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Grand Tetons National Park

Our second full day in Gartner, Montana, we decide not to hang out in Yellowstone, but to drive through Yellowstone to Grant Tetons National Park.  I have to say, this was DEFINITELY worth the drive.  The views of the Grand Tetons mountain range is so breath taking.

As usual, we stopped as soon as we got into the park at the first visitor’s center we could find and got the kid’s Junior Ranger books.  The badges at Grand Tetons were so cool, as they were made of wood instead of the usual plastic.  We started driving around while the kids worked on their books, and ended up at the Rockefeller Nature Preserve located in the park.  K wanted to sit and listen to a presentation by a ranger on butterflies, so the boys decided to check out one of the scientist backpacks and take a hike.  What we thought would be like a 30 or 40 minute hike for them turned out to be a two hour hike to a beautiful lake.  K and I started down the trail to find them, but it had been a long week already, and my navigation skills were off.  Yep, I took the wrong path…the LONGER path.  after 45 minutes of hiking, we turned around and gave up.  I knew we were safe and the bears wouldn’t come near us because K wouldn’t stop talking!!!

Once we located the boys, we started driving back towards Yellowstone and stopped at Colter Bay for dinner and to get M Junior Ranger badge (K got hers waiting for the boys to come back from their adventure at the nature preserve).  We at dinner at the Colter Ranchhouse.  The food was ok, but what we really loved was the huckleberry ice cream we saved room for.  All four of us fell in love with huckleberries there!

If you ever take a trip to Yellowstone, make sure to definitely build in a day at Grand Tetons.  Considering they are literally right next to each other, you will kick yourself later if you don’t!

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The Great American Road Trip 2018

Well, K didn’t have her summer kid program for the last two weeks before school started, so Hubby and I figured if he needed to take off to hang out with K and M, we might as well throw in a road trip!

It has been two years since our last road trip to Mt. Rushmore and Devil’s Tower, so we figured we would try it again.   Besides, we have had two kids for a year now, what could go wrong with putting them both in the back seat of a car for 8-10 hours a day!  Family bonding right??

Hubby and I looked at a lot of different options, including flying to either Seattle or Sacramento, renting a car and driving to the other place and flying home.  Once we got THAT crazy idea out of our head, we decided on heading out to Glacier National Park.  Our thought process was really selfish, but we all know it is all about me, right?

Once i started really looking into the distance and what we can do there when you don’t camp and aren’t into serious hikes (have you ever tried to do a decent hike with a 6 year old???), we decided to have a really lofty goal of hitting 5 National Parks/Monuments in 9 days.  It’s okay, you can say it out loud, we are nuts!!!

When we started looking, we decided we could really do it.  After learning some VERY useful tips and lessons with our first road trip with M, we figured we could do it!  It would also let us mark off a few more states for M, and start marking off states for K!

So, here was the plan:  we left St. Paul, Minnesota (I had a work meeting I couldn’t miss!) on Friday afternoon, and drive straight to Rapid City, South Dakota.  One full day in Rapid City to see everything we need to see.  The next morning, head off to Devil’s Tower, on the way to Yellowstone National Park.  Hopefully there is enough time to stop at the Hot Springs State Park, located in Thermopolis, Wyoming to be able to swim in some hot springs, which is all M really wanted to do.  Then, one full day at Yellowstone National Park, followed by the next day driving down to Grand Tetons National Park.  Once those two are done, including hopefully a quick trip into Idaho to check that state off the list too, and we are off to Glacier National Park for one full day, and if we really want to push it, part of a second day before driving straight home.  Like I said, ambitious.

So read on friends, and let’s see if we can actually do it!!