The Palmer Express

 

August 8th – 10th traveling back to MN for our nephews wedding.

Greybull KOA, August 8th, very nice campsite, only a few blocks from downtown.  Laundry day so we didn’t venture out.  Big Horn Mountain pass tomorrow.

This was the second decline sign, lots of warnings to check your brakes.                       The elevation route, another butt clinching day.

Sundance campground, beautiful views, wasn’t really able to explore the town as Sturgis rally as going on and absolutely no place to park.

Devils tower, great place to stroll around.  Bring your binoculars so you can watch the climbers.

Vietnam veteran’s 1/2 scale wall

Famil-E-Fun Campground near Mitchell, easy to get in and out of, lots of mature trees.

Yep, we had to stop by the famous corn palace.

August 3rd – 7th Valley View Park / Yellowstone National Park

Beautiful views from our campsite John and I got all dressed up for fly fishing.  We caught Rocky Mountain White Fish, Rainbow, and Brown trout.  It was a chilly start to the day, low 50’s and frigid waters.

Upper Mesa Falls, breath taking views.Yes, we were there.Lower Mesa Falls, picture taken through our binoculars.  You can YouTube some idiots kayaking down these.

The drive to Cave Falls brought back the memories of driving in Costa Rica, gravel and very bumpy.  We were wishing we were in a rental.Panoramic view from Cave Falls overlook.  The caves collapsed a couple years ago, so no cave exploring for us.  From here they have a 30 mile hiking trail to Old Faithful, maybe next time.

Mama Elk and 3 babies alongside the road in Yellowstone, caused a major traffic delay.

 Hot tub anyone?

The happy couple.

Old Faithful, we watched from The Old Faithful Inn observation deck, sure beat standing in the crowds.

Buffalo crossing, Yellowstone rush hour.

Some of the devastation from fires we saw as we left Yellowstone via the east gate. Driving out we climbed to an elevation of 8,678 feet and within 5 miles we were down to 4,131 feet, really glad to have the jake brakes. Karen was pumping the passenger brakes a couple of times on the tight turns.

We will plan another trip back to Yellowstone but in the off season when it is not so crowded.

 

Medora, ND – July 30th – August 2nd

Our day didn’t start very well, we were busy packing up to head to Medora and John came to the door and told me that I should “hold up, we got a flat”.  Being a Sunday and wanting to get on the road we changed it ourselves.

 The day didn’t get much better, we were between Bismarck and Dickinson and all the sudden we heard something dragging.  We pulled over on I-94 and saw that our tail pipe rusted out right behind the muffler.  John was able to hog tie it up and off we went again.

The view of Theodore Roosevelt National Park just east of Medora.  The drive was beautiful.

The view from our campsite at Red Trail Campground.

Inside TRNP, we seen a few different herds of buffalo and wild horses.  We observed a park ranger shoo off a coyote in one of the many prairie dog farms.

Painted Canyon part of TRNP, (free) yet another warm day, the clouds helped.  The visitors center at Painted Canyon has a hiking path down in the canyon.  Hiking down in the canyon was easygoing, the paths were nice, views were spectacular, the hike up was a little more challenging.  The elevation at the top of the Canyon was 2780′ we hiked down to 2538′.

We were surprised to see cactus down in the canyon.

We went to the pitchfork steak fondue and the Medora Musical.

July 12th – 20th we stayed at Royal Oaks Campground, close to town and bike paths.  Ben and Gwen joined us for the weekend. It was a lot of fun to go sight seeing with them.

Spacious camp sites, a little close to the road but not too noisy.

Ben and Gwen’s first time at karaoke together.
Gwen kept rocking out, like father like daughter.  Great job Gwen!

Saturday we rented a pontoon to go fishing on Lake Itaska, to late of a night singing for Gwen.

Is it a feed bag or barf bag?  Kid, you are hilarious!

Gwen was fishing with worms and ended up catching a perch with a minnow.

The four of us at the headwaters.

We climbed the fire tower 16 flights to the top, we all made it, it was more of if Gwen’s going so are we. Gorgeous view, a little windy and sway at the top.

Huge white pine tree.

Gwen, Ben, & Paul
Um, Ben does it feel like someone is standing over you?

Bemidji State Park, nice beach area.

July 28th – 29th we stayed at the Jamestown Campgrounds, nice and clean, on a gravel frontage road dusty getting there but large spaces and very easy parking.  We did the tourist thing and went to the Frontier Village.

Bellying up to an old western bar.

John at the shack of one of his favorite authors.

Every once in a while I can get a picture of Karen.

World’s largest buffalo.

Jamestown reservoir, nice swimming beach, boat launch, and what to us looked like a very challenging frisbee golf course.

July 24th – 27th, we had such a great time we had to swing through again.

Oh, what a beautiful morning.

Another nice visit with our campground host & hostess.  Thanks mom & dad.

June 29th – July 12th stayed at the new Wollum Family RV Park on Lake Cochrane.  Family, fish fry, and fireworks.  The games with Boris and his Russian style of score keeping kept us on our toes.  Spending time with family was a great way to start our adventure.  Many thanks to our Host and Hostess.

 

June 29th we closed on our house and our travel adventures officially begin.  Downsizing from our brick and mortar house to our new home on wheels was quite the challenge, we’re in need of some serious R & R.

 Thanks to Mary Jo and Brianna who baked this cake for us, and of course Jake who drank the beers.  Thanks to Kevin, Mary, Jake and Mary Jo for planning and bringing us dinner so we just had to show up.  Wonder day and send off with friends.

March 11th we arrived back in Minnesota, just in time to shovel. We covered  a little more than 1,700 miles in 48 hours. The first night we pulling over in Jasper Tennessee and got stuck in a hail storm luckily it was pea sized so no damage. We stopped in Illinois and winterized the rv, for our first and hopefully only time.  This took place in a cold and windy Staples parking lot next to Lowes where we purchased the supplies.

John  goes in for another thyroid scan Friday then we’ll be setting up the radioactive iodine treatment.