Just browse through the posts again and enjoy!

Thomas

Monday, July 4

Today we arrived after an uneventful drive in Casselton, ND near Fargo. Tomorrow we are heading towards Minneapolis and stay another night at a KOA. Wednesday then we plan to arrive in Westby WI.

This will conclude our trip “The Gang of Three is Heading West”. We were 17 days on the road and traveled 4’000 miles. We visited 6 National Parks and a couple of State Parks.

Thanks for visiting and following us!

Thomas

UPDATE:  In the evening in Casselton we had a tornedo warning. We were lucky, but have seen the dark cloud passing about 10 miles east from us. We stayed in the motel till the warning was over. This warnings are very serious here in the U.S. and we treat it that way, you don’t want to be caught by a tornedo in a travel trailer!!!

Our last campground, Northwest KOA Minneapolis in Maple Grove, a real KOA again!!

My two travel companions.....

aka the BUFFALOES!!!! sic

Sunday, July 3

After leaving the mountains the journey through North Montana in direction east was nothing to mention, other than long, very long. It took us two days, Montana is a huge state.

Also we drove through a lot of tribal areas all with the well known problems, even in the McDonalds we had to wait in line; It took forever to get our food. The police officers are not very nice, expensive  and easily scared!!

Another interesting episode was when I tried to make a reservation for a campsite close to the Theodore Roosevelt National Park. The camping lady gave me the advice to stay away from this area, it is very bad here, she said, and the roads are dangerous. All this because of the oil boom happening right now in North Dakota.

I still wanted to visit the National Park to see how South Dakota’s Badlands differ from the North. But we learned over time in the U.S. to listen and to take it very seriously what locals and natives try to communicate to you, therefore I changed the plans and traveled further south to continue our trip on Interstate 94. 

On the campground we are staying (close to I94) 80% of the sites are occupied by oil workers and when I drove up today to the North Unit of the Park, traffic was very intense because heavy oil trucks and other oil related vehicles. If we add to this the enormous flooding in Minot, I’m glad we are traveling I94 from now on.

The visit to the park was grea; We had  beautiful weather with a clear blue sky. Again a camera with polarized lenses would have been very helpful and would have enhanced the pictures a lot, but up to you to judge:

Friday, July 1

Yesterday we reached our most western point. From now on we drive again east through Northeastern Montana, North Dakota, Minnesota back to the West Fork Kickapoo Valley.

The main road was still closed because of snow and it was raining so hard we decided to skip the visit to the park..

So we decided to visit the bears instead

The boys thought that my early visit to the Back Home Bakery was a huge success, an hour after I came home nothing was left. Thanks Mark and Sharon!!

I will make and bake these again end of July, yeehhh!!!!

And at the end a picture to proof that the drive up north was really beautiful!

Wednesday, June 29

Yesterday we drove through the Grand Teton National Park with the most beautiful weather possible. We had to pass three times the Continental Divide (Continental Divide of the Americas ) to get there. A special event was the grizzly mom (not Palin) with her cups roaming next to the highway. The day before I was reading about this in the msnbc online news. (Read the story here) And now I have pictures too.

Unfortunately the Whitefish/Glacier National Park KOA is restricting the bandwidth use of the internet so I cannot upload the pictures yet, but they will come….. Just check in again or RSS the page!

Today we drove 400 miles through the unbelievably gorgeous landscape of western Montana up to Kalispell, with the intend to visit tomorrow Glacier National Park. Hopefully the weather is better tomorrow, it is raining right now.

As a special treat I will visit tomorrow morning (5 am) the Back Home Bakery (Mark’s Home Page). Mark indicated that there will be some fresh croissants for me, THE BEST CROISSANTS WEST OF THE MISSISSIPPI!! (maybe also east).

And here are the pictures:

Always somebody who is taking a picture for you

The snow is still very high at this altitude and of course invites.....

How do I go down now and where are my hiking shoes..

Peng!! Volltreffer, but at least I'm down now...

And here we are, good people from Wisconsin took this picture

Aren't they cute, at least from a distance and not between the mother and them....

Even without a polarized lens, beautiful..

And another one....

Rush hour in Yellowstone

Traffic comes to a complete standstill

Finally back at our campsite..

And that's how a delux campsite for 80 bucks looks like, I guess they can ask for that because the campground was completely booked

Well work was not done yet for me..

I wanted to mix a dough and retard it in the fridge over night...

To bake it in Mark's bakery the next day...

Monday, June 27

The drive yesterday through the Rockies was spectacular. It still took us a while to get to our West Yellowstone KOA campground.

And here we are, the Gang of Three arrived..

Even though also expensive and in a highly touristic area like Mt. Rushmore KOA, we discovered a very nice, well organized and family oriented place. The boys set up the trailer and then we had dinner and smores around our campfire.

The next morning my plan was to get up and start our tour into Yellowstone National Park early to try to beat the crowed. Well when I fired up my computer this morning what I saw was this:

Grrrr!!! This morning when I launched the computer

I couldn’t believe it and went out to check the reading in the car but:

Also the car didn't show any better

But we are visiting today the thermal area of Yellowstone, this should work...

Still I decided to let the boys sleep to give the sun a chance to warm up the basin a little bit and they boys had no objections!!

The weather was beautiful and after the wait we also had the perfect temperature for our sightseeing.

The Fire Hole River Falls

Geyser spectacle in the lower basin

Unbelievable colors, difficult to capture with an unsophisticated camera

Nothing is happening and we are already waiting at least 2 minutes...

Wooow!!!!!!

Sunday, June 26

Yesterday the drive to Greybull was not difficult but still long. We had the Bighorn Mountain Range in front uf us and the Avalanche had to climb to an elevation of 9’666 feet up to the Powder River Pass. Not a problem for the 8,1l engine, but pulling 8’000# up there means a lot of gasoline, even at low speed. Then of course all the way down again into a large plain towards Greybull,  just to do the same thing again tomorrow,but this time in the Rockies to get to the Yellowstone Geyser Basin. 

But the scenry was again spectacular, there is still a lot of snow in this mountains and the boys had some fun on the pass.

The arrival at the Greybull KOA was pleasant, a Dutch couple owns the place and they have it completely remodeled and modernized in the last seven years. This was again the KOA feeling I like and I’m used to.

The Bighorn Mountain Range, we are getting closer to the Rockies

At that altitude we changed our attitude

And run barefoot in the snow

Not to warm here

The descent reveals some breathtaking scenery

Everything updated and very modern, concrete sites plus a professional kitchen. They want to sell in the next 3 to 5 years....

Dinner was almost ready....

And no messing around with a wood fire....

The train ride on Thursday was fun and smokey and brought us trough a beautiful landscape you normally wouldn’t see by car. Even the boys, even though their face expression could lead you to believe different, enjoyed the slow pace of this steam train.

The tshutshu ride is cool!! but let's not show dad....

Harney Peak highest summit east of the Rockies

Only for train aficionados

On Friday we visited Custer State Park and drove the Iron Mountain Road and the Needles Highway.

Young bisons or buffalos, I had also two in the car....

Nice backstraps and all organic...

What a beautiful landscape

The lonely bull, big guy

The Needles Highway, unbelievable what the engineers have built here...

It's so boring and the gameboy is out of power = the two buffalos

If dad could upload the video, it would show that we also had fun....

 
We leave this KOA today, a day early, because we didn’t like the place. For the boys the internet was not working (btw for me too, therefore the update only now) and for me this was not a well managed place  and the price was in no relation to the site. I don’t like to pay for a name. (Mt. Rushmore)

Next Stop will be the KOA in Greybull, WY.

Thursday,  June 23

Yesterday was the first really 100% beautiful day and the right setup for visiting Mount Rushmore National Memorial. Attached the pictures with the dinner at the end of the day.

Today I plan to ride the vintage steam engine train of the Black Hills Central Railroad. The two boys graciously agreed to come with me,  not without a comment from my son:  but dad trains are you thing,  why…………….

2/3 of the Gang

A nice and tasty end of the day, of course with TTmR (Travel Trailer made Rolls)

The drive yesterday from the Badlands to the Black Hills was very difficult, only 80 miles but it took me about three hours. Even for a 3/4 ton Chevy Avalanche a 31 foot, about 8’000 pound travel trailer is a problem with strong winds from the side and super heavy rain.

On our way to the Black Hills with stopped at one of the many missile launch silos of the Cold War Minuteman missile, part of the atomic protection of the U.S. The kids were not too impressed because they expected also a launch control center and not just a “hole” with a fake rocket in it. Well I’m glad it is a fake now…….

 Arriving at the foot of the Black Hills the sky finally cleared and we (maybe better: the truck) were able to climb to the 5’400 feet above sea level Mount Rushmore KOA enjoying the beautiful scenery of the Black Hills. The views are comparable to the Black Forest in southern Germany.

Today light wind and not a cloud to be seen. Best outlook for a beautiful day at Mount Rushmore National Monument and the Black Hills.

I think I have to wake up the kids.

View when I woke up...

Great it is really nice weather today..