The Yellowstone Journal (June 2004)

Day One (Wednesday)

• We left Elk Horn at 7:00 a.m. in Dick and Barb's new? 2001 SUV, which was less than a month old. Dick announced there would be No Stops until we hit Rapid City. This was met with protests from Nancy and Barb. About Omaha, Nancy wanted to shop and Barb was ready for more coffee. We played all of our CD's by the time we hit Sioux City. I knew we were in trouble when WW pulled out his Slim Whitman's Greatest Hits. Going through Sioux City was tough enough listening to Una Paloma Blanca, but we also had to hear all of Warren's old SC stories while Nancy kept crying to stop in and see Beth for breakfast, but "Hey, No Stops!"
• Heading up to Sioux Falls, there was talk of stopping in the see Todd, but "Hey, No Stops!" About this time, DBT was hit on the head by Barb and a protest was mounted to at least hit a rest area.
• Barb said she had never seen the Corn Palace at Mitchell, SD and we were getting gas there, anyway, so she begged Warren to just drive by. We ended up stopping for gas and Nancy took off because she saw a flea market set up inside the Corn Palace. They said they were just going to take a picture, but after twenty minutes, we had to go find them. Both Barb and Nancy were knee deep in crafts on the main floor. Each blamed each other but I think it was planned back at that rest stop. We literally had to drag them away.
• Murdo, SD or something like that was where we ate lunch. Amid much protest by DBT a sit down restaurant was found. When we stopped, Nancy demanded (she does that a lot?) that we MUST hit Wall Drug. She gave as an excuse she needed to buy a post card for Marj, but I know she just wanted to shop, she had not done that for 60 minutes and I think she is addicted. At this stop, we began to hear a strange noise when the brakes were applied. Oh, oh......
• We drove through the Bad Lands, very beautiful, except for the orange that Barb tossed out of the window. Brakes were getting worse. Nancy was really getting agitated about not stopping and shopping. As we flew by the gift shop....cursing was heard from the back seat.
• Nancy grabbed the driver (Warren) by his ear and INSISTED that we stop at Wall Drug, so Warren did. (DBT was cussing) Barb was glad to find a rest room. Nancy sprinted from shop to shop as Dick worried about his brakes and Warren just sat on the bench with his arm around a wooden dance hall girl. (I found that a little strange) Finally, Nancy was grabbed by Barb and led away. Nancy doesn't spend much money, she just shops and shops and shops and shops.
• We pulled into Rapid City around 5:00 pm and the brakes were in serious trouble. Nancy wanted to find a Mall, but DBT and WW went to find someone to look at the rear brakes. Luckily we found Tires Plus and they would be open until 8:00 pm.....After an hour of looking things over, here came the bad news, new brakes, cost of about $400, but they could be done in another couple of hours. We waited, they had much difficulty, but finally...DONE. We went back to the motel, where the women had ordered enough pizza for 8.

Day Two (Thursday)

• We were all excited to get up and head to Mt. Rushmore. We had to wait for Barb, but around 7:00 a.m. we found a gas station and then headed up into the Black Hills. Nancy kept pouting as we passed shops and antique stores. It started to rain. We paid the entry fee and parked our SUV into the new parking ramp area and walked in the rain to Mt. Rushmore. We just made it, as a heavy fog was rolling in. We enjoyed the museum and Nancy enjoyed the gift shops. We had to wait for Barb, but after an hour or so of checking out the exhibits and shopping, we left. We could not believe how much this place has changed.

• Next stop was the Crazy Horse Monument. It was still raining off and on, but the fog cleared. Right when we entered the park, heavy fog came in again, just as we were pulling up to view it. We barely saw it. The museum was pretty neat and Nancy enjoyed the gift shops and we waited for Barb, again. Barb was always getting lost and had no concept of time, hereditary I think or maybe it is gender related?

• Now it was back on the road for a wild trip to Cody, Wyoming. It started out just beautiful, but when we went over the Big Horn Mountains the real heavy fog came in. Fortunately, we had the first team driving (Warren) as DBT could not tell if it was foggy or his glasses just needed cleaned. Curvy roads, dead drop offs, big Winnebago campers to meet and pass and all of this in the heavy fog. We worried about our new brakes and very poor visibility. Finally, after coming down in altitude it cleared and it was just gorgeous again. Many of the beautiful scenery pictures are of these rocks and canyons.

• We arrived in Cody, Wyoming in record time, except for the delay in crossing the mountain pass. At the motel, Barb was attacked by a large white parrot or cockatoo? The dumb bird was out of it's cage and headed straight for Barb. Nancy wanted to "have fun" and demanded that we go uptown and see the BIG gunfight, done nightly for the tourists. (Yippe Kye-O Kye-A) We did. We waited for it to start for quite some time, then it took about 2 minutes to happen. Barb went running up to the "stars" and asked for her picture to be taken, She pushed away some little kids and got right in with Buffalo Bill, himself. We then had a super meal at Irma's Hotel (supposedly built by Buffalo Bill's wife) to celebrate Barb's 50th birthday.

Day Three (Friday)

• The BIG day began as we hit the road around 7:00 a.m. We had to wait for Barb. Such a beautiful drive from Cody to Yellowstone, it was about an hour. Our hope and dream was to see a bear. We had read that a grizzly had attacked and seriously injured someone, recently. We talked about the "old" days when we went to Yellowstone and how the black bears would stop the cars. Yes, we even laughed how the Dick and the bear story has been exaggerated over the years. The first thing we noticed in Yellowstone was the forest fires. On the East side they were fairly recent, but on the West side they were huge and it happened many years ago. (1988, I think) We were up with the snow and came down the mountain to Lake Yellowstone, where we noticed a couple of cars stopped. They had stopped because there was a large grizzly bear, walking the water's edge, near the road. We got out and took pictures. Wow, it sure made our trip! You can see this on the slide show. We also ended up seeing lots of buffalo, elk, moose, deer but we never heard any of the wolves, except Warren trying to "attract" them out of the car window. We drove around the park most of the day. Saw the water falls, geysers, mountain streams etc. Nancy wanted to shop so we stopped at a little gift shop and waited for Barb. The buffalo were everywhere and right next to our SUV. We even had to wait 20-30 minutes for Rangers to get a herd of buffalo off of the road. During one of our geyser walks, it poured rain, then hailed. We had to run to a little one room book shop to get out of the deluge, Nancy was happy, they were selling stuff. There is a picture of the hail in the slide show. There is also a picture of Barb with Ranger Rick. I think they were talking about littering in a National Park, but I am not sure. The weather was bizarre, sunshine then storms. We went to Old Faithful, where Nancy found another shop and we waited for Barb. We went out with the crowd and watched the geyser go off. Dumb Dick was down wind and was sprayed by Old Faithful herself. Some said it was his first shower of the trip, but that was not true. He could not blame Barb, because she had moved to another area.

• After the full day of driving around Yellowstone (much construction) we headed to Jackson Hole. As you know, the drive is beautiful. The Tetons were gorgeous, but there were storms about. When we arrived, Nancy wanted to go uptown shopping and we headed to tourist paradise. After finding an interesting place to eat, it was decided that the women would take off and shop and the men could go do what they wanted. (nap, read or maybe a museum) A terrible rain storm hit around 8:30 pm while Nancy and Barb were riding a stagecoach. The driver told them to leave as they could not sit there and stay out of the rain, he was quitting for the night. So they had to almost swim back to the motel. Hard for Nancy to pass up those shops.

Day Four (Saturday)

• We hit the road around 7:00 a.m. after waiting for Barb. We thought we could drive to Ogallala or so and stay the night. Dick put the pedal to the metal and we cruised through Wyoming. Another, just beautiful drive. Around 10:00 a.m. Mr. Policeman stopped the streaking white SUV, which was going 80....the cruise control was pretty accurate according to his radar......After a very interesting conversation we found out that Mr. Policeman used to live in Vale, Iowa.....even had his drug dog (a lab) from there. (the dog was sniffing around Warren's dirty laundry, but then pulled away, fast! Probably ruined that dog's sense of smell forever!) DBT brought up anything he could think of to "relate" with this guy and then WHAMMO.......another speeder went flying past us and brushed our @!%#@!......Well, he took right off after him and left us alone....Whew.....we made super time through Wyoming and dodged some intense storms....got into Nebraska and decided to drive all of the way back. Nancy was not happy that we did not shop the whole day, but we arrived in Elk Horn around 11:00 pm....Dick and Barb then continued on to Nevada and arrived around 1:00 a.m.

Conclusion

• It was a wonderful time. Great family times, great food (Dick even went off of his Michael Moore diet), and great sites to see. A big thanks to the Watsons for joining us. It was fun picking on Nancy (although I think most of the time was Pick On Dick) and letting Warren (little Napoleon) think he was running things. Barb wanted to get out of town for her 50th birthday and it was such a memorable one. Barb had not been to these places and really enjoyed it. I could not believe how things have changed. I know I am getting old, but I really enjoyed the Western scenery. (even though they say I dozed off a couple of times) I like western movies anyway and the buttes and canyons of the USA are really something. Growing up, it seemed the Folks were always heading West to Colorado or California or Idaho or Yellowstone or The Black Hills, it is pretty easy to take those trips for granted, but the ones that I got to go on are priceless to me now. (I will never forget C.L. enjoying the farm tools at Pioneer Village. He would pick up a tool and ask me what it was. I have no idea what a tool is today, let alone 1880, so I would say, "a wrench?" and he would laugh/cuss and say it was used to hook the bridal onto a horse's rig.....oh, or something like that....he especially liked the old steam/threshing machine stuff....just priceless) One of my earliest and fondest memories was the trip in 1960? where we had two carloads full of Tryons and went to Yellowstone, it was always such fun to go as a family. I remember so well watching and re-watching the slides from that trip. Things are sure easier now with digital pictures and the internet. We are already talking about heading back, maybe with our grand daughter some day. Maybe that would be priceless for her............