Weekly Mileage #119 and More Road Trip Fun

What a view!

After Sunday's storm, Monday was much calmer, though the skies were still overcast.

the colors were pretty spectacular!

We went to Badlands National Park, where the kiddos did their Junior Ranger books. Ocean joined Sunshine and River in this, though of course I did most of the work. He thinks he's such a big kid now.

The contrasts of the rock formations with the green grass and yellow sweet clover is beautiful. Though apparently the sweet clover is invasive....

After we finished at the visitor center, we drove through the national park and exited at Wall, SD. I remember going to Wall Drug as a kid (I think on the way home after my grandparents 50th wedding anniversary celebration?) and though we've driven past it several times over the years, this was our first time stopping.

those faces! I could not get a picture of them looking pleasant...

at least she cooperated

I don't remember much from that first visit other than jackalopes and cinnamon salt water taffy. I didn't see any salt water taffy, but we did find some jackalopes. I feel like Wall Drug is much more of a tourist trap than it was 30 years ago, but that's what's helped it survive since 1908.

the boys wanted a photo with the giant stuffed jackalope

these are the jackalopes I remember....

While we were in Wall, we stopped by the National Grasslands visitor center for more Junior Ranger fun. I wasn't sure that it would be worth our time, but it was actually pretty interesting and Sunshine said it was one of her favorites. This visitor center covers the 20 national grasslands in the US. If you're in the area, it's worth a stop!

notice Ocean now has a vest- it's actually the one River was using, which was originally Sunshine's

this year is Smokey Bear's 75th anniversary, so the kids each got goodie bags at the visitor center. one of the items in the bags were these scarves- doesn't he make a cute junior ranger scout?

Our original plan was to boondock on the wall, just outside Badlands, but our timing was off (we arrived in the morning, instead of late evening) and we were worried about mud because of the storm we'd battled the night before. Reports indicated that the mud is a slippery clay mud that you can very easily get stuck in. The mud was a non-issue for us since our timing was off, though we did see several intrepid people parked along the wall, so I guess it wasn't that bad.

After that we hit the road and drove to Devil's Tower national monument in Wyoming. We squeezed in one more set of Junior Ranger badges just before the visitor center closed. Fastest we've ever worked through those packets! Good thing they weren't too difficult (difficulty varies by park and we have definitely found some that were much more difficult than others). Devil's Tower is quite striking- it rises up above everything and can be seen from some distance away. It's equally impressive up close.

5 minutes before closing....

It was still light, so we hit the road again and drove to Casper to spend the night. We'd been looking for potable water all day (and the day before), but couldn't find any anywhere. We finally found a gas station in Casper that had potable water for $15 (!!). Highway robbery, but we were running on empty and really needed to refill the fresh water tank.

Tuesday morning we stopped at a rest stop somewhere between Devil's Tower and Martin's Cove to dump the tanks and finally found <free> potable water. So disgusting. We did top off the tank, but that didn't change the fact that we'd paid $15 for water the night before.

After dumping the tanks, drove to Martin's Cove to pull a handcart to the cove. We visited 6 years ago, when I was pregnant with River, and we toured the visitor center and surrounding buildings. I wasn't feeling up to trekking out to the cove with a handcart, so we skipped that portion. This time around we skipped the visitor center and went straight for the handcarts. But this trip was ill-fated as well. We only lasted about a quarter mile before we turned back- we have never seen so many huge mosquitoes at one time. Mr M bore the brunt of their attack and he was just covered in them (seriously- no exaggeration- his back, arms, and legs were black with giant mosquitoes trying to suck him dry). We'd put bug spray on, but it clearly wasn't effective.

pretty easy going with no payload slowing us down

I pulled the cart on the way back so Mr M could concentrate on swatting mosquitoes ;)

We'll have to return sometime when it's not so hot and the children are big enough not to be carried away by or completely drained by the mosquitoes.

We had planned to visit Craters of the Moon (another location that we have passed multiple times in our travels, but never visited), but we wouldn't arrive until after the visitor center closed, so we decided to try later and just head for Boise.

That was a good decision as I'd been feeling a little off in the morning and by mid-afternoon I was feeling really crummy. I ended up switching seats with Sunshine so I could lay on the sofa and try to rest.

While it stinks to get sick, the timing was about as good as it could be since we ended up staying in Boise for the rest of the week. I laid in bed and felt crummy while Mr M kept the kiddos occupied.

Summer bowling programs with free games for the kiddos, trips to the park next door, and so on helped keep them busy. On the Fourth of July I was still sick in bed, but everyone else went to a pancake breakfast and parade, and then a fireworks display later that night.

Friday I felt a little better, but Mr M insisted on taking me to an urgent care facility to get a strep swab done. My tonsils looked worse than I've seen them in a really long time. Despite that, the test was negative, so I just had some nasty bug, not strep. I think the kiddos went bowling again and to the park again. I was hiding in the RV, trying to keep my germs to myself, not feeling good, and hacking my lungs out, so I don't remember the details of everything they did :)

Saturday I was still sick, but on the mend, and I watched the kiddos while everyone else went to the Meridian temple. I felt worse again after that, so I stayed home while everyone else went to a cousin's birthday party that included swimming (always a hit with our kiddos).

We've had good cell signal most of the trip so far. The only time we really haven't had any was in the middle of Wyoming. We feel like the networks have improved their coverage since we were last out here two years ago, but we're also not going to the same places, so it's hard to tell definitively if this is true.

Weekly Mileage
0
total- 0 miles

13 hikes towards #52hikechallenge
1.25 kayak miles towards #365milechallenge

68.53 outdoor foot miles towards #365milechallenge
15.87 indoor foot miles towards #365milechallenge
80.0 bike miles towards #365milechallenge
165.65 miles total