The Road Trip Begins!

Well, it’s that semi-annual time when I go on a vacation of sorts.  This year it worked out that me and my Dad are doing a road trip down to California to visit my brother Jyles in Las Angeles where he is going to school.  Over the next few I will be posting a rough account of our trip.  I hope you enjoy reading about what we all experienced!

Day 1 – Thursday, January 6, 2012

We left.  It really was that simple.  We’d packed up the night before, and my ’99 Honda CR-V that we were taking was not even that over-loaded. Turns out we didn’t need much; one large extra item we had was Jyles’ guitar that we were bringing to him.  It was a busy week of pre-trip prep that included buying 2 new tires and switching all 4 from winter to summer tires in preparation for the beautiful climates we hoped to be driving into.  I also repaired some sort of shaft and a wheel bearing, so before even leaving this trip had cost be $1500… but only in a round about way because I would have had to do those things at some point anyways.  Ok, but back to the trip. 

We left on schedule at 9:00am and headed west for the Boissevain border crossing, which we zipped through like we were duel citizens or something.  I had plans to make a movie of the trip and so we knew we’d need to make deliberate stops to take pictures.  In efforts to start the photo taking pattern, we took a quick stop and photographed a giant turtle made of metal tire rims.  Then we drove…and drove… and drove some more.  We made one more tourist stop in Wall, SD, the famous site of Wall Drug.  It turns out there was a really neat western style block of buildings including cafes, bars, the drug store, post office, restaurants, and many other store fronts, all set back in the wild west days with boardwalk and false fronts. 

Finally we made it to our location, Rapid City!  After a bit of looking around, we settled in at the AmericInn for an impressive $39.99 with a free breakfast.  We actually got a handicapped accessible room, so we had lots of space at a great price.  We hoped to not be let down in the future stops due to such a smoking deal on night one.  Once we were settled, we began our tradition of eating a late supper and went to a 24 hour Perkins.  After that, we relaxed in the hotel reading, looking forward to tomorrow.

Day 2 – January 7

After enjoying a free breakfast at the hotel, we were ready to go by 9:00 AM, only to be met with a flat tire.  Luckily we were prepared and refilled the tire and found a wal-mart tire center only a few blocks away to fix the problem.  In under an hour we were ready to hit the road.  But, because we’d seen some stores on our way in, we decided to try and find some deals shopping. It didn’t take long though, and after walking into a few stores, we realized that there were 3 problems with this plan. 1) They didn’t have very many  great deal, 2) They didn’t have any summer stock out (which is what we wanted), and 3) We didn’t enjoy shopping.  So, then we were off to Mount Rushmore!  On our way there we stopped in at Keystone for some pictures.  Keystone was another cool town set back in the days of the West with false fronts and a variety of shops.  After slowly climbing up the mountain we arrived at the pay station (only $11.00 to see the faces) and Dad was surprised to see how developed it was. There was now 2 multi-level parkades, a gift shop, amphitheater, avenue of flags, interactive interpretive center, and more.  Not like he remembered it from the 70’s.  Anyways, it was really impressive and the architecture focused everything on the huge faces carved in the mountain.  We took some pictures and spent a while in the center which was very informative and interesting.  It was amazing to see how they did it with such limited funds and equipment, truly an amazing feat!

Then it was off to Cody Wyoming, a smallish town with half of their hotels closed for the season. Eventually we decided to stay at a Super 8 for 57.99, but it included a breakfast.  After a salady meal at Granny’s restaurant, we picked up some fruit at Walmart and then retired to our room and again read, and slept. 

Day 3 – January 8

Off to Yellowstone National Park, via the NE entrance through the mountains!  Or so was our plan.  After 1.5 hour of driving on steep, windy, but very dry and clear mountain roads, we came to a dead end.  Apparently this road was closed for the winter.  What could we do but head back to Cody and try the East entrance.  It too was closed though, it was then that we found out, “Yellowstone is closed for the winter”  A plus on the first dead end was that it gave us a good opportunity to listen to our “on the road church service”, a podcast from the Southlands church (Thinking rightly about Israel). Before leaving Cody for a second time, I took a bunch of “Cody” pictures and hope to send a few good ones to my friend of the same name.  No discouraged easily, we began to go the long way to Jackson so we could see the Teton National Park.  The drive out of Themopolis was amazing though because we drove through a beautiful and impressive canyon, it was well worth the detour.  As we continue to drive we started having fears that the Teton National park may be closed too, causing us to backtrack many hours if this was the case.  In a flurry of trying to find out we texted mom, but the cell service in the area was sketch at best, called info at 511, but again  the service caused a problem.  Finally, we met up with some travelers at a rest stop who assured us that the Teton Park was open, we were safe to drive to Jackson.  So we continued on.  The Tetons, an impressive and towering set of mountains, were unfortunately covered by fog as we passed them, and Jackson was a ritzy place that we made our way through on our way to Idaho Falls.  We found a Guest House Inn for $49.99, with a free hot breakfast, and after checking in tried out Chilies for a super supper. It was great, and following eating we planned our trip a bit, read, and the hit the hay.

Day 4 – January 9

Day 4! It really felt like it had been longer than that, I mean, we’d done/seen so much already!  After a great hot breakfast buffet we took off for Craters of the Moon.  We were foiled by fog again and had to settle for a small but interesting museum explaining what the area looked like and why.  On our way out of the area the fog lifted and we saw lots of the strange spewed rock that had apparently been there a long time.  Next we were off to see some waterfalls, but on our way we stopped at the Snake River canyon, made famous by Evel Knievel when he tried to jump across the canyon at a narrow point.  The canyon is unreal, it’s so deep it messes with your mind, and the feat of bridging it is really remarkable.  Our time there was made even more interesting when we got to watch and film two BASE jumpers from Utah jump off the bridge in the canyon below.  I can’t begin to predict what that would feel like; the adrenaline of a free fall followed by gently floating to the ground once your parachute opened. Wow!  Once they jumped we left to find the falls, which were amazing!  It was definitely one of my favorite sights so far!  We explored the falls area for a while and after taking many pictures, started our journey to Utah.  But true to form, we avoided the interstate, (and any main or paved road really) and after talking to the locals, found some gravel, non-winter roads that would take us where we wanted to go.  The sights were amazing and for an hour we trucked along on winding gravel roads, often going for miles without seeing any sign of human development, other than the road we were on.  Eventually we arrived in Wendover Utah,  and checked into the Best Western for $52.00, no breakfast.  This was an interesting little town and the only places to eat were at the many casinos (It’s on the Nevada border, what did you expect)  That in itself was a bit of a (smelly) experience, but we found a quieter place in the corner of the flashing lights and dinging bells.  I believe the best way to describe the restaurant was a cross between gaudy and glam.  The food was good, but I was glad to get out of that place, partly due to the smoke that was hurting my eyes, and partly due to the sad state of the many people that a casino caters do.  It was not an overly pleasant place by any stretch of the imagination.   At the hotel we read and slept, as per the norm.

Day 5 – January 10

Today we drove on the salt flats, the site of the Bonneville speedway.  It was strangely simple and where the pavement ended, the speedway started, nothing more than faint trail in the rock hard white salt surface going for miles in every direction.  We of course drove down the track for while, took some pictures, and then headed back to the main highway.  That was really all there was to do there I guess.  It was another day of driving back roads, and eventually we ended up in the dark in Moab.  We played our regular game of “Finding the best, cheapest, nicest hotel in town” and after driving up and down the street a few times, we settled on a Motel 6 for 39.99, no breakfast.  It was simple alright, and not the cleanest, but it would do.  We finally went to Pizza Hut after talking about it for days and ended up with enough food to have pizza for breakfast the following morning (which was perfectly alright with me).

Day 6 – January 11

Today was a day of sightseeing, looking, seeing, and well, more seeing.  The Moab area (and miles in every direction) is a beautiful unique area that forever has a canyon, mountain or ridge of red, orange, white, grey or green stone to entertain you with.  We drove around in Arches National Park and saw many famous sighs (the balancing stone and the arches specifically) and then did one of my favorite things of the trip so far, went on a trail advertised as “4x4 road” for 8 miles with my little (but awesome) CR-V.  It was more than Dad expected, but I couldn’t help but smile was we bounced, jostled, winded, and nearly scraped our way on this rocky trail.  It was super fun and we definitely held our own with the big F150 truck on the trail in front of us.  Point for the Honda.  After that we checked out the Canyonlands National Park and saw another few hours worth of the same but different stuff.  Amazing, beautiful, awesome…but there’s a lot of it. I think I was wowed-out by the end. There are lots of 4x4 trails marked, and after asking a warden, we were assured that you generally need a high clearance 4x4 to take them, not a (sweet and awesome) CR-V. (I’d said this, but Dad was not sure, point for me). Something worth noting is that the National Park fee is only $10.00 a vehicle, and they are sometimes good for 7 days. 

After all the travel in red rock, we drove to Kayenta, Arizona for the night.  The GPS said there were 2 places to stay here, and it was only off by 1, so after checking out all 3 we picked the more expensive, but clearly nicest one, the Hampton Inn. We ended up getting a deal and so for 67.00 (down from $85) we are in the nicest hotel of our trip with a free hot breakfast.  God is looking out for us that’s for sure (and for more reasons than us getting a sweet deal on a hotel room).  After a small meal at the hotel we relaxed and enjoyed the evening.  Off to another adventure tomorrow!