Day 3

This morning we woke up to a beautiful day and Stevie’s birthday!  In the morning, Stevie, my dad, Cannon and I wondered down to the visitor's center to check out the options of what to do and to see the mountains.  Cannon and I wondered on a bit further to hike a short trail which led to a spit with a fabulous view.

When we returned to the cabin, we gave Stevie his presents and a cake that we had hidden from him.

After checking out all the possibilities, Stevie decided to do a rafting trip down the Snake River for his birthday.  This was not exactly a high-adventure white water rafting trip, but more a scenic, relaxing drift down the river.  The guide was excellent, though, and gave us history of the area as well as pointing out some wild-life (like some pronghorn deer and several bald eagles).  The most exciting part was the brewing storm over the Tetons.  While it started out a beautiful, sunny day, the minute we hit the river the sky over the Tetons turned black.  Never fear, we never got wet but we did get a beautiful lightning and thunder show!

After our drift down the river, we went back to the cabin for a bit before heading over to Jackson Lake Lodge for a special birthday dinner.  The Lodge had the most amazing view of the Tetons and we were treated to the sun setting on the mountains while eating a spectacular meal which included buffalo tartar, elk steaks and Idaho trout.  Yum!  All in all, I think it was a pretty nice way to spend a birthday.

Day 2

We headed out of Boise this morning flying along at the 80 MPH speed limit!  Love it!  No, actually, with a stiff cross wind going it was a little too fast.  We soon diverged from the highway to head up a two-lane road that lead us into south central Idaho.  Before driving to the Grand Tetons, we are taking a side trip to a place called Craters of the Moon National Monument.  

Craters of the Moon is an odd geographical section of the state that closely resembles the lunar landscape.  In fact, in the late 60’s astronauts came here to train for their missions to the moon.  The barren landscape is formed by large lava flows left here by explosion as recent as 2,000 years ago.  There are all kinds of features like caves and lava tubes and domes and cinder cones.  It was strangely barren and strangely beautiful.  The weird thing is that while driving through remote Idaho, the landscape so suddenly changes.  One minute it’s like a high dessert and the next, it’s black lava flows.  The other weird thing is that for all the lava around, there is no distinguishable, large volcano.  In fact the eruptions were all "fissure eruptions" or lava that pushed out through cracks in the earth's crust.

One of the caves - we didn't have flashlights so we couldn't explore the smaller caves.

An example of pahoehoe lava

Crazy lava fissures

 

This was a crazy large hill that was made from tiny bits of lava.  When the lava shoots up into the air and cools in the air, it forms tiny pieces.  These were blown by the wind and formed this hill, which in essence, is like a giant sand dune.

On top of the world!

Crazy beautiful clouds and sky

This was Cannon and Emmy's recreation of the scene in Lion King.  Think "Circle of Life"

After spending several hours here, we piled back in the van and headed on to the Grand Tetons where we were to meet up with my parents who flew into Salt Lake City and then drove up.  This was by far the longest part of the journey – particularly after I realized I made a wrong turn and added an extra hour to my journey.  We came in on the west side of the mountains and then had to drive up and over them.  The top afforded a great view down into Jackson Hole.

Looking down onto Jackson Hole

Swinging down and down and down the mountains, we drove through Jackson before entering into the Grand Teton National Park.  We are staying in the park in an original Jackson Hole homesteading log cabin.  It was certainly rustic, and when it was stated as a two-bedroom cabin, that’s exactly what they meant.  Two bedrooms and one bathroom and that was all!  Still it was a place to lay your head and it meant we were in the middle of the park.

National Parks tour

We’re off today on our next great adventure – a trip to the Grand Tetons and Yellowstone!  Day one included 9 hours of driving east through Washington, cutting across the northeast section of Oregon and across to Idaho where we spent the night in Boise.  

It's a lonely road...good job we had enough gas!

The boys made the most of the rest stops by playing frisbee

I was really excited about seeing the countryside since I’ve never been east of about Ellensburg in Washington.  It was exciting to see all the changes in topography and the different landscapes.  All of it was beautiful and all in its own unique way.

Nature's bounty

The weather has been beautiful and my garden has been going nuts.  We have more peas, beans, zucchini, squash, kale, tomatoes and potatoes then we know what to do with!  Yesterday I pulled in 14 pounds of squash, 6 pounds of green beans and a huge bowl of blueberries.  I've been channeling my inner Martha Stewart and making blackberry mint jam (really yummy), pickled beets and lots of zucchini bread, muffins, cakes and brownies (actually, really, really, really yummy), not to mention the bags of frozen beans, swiss chard, shredded zucchini and the likes.  Holy cats!

July is the only month the full moon rises behind Rainier.

I didn't check the garden for 2 days and found these giant monsters.

Cannon's 14th birthday

Cannon turns fourteen today - Happy Birthday Cannon! 

For the last few weeks I've been asking him what he wants for his birthday and he has decided he neither wants nor needs anything.  Boy, that's a pretty lucky spot to be in, I told him. 

The only thing he did want to do is go paintballing with Stevie, London and some of his friends. So on Sunday we headed up to Bremerton with his water polo buddies, Nate and Bobby.  This course was billed as a "family-friendly, first-timer's course" and since everyone but Nate had only played once and Nate had never played at all, that seemed like a better choice than the course on the military base!  Still, I think there were some serious players out there...

Suited up and ready to go.  No, Emmy didn't play!

That's Stevie on the move with London laying cover.

I'm pretty sure that's Cannon shooting - it was a little hard to photograph through the mesh fence.

I think that's Nate and Bobby

 After round one, they're beginning to look a little colorful!

Stevie decided he was a good target as he got hit about 6 times in the first game.

Afterwards they were tired, sore, hot but happy!

Good job he was wearing his mask.

 Poor Stevie was post call when we went and he had had no sleep except the 20 minute nap in the car on the way to the course.  I think he was feeling it.

Emmy - looking cool

Cannon

Happy London

While the boys played, Emmy decided that she and I would have a girl's afternoon and get our toes done!  So after watching the guys play a little, we drove back into town and found a nail salon to have our tootsies beautified.  She was in love with the massage chair and the lady doing her feet was in love with Emmy.  She even painted a free flower on her big toe.

Afterward, we headed back to the house for a cook-out and cake.  Emmy was insistent on decorating the cake and she chose a mustache theme.  The evening rolled into an impromptu sleep-over which the boys stayed up until 6 am.  Consequently, Cannon was a little tired on his actual birthday!  Happy birthday, Cannonball!