Browsed by
Tag: forest fire

Cities of the Ancients – Hovenweep and Mesa Verde

Cities of the Ancients – Hovenweep and Mesa Verde

The main attraction in Utah’s Mighty 5 national parks are natural rock formations. After visiting Canyonlands and Natural Bridges it was time to start exploring some human created formations. We headed to Hovenweep National Monument and Mesa Verde National Park. These sites (along with many others in the four corners region) contain the ruins of ancient civilizations. Specifically, Ancestral Puebloan communities that built large elaborate villages near canyons and cliffs. Hovenweep National Monument Hovenweep includes six different villages spanning the…

Read More Read More

An Announcement and an Eclipse

An Announcement and an Eclipse

First Things First We don’t want the announcement to get eclipsed (see what I did there?) so let’s start with the reveal. No, we didn’t get a dog. Sorry to disappoint. Our announcement is that Tom’s starting e-learning development work again on a contract basis. We’re extremely excited about this because it’s the first big step in making this new lifestyle sustainable for the longer-term. So what does this mean for the blog? Well, I’m going to take over more…

Read More Read More

Smoke on the Mountain – Mount Rainier National Park

Smoke on the Mountain – Mount Rainier National Park

We had one main goal for our visit to Mount Rainier National Park: See Mount Rainier. We lived 3 hours away from the mountain for over a decade and the most we’d seen was a glimpse of Rainier’s snow covered top from a distance. We’d never been up close and personal with the behemoth. Seeing Mount Rainier sounds pretty easy right? It’s a giant mountain after all—just look up! Well it didn’t turn out to be quite that simple. Wildfires…

Read More Read More

Things Go Wrong on the Road – Glacier National Park Part II

Things Go Wrong on the Road – Glacier National Park Part II

Glacier National Park. The park that we were most excited to explore. Amazing lake hikes, beautiful waterfalls, and the most spectacular white peak mountain views. Glacier is also the park that kicked our asses. We cracked the radiator getting here. Our computer broke. Stan popped a tire on the bumpy roads and needed new brakes from all the mountain driving. And I suffered a mild case of Bell’s Palsy. Part I of our adventure had its ups and downs. Determined…

Read More Read More

Things Go Wrong on the Road – Glacier National Park Part I

Things Go Wrong on the Road – Glacier National Park Part I

We made it! Glacier National Park may be the place we were most excited to go as we traveled the country. 1 million acres. 130 lakes. 200 waterfalls. The Rocky Mountains. How can we go wrong? We decided on a primitive campground on the southeastern edge of Glacier National Park called Cut Bank Campground. It was down a 5 mile dirt road. We didn’t realize it was a super rough dirt road. While Stan makes for a cozy rolling home,…

Read More Read More