Heaven! Grand Teton National Park.

I had forgotten just how much I love the Tetons. It's probably been over 10 years since we have been there. That was back in our working days when we would fly into Jackson for a week long backpacking trip in the Tetons or the Wind River Range. We would explore the Tetons while we were there, but we didn't really have time to relax and enjoy ourselves or to fully explore the park. This time was different. We had nine nights to stay and play in the Tetons until our reservation in Yellowstone.

 


We were on the road early and left Dubois about 8:00 am with our bellies full of breakfast skillet from the Cowboy Cafe We wanted to get to the Grand Teton National Park and Gros Ventre Campground as early as possible. Gros Ventre CG does not take reservations, and this was the week of the Fourth of July. We wanted to make sure we secured a good camp site. Not to fear. We arrived about 9:30 and were assigned a site on “The Thoroughfare”, the road that connects all the camping loops. It was a nice sunny site. We prefer open sun when we are dry camping; solar panels seem to work better there. We initially signed up for 4 nights, but re-upped later for 5 more. Harry was parked in a nice site directly across the road. We had excellent views of Blacktail Butte and the Teton crest ridge beyond.

Mt. Moran and Oxbow Bend on the Snake River

The Tetons got their name from the French fur traders who came through the area. They came upon the magnificent peaks and called them “Le Trois Tetons” meaning “The Three Breasts”. I guess they had been away from civilization too long, and were missing the ladies. They are however the most impressive mountains I have ever seen.

When you just gotta go!

We pretty much did it all. We did three moderate day hikes. The first was to the top of Blacktail Butte, the most prominent hump near our camp. Just after we put on the trail a herd of bison came through between us and the car. They paid us no nevermind and continued on into the valley near our campground. The hike was about 5.5 miles, and we climbed about 1100 feet. At the peak we observed some storm clouds headed our way, so we beat it on down the mountain. Even so we enjoyed some lightening and a short hail storm about half way down.

 














Another hike we did was to Phelps Lake and into the mouth of Death Canyon. This day we hiked about 6.5 miles and climbed about 500 feet. We hiked up to an overlook of Phelps Lake and then a little further until we could glimpse into the mouth of Death Canyon. The hardest part of this hike was finding a parking spot at the trail head. It is apparently a very popular destination.

Phelps Lake overlook

Death Canyon

Shy moose

Our third major hike was around Jenny Lake. This was a 9.5 mile loop hike. The trail was pretty flat except for a 500 foot climb to Hidden Falls and Inspiration point.  Dorcas saw a black bear on the trail.

Hidden Falls

Marmot

Mule Deer

Harry has a Jeep Wrangler that he tows behind his Tiffin Breeze motor coach. One day he said he was going “four-wheeling” and asked if I wanted to go. I said sure; I'm always up for an adventure. We went across the Snake River and about 20 miles along the River Road, which basically runs along a plateau overlooking the Snake River on the west side. I guess I had never been “four-wheeling” before, but I now surmise the objective is to break the spine of your passenger.

Four-wheelin'

 


We made several excursions into Jackson. We attended their 4^th of July parade and the fireworks display. The parade was fantastic. Folks in the parade were throwing out trinkets, such as candy and beads, to the crowds. Our favorite trinkets were whole ears of corn chucked out from the float sponsored by the local farmers market. We snagged six ears, enough for two meals, and cooked them on the grill. YUM! We ate lunch one day at the Snake River Brewing Company and enjoyed a pitcher of their brew. Harry bought a growler and we worked on that later that evening.

 


 

This guy brought up the rear, as Santa does during Christmas parades back home.

 







Finally, we did a paddle on the Snake River. I've always wanted to paddle on the Snake, but have never been here with a boat before. Harry carries a kayak, but Dorcas was not terribly interested in going so Harry paddled in the bow of our canoe while Dorcas ran shuttle. We put in just below the Jackson Lake dam and paddled about 15 miles to Deadman's Bar landing. It was a very easy paddle and the current was ripping; much of the time we were going 6-7 mph. We had great views of the Teton peaks from the water. We finished so early I was tempted to paddle the next section from Deadman's Bar to Moose landing. However, that section is fairly braided, and there are multiple channels, sometimes with very swift water, flowing into log jams. The literature strongly suggested not going unless you knew the river. Several rafts had put on just before us, and I knew we could follow them down through the proper channels, but I could not get takers. Maybe another day.

Pronghorn on the Snake River

One aspect of traveling for many months at a time is that sooner or later you have to collect your mail. Our friend Ann at home picks up the mail at our house then sends it to us when we are parked in one spot long enough. This usually happens once every 3-4 weeks or so. We have very good luck using “General Delivery” at local post offices.  Generally the smaller the post office the better. Well this time I think we went too far to the extreme. We had Ann send our mail to the post office in Kelly WY, which is a small community (one store and a post office) just a few miles from camp. We figured it would be a great choice. How could they lose our mail in a post office that consists of a 10' x 12' log cabin? What we hadn't anticipated was their limited operating hours, 10:00 to noon.  And it seemed to take them 1 ½ hours to sort the days incoming mail. That left us a window of just about ½ hour to pick up our mail. Not a long time when you want to be out playing in the park. After about 3 attempts we did finally collect our mail.

Our camp at Gros Ventre

Life is still good!

Dubois WY

After 3 nights we left Hart Ranch and headed west across Wyoming (once again!!!) with our ultimate destination being Jackson WY and Grand Teton National Park. The obvious route would have been north back through Rapid City and west on I-90 into Wyoming, but we had already been that route twice this month, so we chose a more southerly cross-country route. We passed through Custer SD and traversed the southern portion of the Black Hills National Forest and the Buffalo Gap National Grasslands before entering east central Wyoming. We eventually got on I-25, before landing in Casper WY for the night. We parked at the Super Walmart, which was also within walking distance to Sam's Club, and filled our larder with groceries.

East central Wyoming is kinda flat and straight

The city of Casper was named after Fort Caspar and Lt. Caspar Collins. Note the different spellings. A typographical error was made when the name of the town was registered, and it was never corrected. Casper is nick-named the “Oil City” because it is a regional center for oil production. At least one oil refinery has been operating in Casper since 1895. In fact, we filled up both the coach and the car with some of the cheapest fuel we had seen in some time: $3.199 for unleaded and $3.719 for diesel.

The next morning we continued across central Wyoming, through the Wind River Indian Reservation and stopped for the night at the Longhorn Ranch RV Resort, on the banks of the Wind River in Dubois WY. There we met our friend Harry, who we have been traveling with since Rally #2.

During the Sturgis rally sometimes bikers have to stay a bit out of town

Dubois (rhymes with “ two voice”) is a favorite stop. We rolled into Dubois the first time about 15 years ago while backpacking in the Wind River Range and discovered the Cowboy Cafe. Since then we go back anytime we are in the area and eat the skillet breakfast at the Cowboy Cafe. It's legendary.

Dubois was originally named “Never Sweat” due to the low humidity and warm breezes, but the Postal Service rejected that name as inappropriate. They settled on Dubois, but rejected the french pronunciation for a more Americanized version. Butch Cassidy owned and managed a ranch on the outskirts of Dubois in 1890. He was a frequent customer at Welty's General Store which is still in operation.

Harry's first Cowboy Cafe skillet

World Famous Cowboy Cafe breakfast skillet

The Black Hills and Custer State Park SD

We stayed at the Central States Fairgrounds for 4 nights, then on Friday afternoon moved to Hart Ranch Resort, about 10 miles south of Rapid City. Hart Ranch is a membership RV and camping resort. It is huge, about 200 acres and over 500 RV/cabin units. The resort is a part of the original Hart Ranch, a 13,000 acre cattle ranch developed by John Harrison Hart in the 1880s. The resort is very clean, green and well-run. It reminded me a bit of our home resort, The Great Outdoors in Florida, only western. Normally sites are about $50/night, but we got in on a three night special for $40 total.




They placed us on a site very central to the activities. One evening there was a band playing dixieland and jazz favorites in a picnic pavilion across from our site. We just turned our chairs and enjoyed the music from our patio. One morning we ate breakfast skillets at the on-site restaurant, the Chuckwagon. For those who don't know what a skillet is, it's kinda like an omelet, except they cook all the fixin's in a small iron skillet, then put the eggs (fried, scrambled, over-easy, etc.) on top just before serving in the skillet. It's a western thing, and it's delicious. There was a large fenced dog area near our site and Matilda made some friends, especially a husky named Scout. This is a membership resort, and there was a huge storage lot where members kept their rigs, and the resort would move them to a site and back to the storage lot when they left, for only $20.




 

While parked here we made an excursion to Custer State Park, where the wildlife is the main draw. They maintain a herd of about 1500 bison. Each year they round up about 500 bison and auction them to ranchers from all over the country to be used as breeding stock. We saw our share of bison, as well as wild burros.  We also toured the Mt. Rushmore area in the Black Hills National Forest.

 










We drove the Needles Highway, which features a series of very short and narrow tunnels.  It was amazing to watch some tour buses pass through these tunnels.  It was obvious that they had done it before and that they had not always escaped unscathed.  One driver asked Dorcas as he exited the tunnel "Is this the way to Mt. Rushmore?"

 

 



 

 

One evening we invited TREK friends over for steaks on the grill. Harry and Pete and Diane, who were all at the SI rally and still camping nearby, visited our site for steaks and beer. Pete learned the hard way that the 10 mph speed limit in the park is strictly enforced. Ironically, Pete got busted while following Harry and trying to keep up. I expect it's pretty embarrassing to be pulled over by a golf cart. Luckily, he got off with only a warning and stern tongue lashing.

 

Rally #3 Rapid City SD

We left Gillette on Sunday afternoon and continued east to Rapid City. The 3^rd and final rally didn't start until Monday, so we parked Sunday night at the Cabela's in Rapid City. Three other TREK friends joined us there, so we had our own mini-caravan working. The RV lot at this Cabela's was not nearly as big and open as the one we had stayed at in Mitchell SD, but it was fine and hospitable. We spent a little time in the store and then walked to the Quaker Steak and Lube and had dinner. We tried to order a pitcher of beer, but they didn't serve pitchers. Instead we had a Lube Tube, which was 100 oz. of beer served in a 36” tall acrylic cylinder.

The next morning we moved a few miles to the Central States Fairground for the 25^th Anniversary Rally of Safari International (SI).  SI is the parent organization for the South East TREK Fun Club, the club associated with our previous motor home. We still hang with the TREKers and are active in their club. Here we had 50A electric and water, a big improvement over the 7 days of dry camping in Gillette. We managed to get parked with a number of our friends, and actually had a very nice site on the asphalt. We checked in with the rally folks to get the schedule of events, then checked in with the Carefree awning folks to schedule our new awnings installation. We are parked very close to the banks of Rapid Creek where over 250 people were killed in a flood in 1972.

We have driven through Rapid City a number of times, but never really stopped to do any sight seeing. It turns out it has a very attractive downtown area. They have life-size statues of all the US presidents on street corners throughout the central business district. They also have a whitewater shop downtown, although it is hidden in the back of a new age sorta hippie shop. We asked about paddling Rapid Creek, but they suggested the level was too low, particularly for a kevlar boat. We had a very nice lunch and beer at the Firehouse Brewing Company, a brew pub located in an historic fire house. Harry and I both brought home growlers.

The rally itself was pretty laid back. There were some folks from Paul Everts RV who had about a dozen motor homes on display. They sponsored a happy hour one night and had a golf cart with a cooler of beer, driving around the rally grounds all day long passing out brews. I hope somebody bought a coach from them, so they'll come back next time!


The Rapid City PD brought their K-9 unit over and presented a live demonstration with their police dogs. It was amazing what the dogs could do, and how they bonded with their handlers. They wouldn't let Matilda play with the police dogs.

The awning guys came and installed our new driver's side slide toppers and window awnings. They look great and are more functional than the awnings they replaced. I kinda now wish we had been more bold and gone with the burgundy fabric. Oh well, they look fine, and match the coach nicely.

One night the majority of the attendees went on a bus trip to Mt. Rushmore. We didn't go since we have been there several times, the last time only 2 years ago. Instead we drove to the Crazy Horse Memorial which is a similar mountain carving, although it is unfinished and will be much larger than Mt. Rushmore. The memorial honors the western Indians and has a large museum and a number of exhibits. The sculpture was begun in 1948, but the original sculptor Korczak Ziolkowski died in 1982. The work has been continued by his daughter and 7 of his 10 children. Crazy Horse is not a federal or state project.  It is funded by admissions and contributions.  They blast stone about once per month, but tonight they were doing a night blast to honor the sculptor's widow, Ruth Ziolkowski's birthday. We toured the exhibits and then, after dark, they had a laser light show on the face of the memorial and then the blast. The light show told the story of the Indians and the coming of the white settlers and then the building of the Crazy Horse Monument. Finally the blast, and what a blast it was! It lasted about 2 minutes as a series of explosions went off in sequence up and down the mountain. I took a really neat video of the whole blast, but have no easy way to post it with our limited internet connection. In the meantime here is a link to a video of the same blast someone posted on You Tube.

Rally #2 Gillette WY

Well, technically it's not a rally, it's a convention. Our second event was the 50^th Anniversary of Family Motor Coach Association (FMCA) at the CAM-PLEX facility in Gillette. The FMCA is a large national organization of motor homes (no trailers allowed!). They have a national convention once or twice a year at various venues across the US. This was the 88^th renunion. Many smaller RV clubs frequently schedule pre-rallies and post-rallies around the FMCA event, explaining Rally #1 and Rally #3. In years gone by the FMCA national conventions have drawn as many as 8000 coaches, but in the past few years 2000-3000 coaches have been the norm. At this event there were 2288 member coaches and 351 commercial coaches. It's not easy to find a venue capable of parking this many coaches and to accommodate the vendors, display coaches and seminars. The CAM-PLEX is a large state agricultural fairgrounds which fit the bill very nicely.

 

To arrive at Gillette we left Cody the way we had come and headed east across Wyoming towards the Bighorn Mountains. Instead of taking US 14, we took US 14A, a little steeper, featuring a very long 10% uphill grade. We spent the night at Sibley Lake CG in the Bighorn National Forest at EL 8500' on the top of the mountain. Sibley Lake CG has a loop with 10 electric sites and another loop with 10 non-electric sites. As expected, the electric sites were all full, but there were 2 sites in the non-electric loop that would hold us. There was no electricity, TV, cellular, or Internet, so we had to rough it. We made a traditional campfire, and the overnight low temperature was 34 degrees.

 

Dorcas is never happy when I take photos while negotiating a winding 10% grade.

The next morning, Sunday June 16, we caravanned with the group from Safari International (SI), the parent organization for our TREK club. Well technically we didn't actually caravan with them, but we met them in a holding lot before entering the grounds, so we could all park together. There were about 32 coaches in the SI group who had been attending their own pre-rally in Hardin MT. Most of our group got pretty good sites, but we ended up in a dirt pit. It was obvious that when it rained (it always rains at FMCA conventions) we would be in a deep puddle. Noel, our next door neighbor, was actually in soft sand, and as he extended his jacks, his jack pads disappeared into the sand, never to be seen again. The parking crew moved Noel and the coach next to him to a better, grassy spot. After 5:00 when the parking crew left, we moved ourselves about 150' to a much nicer grassy spot close to some friends. It looked like, when (not if) it rained, it would drain pretty well here. This also put us closer to the SI group happy hour that occurred every evening at 4:00!

There were four restored Flexible coaches on display at the convention, in commemoration of the 50th anniversary. The Flexible is the coach featured on the FMCA logo.  Jeff Daniels drove one in the movie "RV"

FMCA conventions are all about seminars and vendors. There are 14 seminar rooms, each hosting 6-7 seminars a day. Seminar topics run the gamut from technical stuff on engines, transmissions, heaters, refrigerators, etc., to travel topics, cooking, crafts, exercise, you name it. Dorcas and I each attended 3-4 seminars a day, usually splitting up and comparing notes later. The other biggie is the vendors. All kinds of vendors are present, and some also provide on-site coach service. We bought some fire extinguishers and smoke and CO detectors from Mac the Fire Guy, some new window awnings and fabrics (more on that later), and a number of smaller doodads. We had the HWH guy come out and look at a problem we're having with our air leveling system, and we had our waste tanks pressure cleaned. The guys at the WiFi Ranger trailer were giving away free Fat Tire Ale, so that was a regular stop several times each day. All in all it was a productive event.

They also have entertainment.  There is daytime entertainment throughout the complex, but also evening entertainment every night.  The headline Saturday night was Marty Stuart.  It was a good show.

Check out that hair!

It was very warm and windy throughout most of the convention. On Tuesday a storm came through, and I noticed that the fabric on one of our slide topper awnings was separating at the stitching. CRAP! Our awnings are made by Carefree and a Carefree dealer had a booth, so we went to talk to him. We asked him about re-stitching the canopies; Dorcas carries a sewing machine, and I know how to remove the canopies. But the guy talked us out of that; said it just doesn't work well with all the new needle holes. And finding a durable thread would be difficult. We then decided to order new canopies, not just for the torn one, but all the way around. They could take the order today, cut and sew the fabrics in their shop in California, and ship them for installation the next day. That's one of the neat things about a big rally: speedy on-site service. We didn't order that day, because we couldn't decide on the color. Our favorite choices were linen tweed, a tan slightly darker than our current fabrics but with some texture, and a burgundy that would match nicely with the burgundy paint on our coach. It was a good thing we waited. On Thursday a major storm hit very suddenly. I had been walking Matilda (and harvesting Fat Tire Ales from the WiFi Ranger guy) and had just returned to the coach before it hit. There was hail and 65 mph wind gusts. The temperature dropped from 73 to 47 degrees in about an hour. And our slide awnings were shredded. CRAP! But wait maybe this was an opportunity. The Carefree guy came and looked and observed that we had some broken and bent hardware. Our Eclipse II models (which are of a very poor design) are no longer made and parts are not available. Most insurance companies will authorize replacement with the current (and in this case superior) model. So ultimately we decided to replace both slide awnings altogether, with the newer model and order replacement fabrics for the other awning on the curb side, which I would install myself at a later date. We chose the linen tweed fabric, but I regret now we hadn't been bolder and chosen the burgundy. By now the Carefree folks were really hopping; there were a lot of other folks who had awning damage. However, the Carefree folks would also be at Rally #3, so we ordered the goods and made arrangements to install the new awnings next week in Rapid City, when they would not be so busy. Sometimes things just work out.

So sad!

Hail from the "Big One"

The big storm brought a lot of rain (big surprise) and it rained some more the next few days. We were in a good spot and standing water was minimal. Others were not so lucky. On Saturday and Sunday folks began pulling out and a number of rigs were stuck. Within sight of our rig we saw perhaps 15-20 rigs pulled out by tractors and tow trucks. We were lucky; the water around us had drained away and we had a clear path to the hard road. We were able to leave the complex without incident.