Mount Rushmore

Three states in three days... Wyoming, Nebraska and South Dakota. Our stops have included Cheyenne, Scotts Bluff, Agate, Custer, Rapid City and Sturgis. Here are some photos. (Map not included.)

Western Nebraska turned out to be an interesting drive... there was just so much NOTHING out there! At Agate Fossil Beds National Monument we hiked through a sea of prairie grass that went on for miles as far as you could see.

South Dakota’s Black Hills were a pleasant surprise. We enjoyed our visit to Mount Rushmore, but had no idea how much more there was to see in the surrounding area.

We visited Rushmore in the evening because we had heard the nightly “lighting ceremony” was a great way to see the monument. It was. We were shocked by the standing room only crowd in the amphitheater for a Tuesday night.

We had our first real (non-Walmart) boondocking experience after the show... we made our own spot at a parking area near a Black Hills National Forest trailhead on the advice of a campground host at a nearby campground. He saved us $23, plus the aggravation of having to back into a camp site at 10:30 a night!


We spent the following day checking out all the wildlife at nearby Custer State Park. At 71,000 acres, it’s apparently one of the largest state parks in the country and boasts one of the largest herds of free-roaming buffalo you’ll find anywhere. They also have a few dozen VERY FRIENDLY burrow!

Rocky Mountains

Rocky Mountain hi! We spent 4 days exploring Rocky Mountain National Park from Grand Lake to Estes Park. Here are some photos.

It was a very busy weekend in the Park. We had to opt for a nearby National Forest campsite our first night, but then managed to find a nice spot within the Park for the remainder of our stay. Turns out one whole campground is closed due to spraying and hazard tree removal related to a pine beetle outbreak that is devastating trees in the area. The damage was incredible.

We did most our hiking in the area of Bear Lake... at 9,000 feet elevation, it was a nice and cool. The kids enjoyed the snow in the Park’s higher elevations, but found hiking that high up a bit too chilly!

We didn’t see as much wildlife as we had hoped to, but did come across several deer, some elk and a few other furry friends. Also, at the Fall River Visitors Center, the kids were able to complete another Junior Ranger program... this time they even got to try on Park Ranger Uniforms!



Our next stops: South Dakota for a look at Mount Rushmore & Devil’s Tower, then Wyoming where we’ll spend some time at Yellowstone & Grand Teton.

Colorado National Monument

Here’s a photo album from the day we spent hiking in Colorado National Monument.

The rock formations were cool, but the temperature in the canyon that day was not. We started on the canyon rim and hiked down to the floor. It was only a 5 mile hike and about 600 feet down, but what goes down must come up... that was the part that really got to us.

The kids had sucked down 3/4 of our water supply by the ½ way point in our hike, so it was a long and thirsty trip back. We recovered with a drink-intensive lunch and a stop at the Visitors Center where the Drew, Jake and Emily each earned their 15th Junior Ranger badges. They’re goal is 20 before we get back to Portland.

Delayed in Durango

We spent a couple of days in Durango recently. This wasn't a planned stop, but when Jake lost a filling and one of the shocks on the RV broke, some minor repair work was in order all around. We found a great pediatric dentist and an excellent RV mechanic, not to mention a really good pizza place, brew pub, playground, etc... Here are a few photos.

The road from Durango to our next stop in Grand Junction proved to be one of the most scenic byways we've ever driven on. The only down side was having to make the trip in the "big rig". Pictured above is a little comparison of Pat's view v. the rest of us!

We're updating the blog today from Cheyenne, Wyoming, in route to South Dakota and Mount Rushmore.

Coming soon: photos from our time this past week at Colorado National Monument and Rocky Mountain National Park.

Mesa Verde

We decided to turn North instead of West from New Mexico and make our way to Colorado.

Because of the 100+ temperatures we'd been hearing about in the Grand Canyon area - not to mention summer crowds and our lack of reservations - we opted to get our canyon fix at Mesa Verde and Colorado National Monument.

Here are some photos from our Mesa Verde explorations. It proved to be a great stop!

We Have Lift Off

We couldn't leave New Mexico without trying again on the hot air balloon ride... this time we achieved lift-off! Here's a photo album from our flight. The kids loved helping get the balloon set up and packed up almost as much as they loved the ride!

Life Imitating Art in Santa Fe

Here's another photo album of the kids enjoying the Santa Fe art scene.

We had so much fun on our last day there that we found the parking lot shut down when we returned to our RV. Luckily, a tool box worked just as well as a passcode would have... it just too a bit longer!

Reports from the Field - Jumbo Edition: Art & Science from St. Louis to Santa Fe

Jubilee field reporters have been busy gathering news, but their “publisher” got a bit behind. Here’s a triple edition of what they’ve seen and learned on our journey West, as well as a photo album of the kids exploring the Santa Fe art scene.

Let’s go to the Kansas Capitol Dome, by Emily, your tour guide
Welcome to the Capitol Dome. It was built in 1885. On top of the Dome there is a statue of a warrior named Ad Astra. Ok ready to walk the 296 steps to the top of the Dome?

There are two domes in the capitol. In-side is a glass dome. Out-side is a coper dome and on the outside there is a little deck. You can see the hole city from up there!

St. Louis Zoo, by Jake
Hi, its Jake. I went to the St. Louis Zoo and did you know that the zoo has 800 speices of animals and 8,000 animals? I saw: 10 kangaroos, 6 giraffe, 20 warty pigs, 2 Okapiz, 20 wild ass, 2 tigers, 2 red pandas, 2 tigers, and a lot more which equals more than 64 animals.

Oh wait, before I go I still have more to tell. When they were feeding the giraffes they put pills in the leaves so they would be healthy.

P.S. I also saw 6 orangatans.
P.S.S. You can see the hippos under water.
P.S.S.S. Go there!

The St. Louis Arch, by Drew
The St. Louis Arch is 630 feet high and 630 feet acrossed. It is located in St. Louis, Missouri and is right on the Mississippi. They put the Arch in St. Louis because it is where Lewis and Clark started on their journey and it was the gate way to the West.

The Arch was designed by Eero Saarinen and he won his design over 154 different designs by other people. You can take an elevator up to the top of the Arch, and there are also little windows you can look out of. When you go back down there are movies about the Arch and Lewis and Clark. Also there is a museum that tells you the history of the Arch and the Oregon Trail.

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While in Santa Fe, we had the opportunity to visit several art galleries, as well as the Georgia O’Keefe Museum. We were very pleasantly surprised by how interested the kids were in what they saw...

Georgia O’Keefe, by Emily
Georgia was born in Wisconsin. She moved to Virginia with her family and moved to N.Y. with her husband, but her real home in her hart was New Mexico.

Georgia was a painter. She painted nature, like flowers, trees landscapes, but instead of the hole thing she did a little part of it. My personal favorite piece of hers is The Black Iris painted in 1926.

Hiroshi Yamano, Glass Blower, by Jake
H.Y. is from Japan and he’s traveled to the US and Europe and he gets his ideas from all the places he goes. He loves to make fish in bowls out of glass, and he says he is like a fish.

What he makes is heavy, but small and they might weigh 80 pounds. It’s very, very, very dangerous work and you get so hot you can die. Also he has a big group of people who help him.

Lane Timothy, by Drew
Lane T. is from Salt Lake City Utah. He is a young and unique artist that paints old but make it look new. The people in the gallery explained his art as “modern nostalgia”.

The girl in all of his paintings is his own wife. Every time he gets an idea for a painting they go to a vintige clothes store and buy the clothes that will look good and match the painting. Lane then takes photos and then paints from them. His art is very big and very expensive. Each piece tells a story and he gives them interesting titles.

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In addition to bringing you news from their travels, the kids are continuing some lessons related to the natural sciences and scientists important to the field. (Sshhh... don’t remind them that it’s summer break in some places!)

Jane Goodall and her Chimp Friends, by Emily
Hi. I am here to talk to you about Jane Goodall. When she was little she read storys about Dr. Doolittle. Then when Jane grew up she whent to Africa and studied chimps for 40 years! She learnd that chimps were a lot like humens. Chimps had feleans, love and care. Chimps use tools, sticks, grass, that tipe of stuff. I think Jane let humens know a lot about chimps.

Elijah McCoy, by Drew
Elijah McCoy was an engineer. His parents were slaves that escaped to Canada on the underground railroad. He was always amazed by motors so when he was 15 he went to Scotland to study them and when he came back he worked on trains. He’d oil the engine every few hours so he came up with the idea to make a cup which dripped slowly on the moving parts. This invention made him famous and is why people even today sometimes say “It’s the real McCoy.”

John Muir, by Jake
Hi it’s Jake. A man named John Muir loved trees and nature and he studied them a lot. He told President Teddy Roosevelt he should make national parks and forests to protect them and he did it. This is why Yellowstone was the first national park. There is a place in California named “Muir Woods”. It was one of John’s favorite places so they named it after him to say thank you for protecting it. The End.

Up, Up and... Not Our Day!

Hello from Santa Fe, NM. Here are some photos from our visit to Sandia Peak in Albuquerque, home to the world’s longest aerial tram, as well as a ballooning adventure - unfortunately, that was someone else’s!

Our stop in Albuquerque proved to be a bit of a bust. We decided to surprise the kids with a ride in a hot air balloon, waking them at 5 am for this special treat. First there was too much wind for a safe take-off, but after an hour and a half wait, things seemed to be turning in our favor.

We all enjoyed watching ours and another ballooning company unpack their gear and begin the inflating process; that is until a tear was discovered in the top of our balloon. That quickly put an end to our launch plans. It also made for a rather grumbly trip up the road to Santa Fe. So much for surprises!

We’re now camped in the Santa Fe National Forest just a few miles from downtown. The kids shook off their morning disappointment by pitching the tent our friends Tom & Ashley loaned us in Oklahoma. They spent the afternoon inside it, organizing and reorganizing their sleeping bags and stuffed animals... who knows, maybe they’ll actually sleep in it too!

More Norman

Here’s another photo album of our time in Norman, OK.

Drew got a chance to reunite with his “oldest” friend Pablo,(the two first met as babies at McFarlin Daycare) as well as another McFarlin friend Samantha and their families for an afternoon swim.

We also enjoyed a visit to Lake Thunderbird - our old sailing grounds - with the Hartleys and a trip to Kidspace which Pat, Drew, Tim, Di and many other volunteers helped build in 1999 shortly before Jake & Emily were born.

We left Norman the evening of July 6 in route to our next stop Albuquerque, NM, via Amarillo, TX. There’s a feed mill just west of Amarillo that was full of more cows than we’ve ever seen in one place. Thankfully, the Hartleys had warned us to close our vents! When Emily learned what really happens there, she decided to become a vegetarian. She made an exception about 15 miles later when Drew ripped open a bag of beef jerky.

The kids now have an outline map of the US to color in each time we visit or pass through a new state... it’s getting pretty colorful!

Behind the Blog: RV Resorts & Other Camping Oxymorons

We’ve learned a lot in the last 30 days about RV living and much of it has surprised us... especially in comparison to our life aboard a sailboat. Somehow, we just weren’t expecting the two modes of travel to be so vastly different. For example...

Reading A Guidebook
Oh, how we miss Skipper Bob! His handy “Guide to Anchorages along the ICW” has been replaced by a directory the size of a large telephone book... “Woodall’s North American Campground Directory - the Complete On-the-Road Guide for Today’s RV Enthusiast.”

Clearly, we do NOT meet the criteria - whatever it is - for “RV Enthusiast”, because we have yet to find the directory descriptions in our Woodalls book helpful.

Coming from Skipper Bob, phrases such as “close to shopping”, “laundry”, “Internet” and “bus-stop nearby” were good things. Not so much coming from Woodalls. Now that we’re on an RV, those descriptions translate into three words: “Don’t go there!”.

Our most recent example of a guidebook-gone-wrong fiasco happened in Santa Fe. This is what we read in the full-page color ad in Woodalls: Top Rated RV Resort in Santa Fe, 4.5 miles from Plaza, Swimming Pool, Play Equipment, Close to Shopping, Bus Stop Nearby, High-speed Internet. Woodalls rates the place 3 out of 4 stars for both services and recreation; cost per night was $34 per vehicle.

This is what we saw when we stopped their to have our propane tank filled: a gravel lot with no distinguishable boundaries or borders between camping sites. There was a tiny pool located just inside the park boundary, just off a busy 4-lane highway, and we did see a small patch of grass on which it appeared a game of horseshoes might be played. We got our propane. We didn’t stay!

We opted instead for a lovely spot in the Santa Fe National Forest just a few miles out of downtown... lots of trees, hiking trails - actual nature for just $10 a night! The Woodalls listing for this campground was in fine print.

Camping Lingo
We’ve learned some new terms now that we’re Rving.

Big-Rig Friendly = Run Away! There’s probably a casino nearby!

Pull-Through sites = see Big-Rig Friendly

No Hook Ups (aka Dry Camping) = We will probably like it!

Dispersed Camping = This is the term for a make-your-own-spot kind of dry camping on public lands. We will probably like it, plus it will be free!

Boondocking = Similar to dispersed camping, but could also include sleeping over in a Walmart parking lot. Believe it or not, we do this frequently and prefer it to KOA (or as we call it K - No Way!) and other RV “parks” and “resorts”.

A few of our “Bests” & “Worsts” so far...
We NEVER thought we’d find a reason to like Walmart, but it has happened. We love their parking lots! You can stay overnight for free; you can almost always find one; and though it lacks ambiance, you don’t have to worry about running out of cereal or toilet paper!

Best Boondocking Experience: Walmart Parking Lot in Albuquerque... there was a Whole Foods Market right across the street and a Blockbuster Video next door! (Note: The kids highly recommend Spiderwick Chronicles. The parents highly recommend the Sockeye Salmon.)

Best Campground Experience: Lake Norman State Park in NC... it was way off the beaten path and we were practically the only ones there.

Best Campfire Moment: Shrimp & Sausage cooked over the coals... so good we made it 2 nights in a row!

Worst Campfire Moment: Emily laughing herself right off her chair and into the fire ring.

Best Road: Kansas Turnpike... so smooth, our gas milage jumped from 8 all the way up to 10 miles to the gallon. Too bad we’re not in Kansas anymore!

Worst Road: Cobblestone street that seemed like it was never going to end in St. Louis.

Best RV-related Investment: Walmart Road Atlas. Our “Nuvi” GPS unit is great, but sometimes “Yolanda” (it’s a woman’s voice that tells us where to go) leads us astray. It’s nice to have a good old fashioned map, plus this one helps us find State Parks, National Parks & Forests, and Walmart parking lots in every state!

Worst RV-related Investment: KOA Campgrounds membership card. We used it once and that was one time too many! I think it was the corn cobs squirrel feeders strategically located on the tree at each site to attract “wildlife” that pushed us over the edge.

Best Thing about our Driving Days: The kids tend to take naps.

Worst Thing about our Driving Days: The kids tend to fight. Also, Pat really misses his autopilot!

Best RVing experience to date: tailgating on 4th of July in Norman

Worst RVing experience to date: tagging a fire hydrant in St. Louis while trying to turn around at the end of a dead-end street. Yolanda’s name was mud that day!

4th of July at Reaves Park

Here’s a photo album of our time so far in Norman, OK.

It’s been fun to reunite with our good friends Diana, Tim, Tyler and Sarah Hartley and to celebrate another Independence Day with them. We’ve been together for the 4th of July many times and in many locales, but it’s hard to top the great fireworks show at Norman’s Reaves Park. We had a particularly good view this year from the top of our RV!

There were some post-fireworks pyrotechnics which took place at the Hartleys, which included the lighting of a roll of 2,000 - yes, 2,000 - firecrackers. If you're wondering how long something like that lasts, it's about 2 minutes. (Of course it felt like a lot longer at midnight in an otherwise quiet residential neighborhood!) In honor of his recent high school graduation and bright future as a University of Missouri freshman, Tyler got to light the fuse.


We also got to spend time yesterday with some other old friends, Tom & Ashley Schurr, and meet their growing family - Astrid, Aleah and their latest arrival, one-month-old Timothy Liam.

St. Louis & Topeka

Here’s a photo album of our recent visits to several Midwest must-sees.

Our stops in St. Louis, MO, included the Arch, Jefferson Expansion Museum & National Park Site and St. Louis Zoo. The kids loved the 60s-era pods that take you to the top of the Arch and seeing it at night was really cool (as well as crowd-free). Also, being very familiar with the "end" of the Lewis & Clark Trail, it was fun to see the "beginning"! One thing we didn't see is much of the St. Louis waterfront given that it is currently underwater due to flooding.

We were excited to visit Topeka, KS, for a reunion with our friends John, Elizabeth and Micah Floyd and very much appreciate their gracious hospitality during our stay there. We had a wonderful time with the Floyds visiting the Kansas State Capitol for a Dome Tour; the Monroe Elementary School which is now home to the Brown V. Board Museum/National Park; and the Gage Park pool with it’s many diving platforms and water slides. Topeka is a lovely city!


We're now in Norman, OK to celebrate 4th of July with friends here. Hope you enjoy the holiday weekend!