Yellowstone

Nothing terribly exciting on Saturday except for the sandstorm outside of Salt Lake City. We made it to Ogden, Utah for the night and on Sunday morning we went to church at Calvary Baptist Church. This was my father's first church after seminary - and he was pastor 1974-1976. We had a GREAT time there - Pastor Willie Martin and his wife Louise made us feel right at home. Walking around the church - much of it looks the same - although they've really done a nice renovation of the downstairs fellowship hall and nursery. Everything looks smaller than I remember - but I guess I'm a lot bigger now! They treated us to lunch at the 'Chuck-A-Rama' which was terrific.

We didn't hit the road until after 4:00 p.m. as we stopped by our old house on Ben Lomond Drive in Ogden. I didn't spot it the first drive down the block but there it was - a little brick house with a nice backyard. We made it to Jackson on Sunday night and finally found a room at the Wagon Wheel Inn.

On Monday we drove through the Teton National Park and then into Yellowstone. That's four National Parks - so we've already paid for our annual pass! We spent that night camping at Lake Lewis which is just a few miles into the park.

One side note: in case you didn't know, the 67th Annual Sturgis Rally is taking place this week in South Dakota. This is a HUGE gathering of motorcycle folks who flock here from all over the country (like tens of thousands). So Yellowstone was packed with Harley's. I mention this only because the sound of the un-muffled motorcycle is everywhere.

Early on Tuesday (well around 11:00) we lucked into a fabulous campsite on Yellowstone Lake - literally overlooking the water. We built a fire at night to roast marshmallows - YUM! We took in Old Faithful which erupts with some consistency - the rangers predict the next blast based upon the previous pattern.

[Myths: Old Faithful erupts every hour on the hour; the Rangers can turn it on / off; you can set your clock by it]

During our trek through Yellowstone we saw bison/buffalo, elk, squirrels, chipmunks, and ravens. They have both black bear and grizzly bear in the park - but we didn't see any which was okay with me.

We spent Wednesday driving across the big sky country of Wyoming and spent the night in Cheyenne. Lots of cowboys out here - real ones that wear spurs. Thursday we hit Nebraska - CORN CORN CORN - literally miles of corn growing in fields. We arrived in Lincoln last night and it really looks like a neat city. We're staying right downtown and plan to check out the beautiful capitol building.

More later