June 18-19

Miles Traveled: 835
Total Miles Traveled: 10823
We got home early Friday morning at about 12:30 am, it is nice to be home again and have our own beds back =D. Troughout all of our travels we kept count of all the different state license plates that we saw, during the whole trip we saw all the states but Hawaii, and in Yellowstone alone we saw all of them but Hawaii, New Hampshire, South Carolina, and West Virginia. During the trip we also saw Washington D.C., Guam, Mexico, and Canadian provinces Alberta, British Columbia, Manitoba, Nova Soctia, Ontario, Quebec, and Saskatchewan. We also drove through 21 states, Pennsylvania, West Virginia, Ohio, Indiana, Illinois, Missouri, Kansas, Colorado, Utah, Arizona, Nevada, California, Oregon, Washington, Idaho, Montana, Wyoming, South Dakota, Minnesota, Wisconsin, and New York. The states that we went though going and coming were Illinois, Indiana, Ohio, and Pennsylvania. When We got home we saw this sign:

June 16-17

Miles Traveled: 597
Total Miles Traveled: 9988
We left Salem, SD and headed for Jon's cousins' house in northern Illinois. We had a monotonous day of driving and stopping for gas, except for the time we didn't make it to the gas station. We didn't think about us having a strong headwind that was cutting our gas mileage. We traveled through Minnesota and Wisconsin and arrived at Bill and Judi Thompson's house and hour south of Rockford Illinois. We enjoyed the relaxing day we spent with them The Thompsons went out of their way to make us feel welcome and we had a fun and relaxing day with the whole family. Kids and adults alike enjoyed catching up with our good friends.

June 15

Miles Traveled: 411
Total Miles Traveled:9391

We left Custer State Park and headed for the Badlands. It felt rally hot like 90 but it was really only in the mid 70's. The Badlands were full of what looked like sedimentary stone formations. When we took a walk among them we found that they were cracked and soft more like dirt then rock. After lunch, we traveled across South Dakota and camped in Salem (west of Sioux Falls)

June 14

Miles Traveled 70
Total Miles Traveled 8980

We started out moving our camper to another site so we could stay another night. After Dad did a church service we drove through Custer State Park on the way to Mt. Rushmore. On the way we saw Bison, Pronghorn Antelope, Whitetail Deer,and we fed wild Burros that came to the car window begging for food. After many miles of turny twisty roads that contained 4 scenic 1 lane tunnels and Pigtail bridges we finally arrived at Mt. Rushmore. The monument was big and impressive. The new visitors complex was also impressive and includes a walkway on which we could walk up to the base of the Mountain.

June 13

Miles Traveled 586
Total Miles Traveled 8910

Today we left West Yellowstone and headed toward the Black Hills of South Dakota. We traveled through Yellowstone Park and had some nice views of beautiful Yellowstone Lake. We slowly climbed up over the Bighorn Mountains and in a high meadow stopped to watch a moose and her small calf. At Rapid City we saw a beautiful red sunset. We saw quite a lightning show on the way to Custer State Park. It was very late, dark, and raining when we varied at the campground.

June 12

Miles traveled:143
Total miles traveled:8324
Today we did the north loop of Yellowstone. We started at Mammoth hot springs,there were huge mineral formations that were being formed by the many large hot springs. The area is constantly changing, the active hot springs are wet, colorful, and steamy, whereas the inactive ones are dry, and whiteish or gray. The colors that you see in the active hot springs come from different kinds of bacteria that thrive in hot water. while we where traveling we saw a total of 3 grizzly bears and 3 black bears, we got to watch a mama black bear give its cute tiny cub a tree climbing lesson. Later in the day we went big horned sheep "hunting" along some cliffs near the north entrance of the park were a park ranger said we might see some. After stopping at several pull offs and glassing the cliffs, we were rewarded by getting to see a whole herd of big horned sheep consisting of ewes and little lambs perched on a steep cliff the same color as their coats. The lambs were jumping about while thier mamas were laying down nearby. A little farther on up the road, we got to see a ewe right next to the road and watched amazed as it easily scampered up a cliff that seemed totally unscalable to us.

June 11

Miles Traveled: 69
Total Miles Traveled: 8181

With Rachel at the wheel, we toured the 3 main geyser basins today. As usual, there were bison everywhere, but no bighorn sheep or bears :(. We took many short walks through the geyser and hot spring fields. Although there were numerous of these sites, we were impressed by how each had very unique characteristics. The kids said that the hot springs were "cool". It was odd to be wearing sweatshirts, and walk amongst water boiling on the ground. Several of the hot springs were clear and deep, and a beautiful aqua color. The Grand Prysmatic Spring, and the Exelsior Geyser Crater were colorful and impressively large (Prysmatic is the biggest hot spring in the world). We saw several geysers erupt, including the Great Fountain Geyser, Jewel Geyser, and of course, Old Faithful (twice). One of the geysers was like a sink that repeatedly kept filling up and boiling over, then draining out. At an appointed time, we all stood in front of Old Faithful and waved at the web cam, so that Grandpa and Grandma Snyder could see us. We had cell service so we called them at the same time. Tomorrow we head north to Mammoth Hot Springs, and Bighorn Sheep "hunting".