Day Two - Coeur d'Alene to Cody - the full story

Dad woke me up SUPER early on Sunday morning (5:30am on a Sunday, seriously?!) We ended up on the road about 7am. Yeah, I was thrilled. It’s a good thing I was looking forward to Yellowstone! The lovely Shirlene fed us breakfast and armed us with snacks (raspberry muffins that are DELISH) and away we went. Spent the morning driving through the mountains of Idaho and then into Montana.

Montana was gorgeous! The sky really does feel bigger there, it’s simply amazing.

We made a couple of short stops for fuel (both us and the car). One short stop turned into half an hour because the gal making sandwiches at the Subway in Three Falls, MT was brand new and super slow. We eventually made it to Yellowstone.

Dad thought that when we entered the park that we’d be entering Wyoming at the same time… But we didn’t see a sign! Since we’d decided to capture all of the state signs as we encounter them, we were bummed to miss WY’s. And then we saw it! When you enter the park from West Yellowstone, you’re still in MT for a few hundred feet. We almost missed it for real though! It’s a cute little sign –

Dad talked up the wildlife he saw on previous trips to Yellowstone. I was hoping to see a bear or wolf or something crazy. We saw a few deer, a few elk and of course, the bison! Some of the animals are tagged with radio transmitters (check out the deer shot!) It was so wild to me – they just chill along the side of the road. Cars and people all over the place and the animals just do their thing. They could care less about us. :)

We stopped and saw these incredible bubbling pools at Fountain Paint Pot. There were all different kinds, bubbling mud, random little geysers and pools of hot water that just steam.

And then we made our way to Old Faithful. We got there a little earlier than I would have liked, it was a little on the chilly side. ;) We sat down on a bench and waited (more or less patiently) for Old Faithful to do her thing. About a minute or so after we sat down, the sweetest lady started talking to us. She never gave us her name or age, but she and her husband (Carl, 83 – got his info!) were celebrating their 59^th wedding anniversary. They’re from Dallas and were traveling with a tour around Yellowstone and the Grand Tetons. She was a kick! Carl had been walking around and at one point after he joined us, she hooked her thumb at him and said, “This crazy thing…” At which point Dad just started dying of laughter. I can’t even remember what she was saying we were so fixated on “this crazy thing”. Dad decided that’s what he’s calling me for the rest of this trip. My guess is that next week it will be Adam. ;)

Sure enough, within a couple of minutes of the time Carl said, Old Faithful made her appearance. The benches were PACKED with people and cameras. I, of course, was one of them. Based on the way the wind was blowing, we had a pretty good spot! The geyser shot up and the steam blew to the right. Pretty awesome!

After that we toodled out of the park and on the path to Cody WY. Dad was expecting something pretty small like Kellogg, MT but it turned out to be good sized. We got a room at a Comfort Inn, grabbed some dinner at Irma’s (cool looking bar + animal heads ALL OVER) and then we crashed. It was a long, but wonderful day.

Tweets Across America!

Alright, since I'm still stuck behind a desk in Seattle I've been fooling around with some things. The most notably is the new twitter feed you'll notice in the sidebar. Since doing a full blog isn't always possible until late in the day you can now follow the trip in real time through twitter, just search for #wroblog.

Also if you notice there is something major that's being missed by only a short distance send us your suggestions with the same hashtag. Actually if you have anything that you'd like to add about the trip tag it. Any questions, comments, gripes, complaints or needs for clarification can all be funneled in this direction.

I know that Rebecca is going to keep up on this, it might be more of a struggle getting Dad to embrace the technology, but we'll just have to wait and see. Who knows maybe he'll become the biggest thing to hit Twitter since @KanyeWest.

Day Two - ID to WY

It's late. We're beat. I'm about to fall asleep in bed with the laptop. Tonight you get pictures. Tomorrow you'll get witty stories to go with them. Good night!!!



Check out the set so far here - http://www.flickr.com/photos/rebeccajeanne/sets/72157624778008938/. It includes yesterday's images too. :)

Name the PT Cruiser!

I have been bugging Dad for a while now to name the car. I always name mine! He said the only way he'll go along with it is if I A) get name suggestions and B) the public votes! So I need some help people.

Leave a comment here! I'm currently thinking Patty the PT Cruiser. Help a girl out!!!

It's a beautiful Idaho morning!




- Posted using BlogPress from my iPhone

Day One: Seattle to Coeur d'Alene

Randy & Rebecca here!

Our first stop was 8 blocks from breakfast to pick up ice for the cooler and a couple of sodas (the pop machine at Julia's was busted! Doh!) As expected Rebecca had to stop by the little room (micro bladder). Yes, really. Eventually we made it onto I-90.

The first REAL stop was in Cle Elum, WA. This was a real bathroom stop. ;) (Aren't you loving all of the detail???) We didn't grab any pictures, we were too busy getting cookies! YUM.

We got back on the road with our treats. We pulled into Spokane at 4pm. We need to pick up a couple of more memory cards for our cameras (go team Canon!) so we hit up the Costco in Spokane Valley. Only to find they had none. LAME. We got right back in the car and headed out to the final destination of the day - Coeur d'Alene, ID.



We were gracefully received by Shirlene at her lovely home at the foothill of a mountain in ID. It's lovely here! We even saw deer before dinner. :) We were served a wonderful meal (Jake, I got you the recipe!) during which, I (Randy) got to tell one of my all time favorite stories of Rebecca's youth. It's definitely my favorite story of one of the kids driving. Ask me about it sometime, it's GOOD!



So I (Rebecca) was working on making a few quick adjustments to today's images, when I saw Dad in the corner of my eye with his new Flip UltraHD camera. He started coming in real close... Check it out for yourself! ;)



Good night! We've got a long day tomorrow in Wyoming!

Day 1 - Seattle, WA or "And they're off!"

It begins.

I just got back from the kick off breakfast. Rebecca and Dad are probably on I-90 right about now barreling east towards Coeur D'Alene, ID. We had a bit of a rocky start but it all worked out in the end.

The plan was to meet at Voula's down on Lake Union to start off the trip with one of the "Diners, Drive-in's and Dives". Now I'd mentioned that every time I've tried to go to Voula's its been closed. So Dad double checked the hours online and it said they'd be open. However when we arrived they were very much closed. Something about a tailgating special. I didn't really understand, but had a smug sense of "I told you so" about it.



So instead we cruised up to Wallingford to Julia's. Great place. They have good food and a pleasant atmosphere. In the end I think everyone was very pleased with the selection. Dad had a Denver omelet, Sharon had French toast, Rebecca a pancake with blueberries and I went for the biscuits and gravy. Mmmmm gravy.



It got a little strange when Rebecca requested some peanut butter and they brought her about a cup and half dish of it. She then smothered her pancake in it and topped it off with some strawberry jam. I've never been one for PB&J but it made her very happy.



After eating I tossed my giant bag in the car, so I don't have to check any luggage, and they took off. As I'm writing this I'm realizing it's not terrible interesting. Hopefully future posts will be more so. Or maybe they won't be. We'll just have to wait and see.

Oh yeah! There are pictures to go with all of this but they're on Rebecca's camera. They're going to add their own take on this and some photos when they get to Idaho. Check back for updates.

I'm here too! ;)

So far you've heard from my brother and my dad and I'm sure you were ALL wondering, is that girl going to blog too? I've been busy yo! Though apparently not as busy as Dad who hasn't blogged in 15 months. ;)

Anyway, to get to the point, I cannot WAIT for this weekend! Tomorrow is the last planning lunch before we roll out on Saturday. Ever since Dad brought up the idea of this trip I've been looking forward to it. I did some fun stuff this summer (shot a wedding in PR with a good friend, camped for my birthday and most recently hit the OR Coast) but I've been REALLY psyched about this road trip. I couldn't tell you the last time I spent a week with just my dad. 1996 maybe? Whenever it was, it was a long time ago!

I'm really looking forward to some quality time hanging with my dad, checking out some places I've never been but always wanted to go to and meeting up with some photographer friends in DC. Political rally schmally - I'm brunching! :)

Can't wait to get out on the road!