After South Dakota we went to Iowa. Most of Iowa around I-80 actually has landscape very much like in Denmark. There are many places where I’d easily make that mistake if it wasn’t for the buildings (and a slightly warmer weather). The most striking difference is, however, the distances. In Denmark you would get some changes in the landscape after maybe 50 miles (80km) – here it was just the same for 100s of miles.
Yellowstone is known for Old Faithful, The Grand Canyon of theYellowstone (and the waterfall), its hot springs and for its wildlife. On the first day we took a drive to Mammoth Hot Springs, and hoped to at least see some Elk when we were there as that was “Elk Countryâ€. On the way up north we even passed “Bear Countryâ€, but we saw neither elk nor bears at the hot springs – only hot springs with the yummy rotten eggs smell that goes with them.
Arriving in Teton from Rocky Mountain meant driving for quite a while with the Tetons in the distance – that was a nice view.
The first day we went down to the little tourist town south of Grand Teton National Park called Jackson to hang out. It is a nice little place with everything moose you can imagine. I guess you can imagine that we didn’t buy much 😉 . On the way back to the campground we tried to stop to take some pictures from the Snake River Overlook. There was still too much light to really get a decent picture, but I think we got a reasonable shot anyway (the one above).
Right now we are in Kennebec, SD, at an “all inclusive†(for us that means power, shower, laundry and wifi) campground getting ready for the next days (with shower, laundry, blog/email and charging the batteries on the laptop).
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We are now in Teton National Park, and we must say the mountains are spectacular.
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After Black Canyon we drove to Great Sand Dunes, a kind of strange place as there are these pretty large sand dunes between a completely flat valley and the Sangre De Christo Mountain Range. Sand Dunes are not foreign to us, but just there in the middle of “no where†far from the water is kind of strange.
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We found a nice spot on the campground, with an almost unobstructed view of the dunes.
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After Great Sand Dunes we were going to drive to Colorado Springs. Originally we wanted to go to Pikes Peak (14.110ft/4233m), but with the bus we didn’t think it was a good idea to drive up. With the cog train it would be $32 per person – with 30 minutes at the top and then you cannot even bring your own lunch. So we decided to stay down and see it from “awayâ€.
Capitol Reef was very relaxed, fewer (German) tourists compared to Bryce Canyon, with a nice campground. There were a few short hikes one could take, but we thought we wanted to take the hike up Grand Wash to see the “slot canyonâ€. Technically a slot canyon is a canyon where you can touch both sides at the same time, and Grand Wash a just a tad too wide, but it still should be very impressive.
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This time we did it – we got gas for less than four dollars per gallon. While we’ve actually seen it once or twice, we never got it even close to that when we needed it. On the road from Black Canyon to Great Sand Dunes we had to have gas – in Gunnison – and we finally managed to get it for less than four dollars
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At present, in the Great Sand Dunes National Park, we have driven about 2400 miles (3840 km) and our average fuel economy has been 15.9 MPG (6,7 km/L or 14,9 L/100km) so far – 23% better than expected.
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The other evening I was leaning on the â€stick†we use for the outer side of Felix’ bed and it said .. crash! Well, it broke. Duct tape made it back to one piece, but after a few evenings it was not straight any longer – more like a hockey stick – and as a result Felix fell out of bed one night while sleeping! Oops!
Since then we have used the aluminum supporter for the awning. This means, that we can not fully extend the awning while Felix’s bed is build, but we usually don’t do that anyway. Mostly we just roll it out a bit (shade or sleeping Felix, our choice of the day J)