Are We Having Fun Yet? (or You Are a Runty, Little Puppy)

Day One: (Coloradoooo, here we come!)

I leave Btown at 8am to pick up Andrea at her home in Brazil, IN. And then we're off. There is lots of music. She pops Death Cab in early on in the drive. I'm lukewarm on it. We drive through Illinois, Iowa, and feel up Nebraska before stopping for the night in Gillette, South Dakota. We stopped there because it has a Cabela's. It is a little to the east of here where we see our first billboard for Wall Drug (more on that on Day Two). We ended up driving for around 15 hours. Her navigating, me driving.

I nearly forgot about the soulless little girl looking out her hotel room as we got out of the car.  Oh. My. God.  One of the creepiest things I've ever seen.  Made even creepier by what happens the next morning.

Day Two: (Avalanche Zone)

We get up the next day and check out.  As we are packing the car I look up and what do I see?  The little girl soullessly staring down at us out the window.  After getting the shit scared out of us we check out Cabela's. Lots of dead animals and fish in there. The fish were alive. Along the way we see numerous signs for Wall Drug; basically the only store in the city of Wall, South Dakota. They are truly random billboards. The one I remember best being:

"Wall Drug. You know you want it."

We made great time. Covering the rest of South Dakota and making it all the way to Cody, Wyoming well before sunset. I'm not usually one to ask strangers questions, but I decided to ask the woman at the gas station we stopped at about how crowded Yellowstone might be.  This woman was like Yoda and so friendly too.  She tells us that we can't even get into the park 'til 8pm because the road past the east entrance is closed due to avalanche warnings.

Yes. Avalanche warnings.

Not the avalanche zone, but still cool.

So we head west toward the east entrance and see a bunch of animals along the way. Being close to dusk, they were all coming out. We saw quite a few elk and bison; even a moose about five seconds after we entered the park. The coolest, though, had to be the mountain goats that we saw standing beside the road on the way into the park. They never moved a muscle. Not even a blink. Soulless goats they were.

Driving through the avalanche zone was awesome. At some points the snow against the road was well over 10 feet high. It was awe-inspiring. After the avalanche zone, Lake Yellowstone comes into view. It is huge... and frozen. I love it. In some spots the lake isn't frozen though with steam rising from these holes in the ice. So we reach Yellowstone in two days and even get a room in the same place we were going to stay already. The cabin we stay in is tiny with no TV, but cute. I knew that so I brought plenty of DVDs to watch on my laptop when we weren't out and about in the park.

Day Three: (Bison in the Road)

We get up the next morning and decide to head to the northern section of the park, Mammoth Hot Springs. We take the road north and find the road closed (I don't think we ever really found out why), but luckily the a park ranger tells us that the road should open soon and we should stop to see Upper and Lower Falls in the mean time. They are really cool. There is a swarm of Asian tourists and we hear a funny conversation about the three classifications of rocks. The road is open when we head back that way and we're off to Mammoth Hot Springs. Mammoth is awesome. There were some really great views of the steaming sulfur pits.

We drove south to the geyser basins where Old Faithful is next. There is a really cool, little general store here. We'd end up back here the next day (more on that later). We stop at Lower Geyser Basin on our way back north and check out the geysers there. The Asian tourists are back. On the way back we come upon some bison (6 or 7) walking in the opposite lane, blocking traffic for over a mile. A cop car ended up having to herd them along.

Before we get back we stop at the little general store by the lake. Just like the one at Old Faithful, but smaller. Andrea finds a raccoon fur Daniel Boone hat (complete with tail). Later that day we decide to grab some food at the hotel restaurant. We find out you need to make reservations to eat there so that's a no-go. That's when Andrea realizes she's not wearing her ring she got in the Dominican Republic. Not good. Not good at all...

...seriously.

Day Four: (We found it!?!)

The next morning we go to grab some food at the lake store. Andrea buys the raccoon hat. And then we go off in search of her ring. The only place where she thinks she could have lost it is the store near Old Faithful. So we head off in that direction. Unfortunately the shortest route to Old Faithful is closed.

Awesome.

So we head off in the other direction to Old Faithful. We get there and she looks by where we were parked yesterday.

There it is. Squished, but intact. It's basically a miracle.

The day gets decidedly better at this point. Eating breakfast pizza certainly helps. We check out Upper Geyser Basin next. There are some really colorful, deep hot springs here. We head back to the hotel after this.

At this point snow is sort of falling. It's really weird seeing snow fall in May. We make a reservation at the hotel for dinner. The food is delicious and the view out of the restaurant is quite pretty since it's still snowing. It's sort of awkward in there though. The waitress is a little stiff and she has a shadow for the evening. It's strange.

Andrea with her raccoon hat (and Bugle finger).

Day Five: (That took longer than I expected.)

We check out early and head south through Grand Teton towards Estes Park and Rocky Mountain National Park. Grand Teton is stunning in spots and we drive through an elk refuge. Oddly enough this is the only place we don't see any elk. The drive ends up taking quite long and the route I planned takes us down this random, dilapidated gravel road, but we found the main road eventually. Northern Colorado kind of sucks. Very farmy, but it gets very pretty the closer you get to Steamboat Springs. There are a few more avalanche zones as we get higher up in the mountains.

By this time Andrea's played Death Cab for Cutie so many times that it's grown on me and I am actually beginning to like them.

The last leg of the drive to Estes Park is a windy road filled with houses lining mountain-sides. We even spot a monastery-like building right on the edge of a precipice in one of the valleys. I wish we had gotten a picture of it. A bit later we finally reach where we're staying in Estes Park.  The room is awesome and just a few miles from one of the entrances to RMNP.

The view outside our room.

Day Six: (Steak Night)

This is the first day we'll get to go hiking. I'm in a funk though. Facebook is evil and reminds me of shit I'd rather not be reminded of. We hike from the Wild Basin Trailhead; farther south than I've hiked before. It has access to some lower elevation hikes that we could do given how snowy it still is higher up. We end up hiking probably over 3 miles. We'd have gone further into the trail, but the snow on it was pretty deep. It wasn't difficult, but it was a lot of fun and it is really beautiful out there. I walk my ear and shoulder right into a tree limb at one point.  Holy shit did it hurt.

I thought it was a flimsy branch.

Andrea climbs a mountain on the way back. Wish I had a picture of that.

(At this point in the trip I've heard enough Death Cab that it's stuck in my head. Andrea loves this.)

After we get back, we head to downtown Estes Park, walk around, and check out some of the stores. I love it down there. It always seems like there is a cool breeze. It's just a good way to pass the time.

There is a really delicious pie shop in Estes Park and my dad wanted me to order him a pie. Well, the pie shop is no longer there. My dad was less than pleased when I told him this early that day. As we are walking downtown though we pass a little indoor shopping center and holy crap, there's the pie shop.  It just moved. So I was able to order my dad's pie.

The place we're staying has a grill so we decided early in the trip that we're going to make steaks one night. So we go buy some steaks, potatoes, zucchini, and some other stuff. Oh, and scones. Scones are delicious and Andrea had never had one, so I had to buy them.

She ends up doing all the cooking. This does not bother me; especially since she did a great job.

Day Seven: (You don't look helpful.)

I make bacon and eggs for breakfast before we head off up the main road in RMNP. First we drive to a place called Bear Lake. At one point in the drive it went from drizzle to full-on snow. We could actually see it change. So cool. After Bear Lake we drive back and head up higher. The entire road through the park wasn't open yet because of larger than usual snow totals, so we can only get as far as a spot on the road called Rainbow Curve. It is quite windy up here and there is some light snow. No real picture opportunities so we drive back down.

There were dark clouds hanging up in the mountains so we decide not to go on the hike we planned on doing. We hang out watching Party Down for a long time before going to back downtown, doing some shopping for her, and eating at this awesome restaurant called Grubsteak.

I love Grubsteak. They have a bunch of different types of meats you can make a burger out of: elk, cow, buffalo, boar, yak. Yes, I wrote 'yak'.

What do you think I got? Of course I got the yak burger.  It was delicious.

Andrea got the Gobbler; some type of chicken sandwich my brother got last year. And we both got frozen margaritas (or margs). Raspberry for her, Mango for me. Grubsteak even plays a bunch of awesome music so she loves it even more.

After Grubsteak we go pick up my dad's pie from the pie shop before driving to Rocky Mountain Chocolate Factory to buy some chocolate for Andrea's dad. We go in search of bighorn sheep one final time, but all we see is more elk. They were moving in a herd, which is cool, but they're no bighorn sheep.

We finish the rest of Party Down and watch some Arrested Development before watching Jurassic Park again; the movie of the trip.

Day Eight: (Well... we're back... in the car again.)

We leave Estes Park around 6am (MDT) to make the trip back to Indiana in one day. We decide to avoid the hell-hole that is Kansas and drive through Nebraska instead. Then Iowa for a bit, Missouri, Illinois, and finally Indiana. At one point Andrea is watching Dane Cook on her iPod and is quoting it word for word.

It is hysterical.

It is around St. Louis that I realize we are making great time and that I am an amazing road trip driver. We get back to her parent's house sometime around 2am... I think.

I can't remember exactly. I had been driving for well over half a day at this point. I get back to Btown at exactly 3am. That's 19 straight hours of driving when you factor in the time change. I know. I'm awesome, aren't I?

It was a great trip; probably the most fun I've had in a long, long time. I wish I were still there.

"Good Life" - OneRepublic