Calsbad Caverns

We drove to Carlsbad this morning and got to the caverns shortly after noon.  We walked to "Big Room" which we had not done last year.  It was not too crowded for a Friday afternoon.  The elevator means that the crowd comes in waves, so you can usually wait a few minutes for a group to pass you.

I took several photos that turned out well.  Near the end of the loop of the Big Room, I came across a tour of the lower cave that was ascending back to the normal path.  This tour of about 12 people requires a certain amount of spelunking.  I took a couple of photos before a ranger came over and asked me not to take pictures.  Not sure why.  (You know, you can click on the photo collages on this blog to see a slightly larger version.)

Mesa Verde

We stayed in Cortez, Colorado last night -- just down the street from Mesa Verde.  We got there early this morning (to road construction as they improve the park road) and spent about five hours in the park.  We stowed away on a tour of the Long House, but left Cliff Palace and Spruce Tree House for another day.

During our tour, we met a park ranger named Habenicht.  Diana was quite excited, as you can imagine.  We also saw a HUGE squirrel climbing the ladders of the cliff dwellings.  (I don't think Diana will approve of that juxtaposition since the two events are not comparable in their monumental-ness... so, to the photos!)

Arches National Park

By the way, last night's motel was across the intersection from BYU's LaVell Edwards Stadium.  I'm sure they are booked all through the fall.

Today we drove to Arches National Park.  We drove through the lower two-thirds of the park before hunger and exhaustion spurred us to leave.  We saw north and south windows (I hiked the "primitive" trail around the back side while Diana hiked over to Turet Arch), and went to the lower viewing area for Delicate Arch.

The desert lizards here are much larger than the desert lizards elsewhere.

We're checking out Mesa Verde tomorrow.

On to Utah

You are looking at the ORIGINAL nuclear power plant control room.  (No Homer Simpson here.)  We visited EBR-1 or the world's first Experimental Breeder Reactor.  This facility was the world's first electricity-generating nuclear reactor.

Made it in to Provo, Utah.  The fellow at the front desk is originally from Brownsville.  Says he's worked here 7 years & has never met anyone else who knew where Brownsville was -- much less was from the same place!

Hanging out near Salmon!

Uncle Jim & Aunt Debbie drove us around some of the great sites near Salmon.  We drove up to Lemhi Pass and the continental divide along the Lewis & Clark Trail.  We ran into some snow and some spectacular views.  The skies were clearer than yesterday when we drove in.

Later, Jim took us up to go check on the horses (and a bonus, mystery mule had come to visit).  In the evening, Jim gave me some Photoshop tips.

More of Idaho

We saw the "50,000 Silver Dollar Bar" today.  These guys have over 55,000 silver dollars fastened to the walls, and each one has a name and home town etched beneath it.  Weird.

The clouds in Salmon were doing some impressive things today as well.  We have so many awesome hosts in our families, we're enjoying the hospitality of everyone.

The Route of the Hiawatha

We took at 15-mile bike ride!  The Route of the Hiawatha.  Along the Idaho-Montana border, an old railway has been converted to a bike trail (so there is a consistent 2% down hill grade).  The route goes through several tunnels (including a 1.2 mile tunnel at the beginning) and across several trestle bridges.

Now, I did wipe out pretty spectacularly when trying to take a photo, but otherwise it was a delightful trip!  The scenery was great and the weather beautiful.  The tunnels were a pretty chilly 42 degrees, but otherwise very temperate ride.

We're enjoying more great hospitality from great family!

Panoramas online

I've posted the panoramic photos from our current trip online.  If you want more photos, that's the place to go.

Wild Mustangs! sort of

We stopped along highway 90 at a scenic outlook near Vantage, Washington (just west of Lake Moses).  We expected a nice view of the bridge & water.  We were surprised by the wild mustang monument built on the top of a nearby hill.  A (very) steep climb got us closer for a good look at the sculpture and a better view of the water.

Seattle Aquarium

We met up with one of Diana's teacher friends and visited the downtown aquarium.  Later we went back to Snohomish and Aunt Frannie took us to a delightful dinner at Anthony's.  We had a great time visiting with her late into the evening.

Downtown Seattle

We walked around downtown Seattle today.  Our Aunt Sandy is an excellent tour guide (and a delightful host).  We rode the bus, went to the top of the Space Needle (Sandy is posing with a $110 pepper mill that we decided to photograph instead of buy), walked around Pike's Place Market, rode a monorail, and had a great time.

Tonight we had dinner with many of Diana's dad's family at a restaurant closer to Everett.  We walked along the river after dinner and had a great time visiting everyone.

Mt. St. Helens

We drove from Roseburg, Oregon on up to Seattle today.  We stopped at Mt. St. Helens to drive through the area.  The top of the mountains was obscured by clouds, so you couldn't make out the distinctive top of the mountain.

I was last here in 1986, and a lot has changed.  I did not see the massive log jam on Spirit Lake that was there before, but we may have been in the wrong place.  The canisters of ash that the historical society sells used to be clear film canisters, now they are fancy glass bottles.

Crater Lake in HDR

Crater Lake

We drove to Crater Lake.  Much of the park still closed to snow, but the views were still awesome.  After hanging around for a few hours, we started zooming up toward Washington.

Sunstone

We visited a sunstone collection area on Bureau of Land Management land near Plush, Oregon.  (Did we mention that gas is full-service in Oregon?)  You can stop at the store in Plush for directions, and then head 23 miles out to the site.  Only six of those miles are paved, mind you.  Most of the turns are marked.  (!?)  Once you find the place, the sunstone glimmers at you in the sunlight.  They say to visit about a month after the snow melt (that about now).  The water washes the dirt away and leaves the sunstone exposed.  We found many many small pieces (about the size of half an M&M).  We had a good time.  And our odometer hit 88,888 miles on the trip back.

By the way...

Did I mention that we stayed in a retired retirement home yesterday?  The Fremont Inn in Lakeview, Oregon used to be a retirement facility.  So the rooms were cavernous compared to a normal hotel room.  And the breakfast was pretty good, too.

We also stopped for lunch at "The Olive Pit" in Corning, CA.  This olive company sells all sorts of olives & olive related stuff.  (I was actually hoping for some sort of factory tour, but Diana was in heaven!)  She said her "olive burger" was the best burger she'd ever had.

Lassen Volacano & Oregon

We left California today, but not before visiting Lassen Volcano.  It was very beautiful, but we could not see much due to the snow.  The road into the park was closed one mile in because of heavy snow.  They tell me the roads are normally open by now, but not this year.  The park has a small geothermal area that we were able to visit, and there was many pretty snow landscapes.

Snow!

We drove from Madera, CA to Yosemite this morning.  The drive there was short, a little curvy, and not too much traffic (that came later).  We got to the park about 11:30 and entered the southern entrance.  We stopped at the pioneer museum near that entrance for a while, then drove on to Glacier Point.  The view were (of course) fantastic.  We saw snow on the ground for the first time this trip as we wound our way to Glacier Point.  Canon had a photo tent set up for some promotional, I asked for some tips on my camera.  They kinda helped.

We took plenty of photos at Glacier Point, and Diana noticed the dense, dense cars in Yosemite Valley below.  So we decided we would skip that loop.  We drove out via HWY 120 and stopped to photograph El Capitan.

Diana got "buzzed" by a dear running past her.  She got a much better photo than I did.  (I spent too much time trying to decide if I wanted to take my camera off the tripod and interrupt the panorama I was in the middle of.)   The GPS conked out all day.  It was having trouble finding satellites last night, and it only woke up a time or two today.  We're not sure if it's signal interference or if it needs some update/reboot.  Hopefully it will get it's act together, it can be useful.

The drive to Sacramento was long and frustrating.  LOTS of two-lane winding roads.  Diana was kind and fetched dinner while I rested at the hotel.

Let's Go To The Movies!

Got to Madera, California today.  One of the few operating drive-in theaters is down the street from our hotel (though you'd never think it if you followed my directions!).  We went and watched The A-Team.  It was a fun experience.

Disneyland

Thursday we spent the day at Disneyland.  We drove to Anaheim early in the morning, and Diana braved heavy traffic and weird parking directions to get us there within an hour of the park opening.  I was immediately surprised by the short wait to enter the park.  Er, did I say wait?  There was no wait.  Which I'm sure meant long lines inside, right?  No, not so much.  The Peter Pan ride just inside the main gate is usually a long wait, I'm told.  We waited about 15 minutes.  Then Mr. Toad's wild ride -- 5 minutes.  Buzz Lightyear?  Five minutes.  There was even a three-minute wait in there at some point during the day.  The longest we waited was at the Finding Nemo Submarine Adventure.  That one was a 20-minute line.  We used a fast pass at Indiana Jones, and there was a bit of a wait there, but otherwise, the park was uncrowded.

The weather was very nice.  It was overcast much of the morning and never hot all day.

Now, I don't recall visiting Disneyland, but I do have many memories of Disneyworld back when I was in second grade.  Toad's Wild Ride and Peter Pan's flight were just as I remembered, but there were many new & different things.  (Is it just me, or is the castle here much smaller than the one in Florida!?)

Changes:

• There have been many changes to Pirates of the Caribbean since the films came out.  There are many cameos of Johnny Depp's Captain Jack Sparrow, and some of the vignettes are removed or changed.  This California version begins with a leisurely cruise through a bayou past real diners at a real restaurant.  Pretty cool.
• The submarine ride in Florida was based on 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea.  That ride is paved over now, but the California ride (which was always slightly different) is now a Finding Nemo adventure.  They have a system for projecting animated clips that are visible from the sub's portholes.  This was an interesting ride
• The Swiss Family Robinson Treehouse is now Tarzan's Treehouse.  Vignettes of cheetahs and gorillas have been installed and the transformation is complete.  So it is completely unclear why the treehouse is made of ship parts.  Odd.

New:

• Indiana Jones is a new ride since I'd visited, and reminded me of a new-generation Mr. Toad's Wild Ride.
• Buzz Lightyear was fun.  In this ride, you use a joystick to spin your car (an updated Mad Hatter?) and use a ray gun to shoot at targets throughout the ride, collecting points.  Very exciting.
• Star Tours seemed very dated, but was new to me.  A 4-D ride based on Star Wars characters.

We had a really good time and actually left the park about 5 o'clock feeling like we got to do everything we wanted.

Buuuuuuuuuzz Lightyear to the rescue!

At Disneyland today, we rode the Buzz Lightyear ride twice.  It's an interactive ride where you use a little ray gun to shoot at targets throughout the ride and earn points.  It was pretty fun, and you can e-mail yourself a photo from the ride when its finished. 

License Plate Update

We saw "Wyoming" on our shuttle bus to take us from the parking lot to Disneyland.  Weird.

Now entering California... High Winds Ahead

We drove to Joshua Tree National Park in California.  This park straddles two desert zones, features interesting geology and the eponymous Joshua tree cacti.  We zoomed through this park pretty quickly since we were meeting friends later in the day, but the park was a winner.  Lots of good views.  The trees were very dense in several places.  We entered by the north entrance (near Twenty-Nine Pines) and looped through the park to drive out the west entrance.  That worked out really well, and I think we spent about an hour and a half driving through the park (fee $15 if you don't have an annual pass).

As we entered California, we encountered serious winds, then I noticed the massive wind farm.  I don't know how those 18 wheelers handle it.

Then we met up with my college roommate who is now living near Palm Springs.  They have a nice little house, and they have done a GREAT job of settling in since they moved their just about a month ago.  Their toddler daughter was a lot of fun (very minimal whining... very impressive).  My roommate gave us a tour of the projector room of the theater where he is general manager.  That was interesting.  I never realized that all of the projectors are contained in a single long room, not multiple rooms.  His theater is a nice building that is in a very pleasant location.  He says he's got some challenges there, but it sounds like a positive change from his previous location.

Volcanos, Indian Ruins, Grand Canyon, and London Bridge

We headed north from Flagstaff to the east entrance of the Grand Canyon.  We stopped along the way at Sunset Crater Volcano National Monument (which sits alongside Wupatki National Monument). There is a 31-mile drive that takes you through both sites.  (It is not a loop drive, so it takes you about 15 miles down highway 89.

Sunset Crater Volcano was an interesting site.  There is a large wash of volcanic rock that was impressive, and there are attractive views of the region.  Lots of pine trees and mountains.

As you transfer over into Wupatki, there are a series of VERY impressive pueblo ruins.  And even more impressive, the park service allows you to climb all over some of them.  We really enjoyed the largest ruin with several rooms and a large tower.

When we left Wupatki, we drove on up to the Grand Canyon, driving in the East Entrance.  We drove from the East Entrance to the South Visitor Center, stopping at most of the great views along the way.  The canyon just goes on, and on, and on!  We had intended to take the shuttle bus that takes you from the Visitor Center area to a couple of lookout points that are not accessible by personal car. 

However, it was getting late in the afternoon (and the line for the bus was pretty long), so we headed on down to Havasu Lake City where we were spending the night.  If you haven't heard of Lake Havasu City, that's the current location of the original London Bridge.

Tomorrow we head to Calfornia:  Joshua Tree National Park, a visiting my college roommate!

In which our hero sees Castles, Wooden Rocks, and Meteorite Oxide

So I've been experimenting with HDR photographs, and the images on the left show a comparison.  The top image is an enhanced illustration of "Montezuma's Castle," a Native-American habitat near Camp Verde, Arizona, built in about 1250.  The bottom image is the original photograph.  How do you think they compare?  I'm currently using the trial version of this software... is it worth $99 to register?

After Montezuma's Castle, we drove out to Petrified Forest and Painted Desert.  A single 28-mile drive takes you through both parks.  They were certainly worth the trip.  Lots of neat rock formations and many petroglyphs.

Next we headed out to Meteor Crater, near Winslow, Arizona.  The site was impressive.  We took lots of pictures.  Finally, we made our way to Flagstaff to spend the night.  Our hotel chain has three locations in town, and we found the other two LOOOONG before we got to the correct hotel.

Missiles, Senor Saguaro, and Family

We left Benson, AZ (near Tucson) and visited a decommissioned Titan II missile silo.  It was a pretty fascinating visit.  There is a short movie that talks about the site & the security that was in place when it was active.  Then a short tour walks above ground briefly, then to the control room (where they simulate the lights and sounds that would accompany a launch), then across a looooong hallway to the silo site.  They point out that this was a "single-use" facility, meaning once the missile was launched, they weren't going to reload this silo to fire again.  So the power of this rocket (that was used to put men and satellites into space) would have destroyed the launch portion of the facility.

Then we drove through Saguaro National Park.  We were pretty underwhelmed, but they had just repaved the road!

Finally, we drove on to SURPRISE!!, Arizona, where Diana's cousin & her family live.  We had a really good time.  They have delightful kids (and they are great cooks).  They were generous enough to let us stay the night with them.

License Plate Update

License Plates we've spotted so far:

Rock Hound State Park

We had such high hopes for Rock Hound State Park near Deming, NM.  They encourage visitors to collect rocks, and many jasper and geodes can be found in and near the park.  Unfortunately, the park visitors' center was closed Saturday afternoon when we arrived, as were all the nearby stores (that we heard often dispense rock hunting advice).  So we had no real idea what we were doing.

We walked for a little while, crushed some rocks with a hammer, and left disappointed in our geode quest.

However, the views were very pretty (though the bugs were pretty annoying).

Lincoln National Forest, White Sands National Monument

We drove through Lincoln National Forest, which had many forest-y mountains.  The altitude change was pretty significant (4,000 feet in 25 miles as I recall).  You could see the white sands of White Sands off in the distance.

Next we stopped at the Space History Museum in Alamogordo.  It's an impressive facility and very interactive.  (Ham, the first space-chimp, is buried on site.)

Then we went on to White Sands National Monument and drove through.  It was very, very warm, so we did little walking.  I did buy a used sled at the gift shop ($10 used, $14.95 new) and went down one dune.  They sell sled wax.  "It's supposed to make you go faster."  The clerk claimed the green wax is actually the high-performance wax.

We drove the loop road, walked on the boardwalk (where I got impressive static electric shock from walking on the plastic boardwalk.... GRRR!), and took some photos.  After our drive, I returned our sled for a small refund ($3 for used sleds, $5 for new).

Artesia, New Mexico

We drove through Artesia, New Mexico Saturday morning on our way to Alamogordo. There are many HUGE bronze sculptures throughout the city. When we can across the largest in the town square, we finally gave in and stopped. The main sculpture is a section of an oil derrick (about 20 feet tall). One smaller piece nearby shows pioneers while the other shows two wildcatters talking on the hood of a pickup truck.

We stopped and played and took several photos.

Did I mention it was hot today?

The sign at the Visitors' Center at White Sands National Monument.  Bring a hat and some water!

License Plates 2010

Just over one day into the trip and we've seen license plates from 21 different states (plus Guam?!).

Off towards Deming, NM.

The Carlsbad forecast calls for a high of 111 degrees today.  That would be good weather to visit the caverns, but instead we are headed to go rock hunting in the desert.  'Cause we're unconventional that way.

There are a pair of state parks near Deming, NM that boast great rocks & geodes to be found.  Then we should be in Benson, AZ just outside of Tucson tonight.

Go team!

Carlsbad, New Mexico... we remember you!

The Grand Canyon ad means we are headed in the right direction.  We left when we got off work today and headed out of Texas.  We made it to Carlsbad, NM, and the same Super 8 where we started last year's trip.

We stopped for dinner in Pecos, TX (along the irritating stretch of 2-lane road from Fort Stockton to Carlsbad).  We at at Alfredo's Mexican Food.  The nachos were good.  The rest... asi-asi.