a 38 mpg average. 

Driving on through Idaho!

Michael and I were both pretty worn out from yesterday and after a night of chili dogs and hamburgers by the fire, we fell asleep a little before midnight. However, we were planning on leaving Logan around 7 or 8 so our alarm was set for 6 am. We ended up sleeping until 9 am, which is partially my fault because I am a stubborn deep sleeper, so when Michael tried to wake me up, I just ignored him. So we both ended up falling back asleep several times after the snooze alarm went off a few times... But we packed up pretty quickly and just decided to stop and get parfaits and sausage biscuits from this really cool, retro McDonald's!

Afterwards, we made a quick stop at Walmart for some food and items we needed before heading out of Utah! We passed through Idaho and it was the first time for both of us to be in Idaho! It's really grassy and filled with small farm towns surrounded by small peaks.

We stopped at a truck stop to get some tacquitos and ended up next door to an Army surplus store where we spent about a half hour digging through camping equipment and other cool novelties.

As we neared Rexburg, Idaho, we saw a billboard advertising the Legacy Flight Museum. We decides at the freeway exit to go check it out, and it was awesome! 

It was an airplane hangar filled with different aircraft and memorabilia. It had a couple P-51s, a T-6 Texan, a restored Stearman, and a Vietnam era O-1, all of which are still flown regularly... Totally sweet!

... And now our next stop is Yellowstone!

Traveling in Utah!

This morning, we woke up to a light rainfall on our tent at about 6 am. We both got a little paranoid and decided to get up right away and start packing our things. The rain ended up letting up a few minutes later ... Only to come down even harder half an hour later! But, we were able to enjoy an amazing sunrise and some oatmeal. 

Huge thanks to our friend Matt who suggested we buy a bug pesticide sprayer! I thought Michael was crazy when he said it was necessary, but we use it so often to wash dishes, spray off dirt, and even wash our faces when we're at a free, deserted campground!

We left a little after 9 and we took a scenic bypass route towards our original destination, Cedar City. 

Even though it made our drive an hour longer, it was completely worth it! It was absolutely gorgeous and filled with mountainsides of aspen and pine, where log cabins were nestled all over.

And we ended up seeing three does and one elk! Of those, a pair of them leaped across the road only 100 FT ahead of us, and another doe was right beside the road and we got pretty panicked we were going to hit it! But we didn't :)

We even saw Bryce Canyon which is hidden right at the top of the mountains! It was gorgeous and huge!

A few hours later, we made it to Provo, Utah to enjoy some $1 chili dogs from Sonic. 

And we finally reached Salt Lake City! We parked in the downtown area and rode our bikes to Temple Square!

It was almost 100 degrees that day and it was definitely not what we expected! But, any day and weather is a great day to get a bike ride in :)

Michael was watching the Travel Channel the day before we left, and he had the great idea to look up good place to eat while we were traveling. We went to Bruges Waffles & Frites and got the Machine Gun sandwich! It's a huge sandwich that has 2 pieces of juicy lamb sausage and their signature seasoned fries inside the sandwich, and topped with a red pepper aeioli sauce! The sauce was to die for!!! And one of the best sandwiches we've ever had!

Afterwards, we were directed to a local brewery called Squatters! It had so much atmosphere and we had some refreshing beers! It's "good for what ales you."

After sitting and talking for a while, we headed back to our car, disassembled our bikes to pack up, and headed on to Logan, Utah!

We both decided we really like Logan. It has a small town feeling, but is actually a city right next to mountainous areas and lakes! We set up camp (at what we originally thought was a free site, but ended up paying to stay and get some firewood for the night) and had a great night! (Also, I'm pretty sure we were right next to a rabbit hole because we saw so many little bunnies playing!)

We were also so hot and sticky (gross... we know) and after finding out it cost $12 per person to shower at a truck stop, we went and found a creek near our campsite while biking around! So, being us, we rode back to our campsite in the dark, grabbed swimsuits, and went to cool off in the freezing creek! It was so shallow we had to do push ups in it, but we got completely rinsed off :)

That day, we drove 415 miles and averaged 38 MPG. 

Day of Departure!

The first day of our trip was great! We both had work until 2 o'clock that afternoon and as soon as we got home, we gathered the last of our things, said our goodbyes to Layla and our roommate Jacob, and set out to take care of a few errands before we officially left Flagstaff. 

By the time we were on the 89 and heading out of Flagstaff, it was a little after 4 p.m. Our car is packed to max capacity!

We drove north and found ourselves in two completely different areas just a few miles away from each other. We were in a desert with distant hills and mountains...

... And then we drove up a mountain and found ourselves in the Jacob lake area, which was randomly located in the middle of Kanab, UT which was cool.

Throughout our drive, we listened to NPR on the radio for a majority of the way. We can now tell you all about the experiment that cured typhus by using blood-eating lice.

On the way up the mountain, Michael almost gave me (Kelsey) a heart attack. I have a mild fear of heights so I was being pretty gutsy and looking out the window over the edge of a huge mountainside that looks over a valley. Meanwhile, he decides to slam the breaks and I literally thought we were going to die. Obviously, my initial reaction was to punch him in the arm as hard as I could (... And I felt pretty good when he admitted it hurt a little).

We also saw a deer on our way through Jacob Lake, which is such a gorgeous place, and we ended up stopping in Fredonia to buy some candy... But ended up buying some Mangoritas and beer instead! 

As noted, we had ended up getting a late start and camped in a free BLM site just north of Kanab! It took us a while to find a suitable place to call home for the night, but we finally settled down for our first night! 

And it ended up getting dark within 10 minutes of us choosing a spot!

Michael grilled us delicious steaks in our camping pans that are seriously great (thanks Mumzy!) and using some great silverware from our friend Jack :)

Our first day, we went 215 miles and got 40.5 mpg.