Saturday, September 7, 2013

Thursday the 5th of Sept. (catch up post)

Grand Victorian B&B where we stayed one night in Jackson Hole, Wy.


Flowers on the porch of our B&B

Dean waiting for the Triple A tow. Our brand new battery turned out to be a dud. Cramped our style for about half a day

The view of the Grand Tetons at sunset from our cabin on Lake Jackson inside the Nat'l Park.




This is our first night here but after 3 days I still haven't tired of taking pictures of these majestic mountains

Dean enjoys wine on the deck our first night here


Sail boat on Lake Jackson at sunset


Up close and personal

These mountains are VERY LARGE. The pictures don't do them justice.

Wednesday, September 4, 2013

Day Two, Leaving Nevada, Entering Utah, Idaho and Wyoming

Somewhere in Idaho, from the car window at 75 mph

 Not much narrative tonight other than I was glad to be out of Nevada. We didn't leave the hotel until about 10:00 a.m. and didn't hit Idaho until about 2:00 p.m. A beautiful, windy trip along Hwy 30 gave us a gorgeous scenic view of alpine meadows and big sky country wrapped in pine trees, Cottonwood and Aspen. I'm guessing in another month this beautiful valley area will be enveloped in golden yellow. We enjoyed it tremendously with emerald green landscape capped off in bright blue skies and fluffy white clouds.
Cattle roamed free range along these back roads and kept my driver alert, :-)
Open range cattle along Hwy 30, MaCammon, Idaho

Big sky country, beautiful valley in Idaho

Fisrt peek of the Snake River, Wayan, Idaho
When we first saw the Snake River I thought it was going to be in close competition with the Rogue River or the Willamette River near Eugene, Oregon. They are all beautiful and I would be hard pressed to name a favorite.


Dean at the View Point, Snake River, Wyoming

a bunch of people doing the white water thing on the Snake River


I can't get enough of The Snake




Tuesday, September 3, 2013

Day One, The Road Through Nevada

Breakfast, Fox & Goose, in Sacramento
 So we stopped off at the Fox & Goose at 9:00 a.m. for breakfast this morning with the idea in mind that we would eat a big breakfast and then we wouldn't be hungry for dinner until we got to Wendover, NV. Wendover is our "usual" stopping place when traveling I-80 toward Colorado Springs or in this case the Grand Tetons. It is a gambling town in the middle of "Nowhere Nevada" and consists of fast food joints and casinos. But the Wendover experience comes later

Somewhere in the middle of the Nevada desert
  On the 8 hour trek from Sacramento to Wendover I shot a few photos out the car window of the Nevada topography and the ever changing weather today. Obviously we had thunder clouds but didn't really reach thunderstorm status until we reached Winnemucca. Winnemucca, my favorite place to hate. I call it Winnefucca and do so in knowing that is not an original thought. Everyone thinks that. You can not pass through this town without hating it. Dusty, hot, hole in the wall town that it is and it never disappoints.
Nevada desert continued from the car window
Fortunately, Winnefucca isn't too far from Wendover (about two hours distance) and we drove out of the thunderstorm in short order. We checked into the Rainbow Hotel and Casino and got a room for the bargain price of $50.00 for the night. Although billed as smoke free, the place still reaked. I'm sorry, I'm negative but I just hate the whole gambling/casino atmosphere. It is our only choice when traveling through Nevada. O.K. so now I have brought us to the point of check in and we did actually go have a nice dinner but at a different hotel which we had to shuttle to because the restaurant at our hotel is closed on Monday's and Tuesday's. Whatever!!! The dinner was 80% very nice but sufice it to say that it was spoiled by a few things, the least of which was the drunk fellow at the next table with his wife that wanted to have a VERY loud conversation with her about when one could collect social security and then ended the conversation, at the top of his lungs in the restaurant with, "I have to go urinate!!" to which his wife replied, "would you like me to show you the way to the men's room?" and then he eloquently replied, "NO!!!! I don't want you to show me the way. Would you like to hold it for me too while I urinate?"
I'm not even kidding!! this was the dinner conversation in the restaurant tonight. The poor woman was embarrassed and humiliated and I felt her pain.

Nevada desert at 80 miles an hour.
My goodness what a start to our journey. The dinner would have been good except they cooked mine incorrectly and therefore they gave it to me free!! Not bad for a steak that was suppose to arrive as medium well only to turn up raw. O.K enough with the negativity lately.
I'm exhausted and ready to call it quits for tonight even though I know I'm not done.
Love to you one and all,
Diana Jo