The first few hours were exciting. We played the license plate game (results below*), the how-many-animals-can-you-spot-game (which we gave up on by the time we got to Yellowstone and were SURROUNDED by too many to even count - although for the most epic part of the game is written below**), excitedly pumped our own gas when we left Oregon (it's illegal to do so there!), put on the iPod and generally had a ducky time. Stopping at a kind of scary and deserted looking Mexican restaurant build out of two train cars and a small house did make for an exciting lunch break, too. But by the time the sun way setting we were pretty over it. A nice, long sleep later and plenty of relaxing time playing Tiny Towers, we were back on the road.
The first day we hadn't really had a set destination in mind - just to drive as far as we could as fast as we could ('fast' being a relative term, considering I'm scared to drive Moxie over 70 miles an hour because she makes a funny noise and it scares me - ha). So when we had a destination for day two - Yellowstone - it made it a little easier to keep going. We stopped at Red Lobster for breakfast to use up our gift card and to pretend we were fancy - even though we hadn't showered in a few days and were roadtrip stinky/unattractive.
By the time we neared Yellowstone it was already late afternoon and although it seemed like we'd been driving for what felt like forever, it didn't feel like it could already be so late in the day. We stopped for a gourmet Dairy Queen lunch and listened to the old car driving back and forth through the tiny town on the edge of Yellowstone - a recorded voice blasting through the speakers, boasting about the "crazy" rodeo that was to take place that night - and we were off!
I admit, I had no idea what the big deal was; Yellowstone was just another National Park with lots of trees and bushes and plants, wasn't it? I'd looked at the map when we came to the fork in the road - one leading directly to Denver and one leading to Yellowstone - and thought to myself this was going to be a huge waste of five hours and a tank or two of gas. But Julia was just so excited about it that I knew I couldn't say no.
While the first few miles of the park after passing through the gates and paying the $25 per car fee were basically just trees, it didn't take long before I saw billows of smoke rising from seemingly nowhere and my interest was piqued. We stopped at several geysers and I was sold! They were so gorgeous and so loud and so smelly and so crazy!! Smoke would seep (or sometimes seem to explode) out of the water or earth and it looked so surreal. There was one part where the ground had split open due to an earthquake awhile back that had taken place miles and miles away from that spot, but the movement had been so jarring that it cracked it open and steam was just hissing and whistling out - like a kettle that has been boiling for waaaaaay too long and is threatening to explode at any time! There was also an area where it looked like hot clay was bubbling and spurting of of the earth and it just looked like something from an alien planet - but it was right next to a grove of pine trees and a little pond! The most gorgeous of all of the geysers had so many colors in it that it looked like a piece of fine art that should be hanging in a gallery or a museum!
The scenery was absolutely breathtaking and at times shocking - but not as shocking as a few of our interactions with the people around us! At our first geyser stop we were innocently walking on the boardwalk around the geyser pools (the ground is so hot and unpredictable that there are signs everywhere saying under no circumstances to step off the boardwalk as your shoes could melt to your feet and you could be severely burned or even die!!), we came up on a mother and young daughter who looked like they were Amish - although there was definitely no horse and buggy in the parking lot and they certainly didn't walk there, so we figured perhaps they were Mennonites - walking toward us. As we got closer to them the mother quickly turned the girl's head away from us and shielded her eyes!!
I was totally stunned. Never before in my life have I been obviously shunned before. It was a strange experience. I clearly wasn't looking extremely attractive, in my I've-been-in-the-car-for-two-days look with my droopy pig tail buns and my smelly sweat pants and open sleeved shirt, but I definitely didn't look like oh-my-god-shield-your-children-from-this-spawn-of-satan bad! And there was a man walking between Julia and myself, so it wasn't that we looked super crazy together. Julia was wearing a cut-off Rainbow Bright shirt - so maybe it was the combination of the greasy mohawk and the bare navel? Whatever it was, I just couldn't figure it out, nor could I get over it! My gosh!
I rushed forward to tell Julia what had just happened when we came up on an Indian family speaking Hindi. Just as I was telling her about the Mennonite lady, the parent of the Indian child turned her head and shielded her eyes from us, too!!!! What the heck was going on!?! I wasn't sure whether to laugh or whether to get offended. I'm not usually one to have issues with people holding their own beliefs and moral opinions, but my goodness people - just because you are miles away from the Montana border does not mean that you are traveling in the 1800's. This is America and this is a popular destination for all kinds of people - conservative tourists and crazy girls living in Portland alike! We're not throwing ourselves on your kids trying to dread their hair. We're innocently looking at geysers just like you are... what the heck!?
Though the natural wonders were amazing, I wasn't really sure I was liking this Yellowstone place after being shunned twice in a mere couple of minutes. We drove to the next geyser spot, a little jaded towards these darn tourists, and began our exploration on the boardwalks again. An Asian family was walking near us and started to look at us strangely. "Uh oh... here we go again," I thought to myself. Just as I was about to hurry off, the dad looked at me and asked, "You take our photo? Photo of family? Please photo?" Oh what relief!! I took the best pictures I could for their little family and the two kids and the two parents bowed several times, sincerely thanking me and bowed some more. It was beyond adorable! :) As we walked back to our car, two kids around our age walked up the boardwalk - the guy with a big, transient's backpack and the girl with dreads and a free-spirit vibe. They smiled real big and waved at us, recognizing semi-kindred spirits in a sea of crazy conservative tourists. :o) Hell yes.
We explored all of the gift shops and hotel and the gorgeous lodge and in no time at all it was time for Old Faithful to go crazy once again. It goes off just about every hour - give or take ten minutes - so we had to sit on the benches for a little while and wait, but once it started it was quite the sight. The water sprayed so high up in the air and it went non-stop for about five minutes - enough time to take plenty of pictures! My new camera was so cute - it made it look like late afternoon in the pictures, even though it was almost pitch black and 9:00 pm. Little Dulcinea - the Jet-set Cupcake - even got a nice shot with Old Faithful!
By the time the geyser stopped, we were getting a little tired, but we knew we had to leave because we definitely didn't have the money to stay somewhere as nice as the lodge they had there! We got a few souvies, I got a large Starbucks, bought a flashlight and checked Moxie's oil and tires and we were off. We weren't too far down the road before we started seeing the obligatory Beware of Animals EVERYWHERE signage. While driving through the park and around a gorgeous lake (the light of the full moon was dancing on its surface and it was absolutely enchanted looking) we came across a few ginormous elk, some deer and, at one point, a literal HERD of BUFFALO.
Julia was in charge of Animal Awareness and spotted each and every animal before I even had a chance to scan for them. She was way more calm about all of the animal sightings than I could have been as a passenger of a tiny little VW Bug, so when she said "Whoa slow down - like really slow down - like stop." I knew something was really up. As I came to a stop we looked to our left and there were 50? 75? 100? buffalo just hanging out yards from our car. Earlier in the day I'd spotted my first (and only) animal - or, rather two - giant buffalo mere feet from the road. But this - this was both awesome and ridiculous. We drove away slowly and I don't think I went over 35 nph until we finally exited the park.
Julia had chosen the route that would get us out of the park the quickest, rather than the route that would take us through another National Park before spitting us out on a highway. At the time, it sounded like the best plan. I was so eager to leave the park behind and get on a real road. Little did I know it would be considerably more petrifying outside the comfort of the big trees that seemed to be hugging us for comfort. Moments after leaving the park, a light up sign warned us of GRIZZLY BEARS on the next stretch of road. No joke. As if the buffalo hadn't already frightened me, I now had GRIZZLY BEARS to contend with!? I was so relieved when we'd successfully driven through bear territory without a single spotting that I almost didn't notice the new lit up and flashing depicting an elk with a giant rack of antlers.
And so the next few hours went. Signs for elk. Signs for deer. Signs for antelope. And not just signs - no, plenty of them just next to the road to greet us in our travels and almost give me a heart attack a few times! Sure, we tried to stop in Cody - the tiny town right outside of Yellowstone - but the prices for a single room in a crappy little motel were more than $120 and it was already past 1 am and we'd have to wake up by 6 the next morning if we were EVER going to get to Denver. And so we pressed on, hoping the next town would have something moderately priced, but realizing the next town was always at least another 50 miles away and only had a tiny motel and the owner was fast asleep - if the population of that town was even big enough to have a motel.
We drove and drove and drove, Julia looking for animals and telling me every few minutes to slow down, she'd spotted one, and me trying not to lose my shit while trying to find enough things to talk about to keep her awake. The stretch of road was literally in the middle of nowhere and absolutely terrifying. There were signs at the edge of every town that, when lit up, would put an arm down to prevent you from passing and tell you to turn back to the previous city. We looked it up later and it was due to high winds and bad weather conditions on that stretch of Hwy 20. And boy, would you never want to get stuck out there. Ever. Say you did get stuck, and say you waited a couple hours and someone drove by. Even if they stopped I'd be beyond petrified to get in their car. There is no civilization beyond population 8 towns for hundreds of miles in any direction. Just wild animals and lots of grass.
We'd been driving for six hours at this point when two semis whizzed past us. A few minutes after that, we came upon the road covered in blood and half of a deer still oozing in the middle of our lane. The sight was enough to make us want to pull over as soon as possible - motel or no motel. And as we came up on the town ahead of us, Julia told me to stop, as there was a deer on the road. As I came to a stop, the lady deer calmly walked across the street. We looked at her and waited for her to run off, but instead she looked back to the road and stopped. Curious, we waiting to see what was going on. Then out popped two baby deer on the other side of the road. One got scared off by our lights, but the other happily pranced across the road to her mother, the other one trailing just slightly behind. And then the three of them were off, into the pitch dark of night. It was the sweetest thing we'd seen all night! I shouted after the deer that they were lucky their family hadn't crossed the road a few minutes earlier and to have a good night.
By 4:15 am we pulled into the tiny town of Thermopolis and we were beginning to run low on gas. As we only had cash and no gas stations were open, we decided it was time to take a break. We peed in the park near the main street and quickly fell asleep in the snug little bug, packed full of all of my belongings. I can't say it was the most comfortable sleep I've ever had, but after having to be so alert for so long in the middle of the night, knowing I had Julia's, Moxie's and my own lives in my hands, sleeping in Moxie sounded like the best thing in the world.
I only got two and a half hours of sleep, but shortly after sunrise I was ready to keep on going. The roadtrip had started off as a fun little adventure, Yellowstone had been gorgeous, but after the night of driving before, I was ready to be in Denver already. We still had eight hours to go, but I was trying not to think about it! We filled up at the gas station, and began day three of our drive.
In case you've never had the good fortune to have experienced driving through Wyoming, let me just tell you this: You're not missing a thing. Literally. There is NOTHING out there. We were starving and hoping to find a place - any place - to eat. When we finally saw a sign with a town's name on it and "30 miles" away written next to it, we decided we'd eat there. With each mile driven we became hungrier and hungrier. And when we finally reached the "town" we looked at the sign and read, "Population 8." "You have to be kidding!" I exclaimed! >_< Needless to say, it was another few hours before we reached breakfast - or, by that time, lunch.
Finally on an actual interstate and nearing the Colorado border, the two hours of sleep I'd gotten started to catch up with me and I knew I was just too tired to keep driving. I pulled off the road when I was able to (the exits were still thirty miles apart) into a patch of gravel in the middle of a field and turned off the engine, rolled down the windows, and lounged across my seat with my feet hanging out the window. I was checking my Tiny Towers on my phone and enjoying my stretch and relaxation when I saw it. A bee. On my steering wheel. Inches from my boob. And that's when I started screaming.
I woke Julia up and she immediately opened her door and got out of the car. I did a backwards summersault over the consul and out the passenger door, Julia catching me. We looked in the car and the bee was still there. We waited but it wouldn't leave. And then it started. Bees came out of nowhere and started chasing us. No - I mean CHASING US. We started running, each in different directions, screaming and laughing, but mostly just screaming. When we'd lose the bee, we'd go back to the car, but there would be another bee or two inside. And as we stood there staring and wondering what to do, another bee would fly up to us and start chasing us again and we'd start running and screaming all over again.
This went on for a good five or ten minutes, us shouting to each other from across the field, "WHAT DO WE DO!?" when a pick up truck drove up to us out of nowhere with a couple in their early 60's and their small dog inside. The passenger window rolled down and the lady leaned out and asked, "Are you girls okay!?" A bee started chasing me again right then and I shouted, "Well, sort of. Not really. Bees are trying to attack us and our car." They both laughed and pulled over an offered us some bug spray. By the time they'd found their can of spray, we'd managed to roll the windows of the car up and look through them just long enough to be 75% sure there were no bees left in the car. We each jumped in, slammed our doors and looked around, hushed, listening for any buzzing sounds. After a few minutes we were confident enough we had at last out smarted the bees, and we drove off, never to take a rest stop again!
The rest of the drive into Colorado was fairly uneventful, save for the bee that somehow launched itself through my window while Julia was doing 75 on the highway. It feel right into my lap and in sheer panic I picked up the first thing I could find (the map and our ticket to Yellowstone) and picked up the bee and threw the whole thing out the window. Julia was a little upset about the loss of her map, but understood the sacrifices that had to be made in the name of a bee free environment.
Hours later we made it to Fort Collins to have a beverage with our friend Drew and were to Dad's in time for a late dinner.
I've done road trips before, but none lasted three days and none nearly as much as an adventure as this one turned out to be! Although it was definitely a really fun time, our last minute adventure to Water World the next day was a seriously needed respite of relaxed fun and silliness. I thought Julia was nuts when she said she wanted to go - and pay full price admission for both of us - to enter the water park for their last hour open - but what a brilliant idea it was!! ^_^ Totally awesome. And the dip 'n dots didn't hurt either. ;o) It was definitely the perfect thing to do to unwind together before embarking on the journey ahead. <3
XOXO
* License Place Game Results:
Chelsea: 14
Arizona
Texas
Nevada
Michigan
Illinois
Utah
California
Virginia
Tennessee
Wyoming
Alabama
Nebraska
Alaska
Alberta
Julia: 12
Oregon
Washington
Oklahoma
Colorado
Indiana
New Mexico
Vermont
British Colombia
Montana
Arkansas
Iowa
Wisconsin
Yellowstone (not worth points): 5
Georgia
New York
Ohio
South Carolina
Massachusetts
TOTAL: 31
** "Chelsea has an honorary mention for her 250 cows and 9 horsies during our truce, in which I had no glasses or contacts. Thank you." :oD
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