PeaceLoveSnowflakes : road trip

Showing posts with label road trip. Show all posts

Monday, September 17, 2012

Day 6

Nothing too exciting today. We left Boise around lunch time and drove through the rest of Idaho, part of Oregon and into Washington. The rest of Idaho was not very scenic. There are wildfires around the area so everything was kinda smokey. My eyes burned the whole way through the state. Oregon was ok... lots of big hills which eventually turned into some pretty big mountains in the distance. Lots of 'Oregon Trail' signs.

At one point we were about 2 hours away from Mt. Hood. It killed us both knowing we were so close to snow but couldn't enjoy any of it. Apparently they are closed mid-September till mid-October for maintenance. Perfect timing for us, huh? My snowboard itch is in full force right now... it actually has been since we left knowing that we were headed for such epic snow and powder. If Hood was open, we would've been there in a heartbeat! Summer snowboarding (real snow, not just snowflex or shaved ice) is definitely on my to-do list!

Washington has been pretty but not what I expected the state to look like. I know we'll see more mountains once we get closer to the coast. I'm pretty sure we went through Washington's wine country. For miles and miles we saw nothing but vineyards lining both sides of the interstate. Kinda makes me crave a big glass of merlot!

We are currently in Yakima, WA... we could've made it to Seattle if we wanted since it's only a couple more hours down the road, but since we have a few days to kill we decided to stop here. We plan on getting up early and getting to Seattle in the morning so we can spend the day sightseeing. I want to go up in the Space Needle! I also wanted to eat in the restaurant at the top but changed my mind after looking at the menu online... good food but everything is super expensive.

Winter has been her lazy, usual self since the beginning of the trip. She found a new spot to be lazy... on top of my newly un-sealed spacebag of clothes. At least she seems like a happy kitty. I was worried at first that she would be super stressed the whole time, but she could care less. The ferry ride will probably be a different story. She'll be stuck in the car the whole time (they won't let pets leave the car) and I can only go check on her a couple times a day, or if we are in port. I guess I'll have to buy her a new toy when we get to Juneau...

Oregon

More of Oregon but at least there's bigger mountains in the distance!

This pass we went through was pretty cool.

Hard to see, but Welcome to Washington! We missed the Oregon sign :(

Grape vines as far as the eye can see!

Winter's new spot. It's fluffy, right above my head, and she can see
out the windshield... I don't blame her, I'd be laying there too!

Sunday, September 16, 2012

Day 5

IDAHOOOOO!

The drive from Salt Lake City to Boise, Idaho has ~~damn near sucked as bad as Kansas~~ been super boring. Those pretty mountains around Salt Lake turned into desert hills, desert, and more desert hills... and long, straight sections of road. It only took us about 5 hours, but it felt like 10 hours. I was so ready to get out of the car by the time we got to Boise! Winter slept the WHOLE WAY again. I knew she was fat and lazy, but not THAT lazy! haha.

Before we left SLC, we went back to Antelope Island since our trip there last night was fun but cut short by the lack of daylight. It's $9 per vehicle to enter the park, and it's worth every penny! The sun was shining and there were only a few clouds in the sky. The visibility was really good and we could see pretty darn far across the lake (and it's one HUGE lake!). I'm working on a video of our Island trip but iMovie is taking literally 2 hours to export it. I should have it on here by tomorrow night.

Other than this morning's several bison encounters, not much excitement has happened. We pretty much just drove straight to Boise, only stopping for gas. Winter has went straight to exploring each new hotel room as soon as we get her inside. She used to hide under the bed for a good 30 minutes until she figured out it was safe. Now she acts like she owns the place!

We originally planned on driving straight to Bellingham, WA from Boise, but now we are thinking about staying in Yakima, WA for a night and finishing the drive Tuesday. That will give us two full days in Bellingham to get the car and the cat situated for the 3 day ferry ride to Juneau. We might even stay in Seattle a day too (mainly because the forecast is calling for sunshine and NOT rain). I'm so glad we left earlier than we originally planned. I think we would have made it in time to catch the ferry, but we would've had to haul ass and been stressed the whole drive.

Here's some pics!

Antelope Island!

Pretty view.

That's one huge lake.

Trailmap.

The bison seemed pretty tame.

Enjoying the view.

Bison in the mirror! Haha.

I didn't see the 'no touch' sign.

Up close and personal.

Is that considered jay-walking?

Dustin checking out the bison.

Winter half asleep on a spacebag... which is now just
a normal clear plastic bag full of clothes...

Welcome to IDAHO!
Which is the 2nd most boring state I've ever been in (so far).

Yep that's pretty much what we saw for 4 hours.

Saturday, September 15, 2012

Day 4

We were on the road by 6:30 this morning since we've slept in almost every day of the trip so far. It was only a matter of minutes from leaving Denver that we were in the middle of the Rocky Mountains. We are SO glad we decided to go that route instead of heading north out of Denver. That mountain range is so freakin' beautiful! Those mountains were massive too. We even saw some snow capped mountains as well as a few ski resorts from the interstate. The first one we passed was Loveland, then Copper, then Vail. They seem so huge compared to Beech... little tiny Beech lol. We passed signs for Steamboat, Breck, and Keystone but we wanted to stay on course so we could make it to Salt Lake City before dark. We had breakfast at a little cafe in Vail. We were expecting it to be super expensive, since most everything is super ritzy in Vail, but it was pretty reasonable for the amount of food we got (minus the fact that a glass of orange juice was almost 4 bucks!)

It wasn't long before those beautiful mountains turned into desert looking hills... then we went through Glenwood Canyon, which reminded me of what the Grand Canyon's little cousin might look like. It was pretty cool to drive through. I think we zig-zagged over the Colorado River about 20 times since it paralleled the interstate the majority of the way. By the time we got to the Utah border, it was straight up desert. And it seemed like it went on foreverrrrr. It felt like it was never going to end. Sandy, dirt covered hills as far as the eye could see. I wouldn't have been surprised if some tumbleweed rolled along the highway. Then those hills started getting bigger with more and more trees appearing.

As soon as we got near Salt Lake City, the mountains were HUGE... they looked way bigger than the mountains in Colorado. It blew my mind how massive everything was! Dustin and I were so happy to see mountains again rather than desert. Then came In-N-Out Burger. It was definitely worth it. I am still kicking myself in the ass for not getting everything 'animal' style. After we grubbed out on the only fast food we plan on eating on the trip, we found a hotel room in SLC, got Winter settled for the night, and then headed out to Antelope Island which is a Utah State Park in the middle of the Great Salt Lake that you can drive out to, camp, and check out the wildlife. We saw a BEAUTIFUL sunset and got up close and personal with a bison, which strolled out in front of us on our drive back out. That thing was MASSIVE. Then we realized they were everywhere... black dots were all over the hills, and several were standing beside the roads. Borderline scary if you think about it... I mean, what if they all decided to stampede? My lil Subaru wouldn't stand a chance! Haha.

Here's the best photos of the day (we had a LOT of pics today)...

Oh, and these are totally out of order... but it's late and I'm tired and you can figure it out :) Just remember Utah comes after Colorado! haha.