The Vander Glad Big Adventure

We both woke up this morning with an icy frost on the ground. We both reached the same conclusion, we have had a wonderful time and now, it was time to go home!   We packed up but still wanted to see Mt. Rushmore on the way!  Then, we drove and drove and drove, and 14 hours later, at 1 AM we arrived in Madison.  We were exhausted and our boots were dusty and happy, as were we!  Until next year!!!    Thanks for taking this journey with us!  x0, jeanne and rick

Good Morning Tetons and Goodbye!  We are off to Mr. Rushmore and The Badlands.   And here are some scenes through eastern Wyoming and the western edge of South Dakota. We are not in the Great Western National Parks anymore!  We are back in the RV for the final few days of our trip!  Tomorrow, a hike and then Mt. Rushmore. Drive to the Badlands to hike on Friday and then home on Saturday. 

 Yes, today started a bit unusually, but the beauty was still there!  And a special treat was getting together with long-time friends from the Bay Area whom I haven’t seen in 15 years! Joel and Kristin live in Jackson now with their two children and it was great catching up! They may or may not know a good realtor to recommend to us!!! :)  The roads are Now dry, the snow has melted and the winds are calm. Tomorrow we begin to head home. Our hiking miles to date are now 96, so we will HAVE TO get one more hike in to reach 100 hiking miles this trip! Badlands, here we come!!!

            Not only is winter coming, but it came last night to Jackson Wyoming! We went to bed with a rain and wind storm, with temps dropping...... and awoke to this.....  Beautiful, yes!  But a little tricky with a 24 ft. RV, with no snow tires on the top of a mountain.  It looks like it will warm up as the day progresses and melt the ice and snow on the windy road up here! Stay tuned!!!

We awoke this morning to air quality warnings bc the fires nearby have made the air very smoky. We decided to give it a day to clear and instead of hiking at Teton Village, we went poking around and shopping in downtown Jackson. We were happy to see this area really taking seriously the mask mandate.   We saw the famed 'antler arches' at each corner of the town square, drove to Teton Village to get the lay of the land for our hiking day tomorrow and shopped!  You can imaging with really nice turquoise and sporting goods outfitters with great equipment, both Rick and I were engaged!  :) Not many pictures though!  Until tomorrow......

The sunset last night was so pretty I had to add it here. Alpenglow on The Grand and wonderful skies.  We moved on this morning from Grand Teton National Park to Jackson, WY. On the way, after we exited the Park, we hiked the overlook to Phelps Lake, down to the Death Canyon Trail and a bit on the South Side of Phelps Lake. It was very pretty. The Canyon was a more sparse beautiful, with fir trees that must have been 90 ft. tall.  Some sad news is that there is a serious wildfire in Yellowstone. We saw the smoke localized yesterday when we were on Jackson Lake kayaking and this morning woke up to lots of haze in the air. We have heard of road closures that created drives of 10-12 extra hours. Here is a photo of Mt. Moran  in the haze.  As stated prior, we are now ensconced in the Spring Creek Ranch. It is very nice. The views are phenomenal, as is the shower, the robes, the lotions, the fireplace, the TV, the WIFI CONNECTION, the in-room refrigerator, the balcony, th...

Before I begin about our 23rd day, something happened today that MADE ME SO HAPPY. Our neighbors in the RV Park are from Southern California and were delightful. It was a couple a little younger than Rick and I, Mark and Michelle, and Mark's Mom and Step-dad. We were given fresh homegrown tomatoes by the Grandma and they were delicious. We had so much fun getting to know them and Rick was so jealous of the fancy, big and beautiful rig they had......not to mention the brand new Jeep they were towing! To be fair, I was lusting after Michelle's beautifully manicured hands and feet. Sigh!  I haven't COMPLETELY gone off to the other side!!!  When Mark, told me what he did, I didn't really 'get' what he did but it sounded similar to another friend's description of his business. That other friend, is also from Southern California, but lives a bit away from our new friends. Over the course of the week, I wondered, do they know each other? Well, I kept forgetting to ...