There and Back Again

Home at last. 2,100 round trip miles. That’s a lot of driving. This country has some amazing things to see and do. Know what else is amazing? I’ll reconcile the checkbook later and make a determination as to how much we really spent during the ten days away. Amazing indeed.

Rode a horse. That was big for me. See, my rule of thumb is never to climb on any animal that outweighs me by several hundred pounds. Yet I did it. A one hour trail ride in Estes Park, Co. Beautiful-the scenery and the multicolored bruises on my greenhorn bottom the next day.

If you get to Estes Park, you have to drive up to the visitor center at the top of the Rocky Mountain National Park. Don’t take the cheater’s way. Go up via the Old Fall River Road. It’s a one way gravel road with narrow hair pin switchbacks. It was simultaneously the most breathtaking and terrifying hour I have ever spent, with the exception of my wedding, of course. A little over 12,000 feet high.

White water rafting with the whole family. Fantastic. I mean fantastic. Survived a class four rapid, Cardiac Rock, on the Cache de Poudre river. It’s a French word pronounced Cash de Poo-der, which sounds like Cash to Poo-der, which is exactly what happened. You pay money to soak yourself in 50 degree water and then end up barely avoiding messing your trunks. I'm hooked.

Mount Rushmore was incredible. Tourist trap, yes, but still something everyone should see. The scale, the complexity, the sheer tonnage of rock that had to be blasted, hammered, chiseled, and polished is mind-boggling. It’s also a harsh reminder that I suck at artistic endeavors. I can’t make a simple bowl in seventh grade pottery class. These people carved sixty foot busts of dead presidents into the side of a mountain.

Spent a hot afternoon on the wild life loop in Custer’s State Park. Pronghorn antelope, white-tailed deer, big horn sheep, prairie dogs, and buffalo. Go off the pavement, onto some of the back public access roads. We ended up in the middle of a buffalo herd as they were crossing from one meadow to another. More buffalo than I could count. Kept saying “I am Need-to-Pee. You, Growl On Face Like Constipated Bear and Little Badger are my family. I find many, many ta-tonka” for like six hours afterwards.

On a scheduling note, I’d pick later in August to go near Mount Rushmore. The troops were gathering for the annual Harley-Davidson rally everywhere. We camped about thirty minutes outside of Sturgis, just a few miles from Mount Rushmore. The place was crawling with bikes and bikers. The rally doesn’t officially kick off until next week. I can’t imagine what it must be like. Let me just say this, and I don’t care how “Bad” you think you are, the whole black leather vest and no shirt thing-no. Gross. On the way home we counted bikes heading into the area for a little while. On average, about twenty per minute. Two people per bike, that’s…multiply by four, carry the one…divide by three..yeah, about sixty two million gallons of water not being used for showers in the coming week. Scary.

What a trip. Loved the time with the family. Now it’s back to work…