Driving East

Craters of the Moon...ZZZZZ

We left Seattle and went inland. Our first destination was La Grande where we stayed with a ranger we found on Couchsurf. The second day we stopped off at Craters of the Moon national park which was a little underwhelming. We passed through - and ate in - Arco, which was interesting for the atomic history of the area. We finally got to Idaho Falls, too late for a Couchsurf which forced us into our second unexpected hotel stay.

Paddle away! 

From Idaho Falls, it was a short trip into the Grand Tetons National Park. This was a beautiful place to drive through. We set up camp in our hammocks on the side of Jackson Lake at Signal Mountain, with snow-capped mountains all around. We were able to get a canoe and paddled out to an island in the middle of the lake, on which we landed and climbed, much to Kim's retrospective justified displeasure (Edit by Kim...I was NOT happy landing and climbing!). 

Where we witnessed a
savage animal attack

For sunset, we drove up a nearby summit. Surprisingly, the view we expected to the West was bettered by a vast vista to the East; we could see for miles and miles and miles of stunning, varied, rolling landscape. The highlight of the view was a small lake, which we affectionately coined the Penis Lake (actually Cow Lake - whoever thought of that...). Thanks to  a bunch of fun old men with telescopic lenses we found out and watched a fight between a pack of wolves and a baby antelope. The antelope herd uselessly watched on while the baby and the mother fought off the growing pack of mutts. The Wolves won. I was backing them the whole time while Kim was a baby antelope supporter. I should have wagered some money on the outcome! We camped that night and hardly any of us were devoured by bears, much to Kim's surprise.

The view from the hammocks

Hot Springs smell NAZZZZTY

TOO CLOSE TO MY CAR!

We liked Grand Tetons (slight exception here: Kim did not like the hordes of road-approaching Buffalo). We thought, "if this is good, then the more famous adjoining Yellowstone must be immense". So we packed out bags and drove North into the inaccurately-named park. Cheapskates as we are, we went to the second cheapest campsite - Madison. The cheapest was up on "the rim", all of which was covered in a meter of snow. Madison, by contrast, is in a large crater or depression that is comparatively warm and dry..? On our first day in Yellowstone, it was cold and rainy and miserable. We went up further North to Mammoth Springs. We weren't too impressed with the springs nor the food. Seeing the place, however, reminded me of a time in my youth when I was last there - Al Gore landed in a helicopter and gave us all a chat.

It finally gets sunny after 4 days
of continuous rain!

The second day at Yellowstone was a little brighter. We wandered the various springs and gysers and pools. Some were quite stunning. Steamboat, once again, failed the blow while we were there. We had some fun in the evening when the car failed to start; the battery had gone flat somehow - fortunately, there was a handy and kind bloke from Wisconsin who helped us out; we discovered that this guy really liked Yellowstone and had spent four weeks a year for two decades there.

We survived another night in the hammocks. The bears would surely have devoured us had it not been for Kim's choosing of a camp site that was actually surrounded in large RVs, all of which had rangers in them. It was like the perfect anti-bear wall.

Buffalo Bill Dam

Not too enthusiastic about Yellowstone (YELLOWSTONE SUCKED!-Kim), we went to go see the essential Old Faithful which was faithful for us. After some miscellaneous wandering we drove east, out to the park through some epicly bleak weather. However, as we went lower the weather improved loads and became very windy as we approached the town of Cody; a place I'd been hoping to visit all trip for reasons that I never quite understood. Right before we got there we stopped off at the Buffalo Bill Dam, a very impressive - and tall - narrow concrete arch dam.

Teepee night! 

When in Cody, we decided to go for one night more camping; this time in fixed teepees! We had to make some modifications - teepees have large holes in their roofs, which seems a bit a shortcoming when huge rain clouds are gathering. We went out for food, wifi and boots - a whole barn of them in fact. Kim was in shoe heaven but the prices were off the scale... or at least off the budget.

While stealing wi-fi in a local McDonald's, we had our first major accident. Kim for all her bear fears, was brutally savaged by a car door/wind alliance.

River rafting like champs

We slept without incident in the teepee that night, and decided to go rafting the next day. We went to a local place and got a dedicated guide on a cute little 3-man raft. Hilarious. Best of all we didn't need to row. Not the most intense ride, but still a fun descent. We left Cody that same day, heading still further East....