Badlands & Family fun!

Left Custer State Park and headed towards Yankton where my cousin Lisa vacations. First stop Badlands after our #campgroundschef breakfast.

After leaving Badlands, we headed towards Yankton, SD to meet my aunt and cousins. My shame of the entire trip is that I was rated third at doing donuts (behind my Morgan age 16 and George). It was apparently so bad that it was rated a burnout and not even a donut. #roomfordonutimprovement

Late night Ringo

Woke up very early and got our Yellowstone on. Good thing! We pulled into the nearly empty Old Faithful parking lot at 8 and by 10am, the parking lot was full and we were hitting the road back to campground to switch sites.

While there, Ringo got to see old faithful from afar. And we took turns going into the inn. We visited the geyser basin too. I have lots of pictures of Yellowstone that just can’t convey how weird Yellowstone is. It’s the sounds, the smells the colors, the deep hot bubbling pools of water /mud that you just can’t capture in a picture.

Inside the old faithful inn. This place never ceases to amaze me. It’s like a tree house.

We got back to the campsite and then after lunch drove to the canyon. It was beautiful. We found a trail to the top of the waterfall that was really cool.

Sorry about my finger…

We had dinner and took Ringo for a walk around the Yellowstone Lake. Pretty sure this lake water made him sick. He’s had diarrhea every 2 hours every night since this photo, but at the time I took it, he was just another cute wet dog and we were dog owners without a care in the world.

John Day Painted Fossil Beds

Left Tumalo Falls heading east towards the Clyde Holiday campground. Hit the John Day Fossil Beds on the way. Really enjoyed the painted hills, but since it was 100 degrees, we waited to go to Sheep Rock for an early morning hike.

The Austin girls will be happy to note that we did make it inside to see the visitor center video, but we had to do it in shifts since we had Ringo. This shows our dedication to both Ringo and the movie. And as George observed probably because one of us can’t have more facts than the other person…

Heres the inside of the T@g. It’s much bigger than it looks on the video. The bed appears to be a king.

Newberry National Volcanic Monument

When we got to the first information sign at the Big obsidian flow there were three boys (age ~ 5-6) pointing at the volcano and making explosion noises. I totally agree, Volcanos are cool!

Newberry is a shield volcano that basically did the same thing as crater lake, exploded then fell in on itself. It had two lakes instead of one with a huge obsidian lava field.

We also took the 4×4 to the rim edge. The view from the top was even cooler. The Ridge can be seen, as well as a cinder cone (2 actually). 2 lakes (East and Paulina), and the lava flow. We had lunch right there on the truck bed.

We stopped at Pauline falls on the way to the Lava Cast Forest. These are hard to see in the pictures. Think slow lava building a wall around a tree and leaving a Hollow trunk mold. I jumped in one for size.

Then we stopped by 2 other breweries for samples. 10 Barrel and Sunriver.

Back at the campground we saw this weird camping dump truck. Where do you need that sort of equipment? My t@g was embarrassed for him.

Detroit Lake, Cascades

We had false start in the Willamette wine country. We made an effort but at 25 bucks a tasting,I wasn’t up for the effort and moved on…

Lovely evening. We took several walks about the lake. Played several songs at the campground and Ringo was a dog.

Ringo jumping waves. This was pretty funny. I missed the initial spasm which was funnier.

Roll on Columbia

We stayed at Ainsworth state park and stop, drop and rolled to the Bridge of the Gods. Then we headed down Scenic Hwy 30 through the Columbia River Gorge towards Mcmenamins Edgefield in Troutdale.

We tried to go to Multnomah Falls but it was July 4th and it was an absolute madhouse parking anywhere, so we figured we would catch it on the way home (Feel the suspense? You’ll just have to wait for it.) There were plenty of other waterfalls to see. Saw another old building (Vista house) but they wouldn’t let us inside.

We ended up at the Edgefield where a Grateful Dead cover band turned into a blues band with this guy. So this is how sasquatch like to spend their Independence Day.

Stop drop and roll

We are getting used to the conveniences of modern camping. Stop, drop and roll is my new favorite. On the down side, I’m still getting used to parking. Sometimes I just hawg spaces because I can’t park frank n furter yet. #parkingfoul

So, to the real business. We saw cool stuff today.

Thor’s Well

We tried to go to rogue brewery in Newport but they didn’t like us (twice) so we went to a seafood market, grabbed fish and chips, beers and Dungeness crabs and made tracks to cape Lookout.

Lots of fog and 60 degrees. I cuddled up with a hot toddy after dinner and a short with a longgggg jacket. I hear Portland was 115 today. #OregonCoast

Campground chef