Mountain Men and Yellowstone

Sulphur Beds!

Geysers!

This is YELLOWSTONE!

It is the height of tourist season.  We had noticed this in Glacier, but were now headed to the oldest National Park in the nation and by far the most popular.  Keaton later described it as a Disneyland flavored national park.  While there are "day-hikes," Yellowstone gets its name from the massive amounts of sulphur deposits created by the systems of geysers, mudpots, springs, etc.  But we had a church to see before we arrived in Yellowstone.

Following the 90 and a few state highways down the Continental Divide, we ended up in the town of Seeley Lake.  Nathan's grandpa had been a backwoods pastor in the real sense.  One could almost say a backwoods missionary.  Three of the churches in Eastern Montana, Al Pullmann had built with his own hands.  One was out of the way in Eureka, one we had passed in a town in Condon, and the last we were stopping at in Seeley Lake.  In a fortuitous turn of events, the cleaning lady was just finishing up, so we got to see the church inside and out.  Nathan's grandfather was a master carpenter who used wood in almost every facet of the three churches that he built. Unfortunately, the pastor was not there.  Nathan signed the guest-book and listed his family history so that everyone would know the descendants of the first pastor had tread here again.  That sounded overly dramatic, but we were hoping it was as cool as something like that.

So, we ended up in Yellowstone late afternoon to discover that every campground inside the park was full (surprise).  We also discovered shortly that every campground outside of the park in a 20 mile radius was ALSO full (less cool, but ok).  The ranger reminded us that in any National Forest in America (including the one surrounding the entrance to Yellowstone) we could camp anywhere as long as we were 100 feet from water and 500 feet from the road. The only problem now became finding a flat spot in which we could camp.  After all, we were in the Rockies.  These weren't even foothills, they were the ROCKIES.  After driving several miles deep into the African rainforest...err, American National Forest, we came across a turn-out.  We decided we'd find something here or bust.  The "happy" medium we found was somewhere in between.  We climbed up a deceptively large foothill (it seemed smaller from down below) only to find false crests, more sagebrush, and a notable lack of anything truly flat.  But, we had dragged our stuff up this mountain, so we were going to make a comfrotable night of it.  At least, we were going to make a night of it.  The good side entailed watching a beautiful and long sunset at high elevation.  I don't think pollution makes the beautiful colors of the sunset; I think they've always been there. At any rate, Wyoming (technically DEEP southern Montana, but whose keeping track) had them just as good as Orange County or LA had.  The down side had us eaten alive by mosquitoes.  Retiring into our sleeping bags simply for protection, we wondered why there had to be so many mosquitoes.  Why not just enough to feed the bat and bird population, and no more?  Maybe they reproduce more after the Fall.  

We woke up the next morning still pretty tired and rather sore (sagebrush does not provide a very comfortable sleeping surface).  Heading down the mountain, we jumped in the car and car-toured Yellowstone.  Almost immediately we saw a couple bison; I'm convinced the rangers teach them to pose.  The ones near the road always seem so picturesque.  It also felt like a theme park; we didn't even have to leave the car to snap a picture of the buffalo.  We then meandered through the park mostly in the car, getting out to walk past the sulfuric fun along the boardwalks provided.  After admiring Old Faithful and the rustic lodge built almost entirely of lodgepole pine, we headed down and out of the gigantic park and into Grand Teton.  Yellowstone is an awesome park, but there were far too many people there to make us want to camp the night there. We saw almost everything they had to offer from the road, which involved quite a lot of getting out.  We also covered both Eastern and Western roads, since after we did Grand Teton we came back up through Yellowstone to get back to Nathan's house.  Here we'll share some of our favorite picture-postcards from the land of sulphur and hot-springs.

The first night, we almost stayed in this abandoned pump-house (it's interesting to notice how much National Forest used to be private land).  This pond actually fed an irrigation ditch that had been out of service for more than a generation. We saw the farmhouse to which is belonged down in the valley, but couldn't find a way to get to it.  The pump-house ended up not really being structurally sound enough (nor big enough) for four men...

                      

so we opted for the MOUNTAINSIDE (it looks a lot tamer than it is):

          

hopefully these pictures provide some scale as to the size of the thing.

Here we are on top attempting to record the sunset while ignoring the skeeters.

                          

And finally, some favorites from inside the park:

Camping - Alpine Lakes and Glacier

Now, if you've read more than two sentences of this rather loquacious blog, you have realized that we do everything on a budget.  Our accountant, Allen, has done an amazing job at keeping track of the numbers and ensuring that our output does not exceed our input.  We applied this same principle to camping.  When preparing, our first stop was REI... then we realized we had just graduated from college and nearly everything in that store was far out of our monetary reach.  So then I remembered a sporting goods chain in the state of California, Big 5.  Other than monetary issues, our other hitch was space.  What more could we fit into the trunk of a Toyota Camry? Four sleeping bags and a tent?  Not likely.  So, which to buy, the bags of the tent?  We opted for bags and two tarps, which folded much flatter than any four man tent could have.  

We did end up paying for this mistake, but more on that later.  Before we even got to Glacier we had two camps to stop at and entertain.  The first camp was Hans Zeiger's church camp.  We had been in touch with the pastor there and showed up at his church camp just after lunch time.  They gathered the teenagers and adults into the main room and we sang from all of our sets: sacred, pop, and barbershop. Afterwards, about 17 super-moms came to our rescue and decided that we needed to be fed.  We did not disagree and after a delicious lunch of flank-steak, mashed potatoes, and corn, they asserted that we must take food with us.  An entire cardboard box full of food later, we swam in their lake for a bit and went on our merry way...VERY well fed.  :)  

We weren't in the car long when we arrived at Nathan's old Lutheran camp.  He had been there many years in a row with his dad for pastor's camp. The location was ideal on Flathead Lake (a large lake that will be on any map of Montana you see).  The water was limpid and felt very glacier-fed.  There was, however, a high dive!  After a couple dips, however, we decided just to try our muscles on top of the water and not in it.  Keaton, Nathan, and I grabbed a canoe (with permission) and canoed around the lake for a bit over an hour.  Keaton got stuck with a gimpy paddle and a less-than-ideal seating location, but performed admirably.  It was comforting to know that I still have some of my scout skills (steering a canoe).  Nathan, as usual, was essentially our motor...pulling the canoe through and against the current on the way back. Now, the only stop left was Glacier for two nights!

The GPS eventually got us all the way to the Going to the Sun Highway (which I thought was ridiculous overstatement for a road).  But, believe it or not, Glacier and its main highway lived up to its reputation of beauty. If I were to give it a review I would say that it exceeded expectations, but then again, I don't think God often cares about our reviews.  So long as His created beauty turns us toward him.  I wish I could just tell the story of Glacier with pictures, but it is a massive beauty so hard to catch with a single lens.  The depths and heights of Glacier is half it's grandeur.  We entered the valley floor at about 4,000 feet about sea level, with 10,000 foot mountains towering over us.  No foothills between us and the cliffs.  Straight up! Carved in a deep U-shape by a glacier.  The first night we only did driving, and already had two bear-sightings!  On the way into Glacier we had counted ten bald eagles.  I had never seen so much wildlife so easily and it was only going to get better.  I had a list of things I'd never seen and this week of camping shrunk my list of American species rapidly.

But, a true adventure is a mixture of suffering and joy.  We had our suffering first to get it out of the way.  Around nine o-clock we noticed that most of the park was full, no campgrounds.  We were finally granted the handicapped spot near a beautiful lake over which a storm was blowing in.  We had about 15 minutes to come up with a solution that didn't have all four of us sleeping in the car.  The Eagle Scouts, Allen and myself, would sleep outside.  We set up the picnic table near the lip of a retaining-wall and stretched a tarp across the tarp to shield us from the rain and drain it away from us. Placing our second tarp underneath, we tossed our bags in, crawled in, and hoped for the best.  The best we did not, in fact receive.  Allen, as it turned out, was at one of the lowest elevations of the campsite.  Thus, he ended up with most of the water in his bag anyway.  (We're not stupid, it was just a lot harder to see these things in the dark.  And, ok, maybe we were a little stupid).  At about 3am, he gave up with half his body soaked to the bone and entered the car.  I huddled close to the retaining wall for the rest of the night with the bottom half of my sleeping bag wet.  Attempting to sleep in the fetal position close to a wall is a strange experience.  It was some of the worst sleep of our lives.  The guys in the car didn't really have a much easier time of it, except that they were dry. We poured out sincere supplications that our next few nights of camping would be dry.  

We woke up the next morning and waited for the sun to peak over the massive granite cliffs. Once it had, we used its warmth and light to find a camp-site early and dry out our soaking wet sleeping bags, clothes, shoes, etc.  Then, we continued up the Going to the Sun Highway and found a day-hike right off of Logan Pass.  As typical of this time of year (the height of tourist season), the trail to Hidden Lake was packed with crowds of all ages and languages.  Keaton, who has been keeping track of all the state license-plates all along, scored big and found nearly all fifty in the National Parks we were in.  Once we got past the boardwalk section which provided an "easy way" to the overlook (in spite of massive snow-fields all around), we could continue on a real trail down to the lake with much less traffic.  On the way, we saw many a hoary marmot and figured out very quickly that the mountain goats had grown fully accustomed to human traffic on their trails.  A couple mothers and their babies grazed high up on the mountain.  Down closer to the lake two different males were meandering right by the water.  Oftentimes, they did not even try to get out of our way.  We kept a respectful distance; they did not.  Allen nearly had to climb into a tree to get out of the way of one of the bigger males.  :)

We hiked back out and camped that night, warm and dry.  We were still on the ground, but we are young so are bodies can handle that.  The next morning, glorious and bright, we hiked a tiny nature trail through one of the oldest stands of trees in the park and found a few cool places to take pictures.  We found a hollowed out tree that was still alive on top, but could fit three of us in the bottom.  :)  From there, we had to say goodbye to Glacier and head down that day to Yellowstone.  There were a couple planned stops along the way to see a bit more of Montana and Pullmann family history.  But this post has gone on long enough without pictures.  Here they are! 

Yes, Glacier provides a beauty almost impossible for us amateurs to capture on film. 

Here are our best attempts.

These were just some of the sights we were able to see right from the road.  Land of a thousand waterfalls this place could be called.  

The pass, well, we didn't have to hike to that... so this is a joke picture.  :)  The goat, was much closer than that, but who can get their camera out as a mountain goat walks towards you?  And the passes full of snow, yes, we were hiking on those.

  

These last three are from our first camp.  Allen and I spread the tarp from the picnic bench to the other edge of the screen.  That was our "tent" during the thunderstorm.  Be Prepared, eh?The other two are from the camp the first night--beautiful, when dry.  :)

    

How many college grads can you fit in a tree?

                               

From Coeur D'Alene to Camping

Leaving Seattle in its typical (though some friends beg to differ) cloudy rain, we continued up and over the Cascades once more.  The higher latitude brought out a different aspect of the Cascades; though we didn't believe it possible, they actually grew greener and wetter.  Stopping on the highest mountain at a tiny little ski resort to gas up, we smelt the "dearest freshness, deep down things" as Hopkins once described it.  The world is indeed charged with the grandeur of God, it rushed down the slopes of the Cascades right into our eyes, noses, and ears. Eastern Washington continued with the typical "desert-side" of most mountain ranges, but it was by no means as desolate as the deserts of California and Nevada. 

It was late afternoon when we arrived in Idaho, but we couldn't really tell the difference as the cloud-cover had not let up much the whole way.  The rain, lightly sprinkling on and off, was quite refreshing after so long in the dry south-west and western US.  Coeur D'Alene, literally translated to "Heart of the Awl" and mysterious in its nominal roots, was already gearing us up for the foothills of the Rockies.  The Jenkins' family, with whom we stayed, lived on several acres outside of town in a true log cabin just finished by their father.  He was a logger who explained to us a lot about the business of designing and building a house where the walls, insulation, plumbing, and wiring all had to work around solid logs.  There wasn't much drywall or plaster in the place.  It's rustic beauty suited the countryside around it quite well.  We also found ourselves not only in the warmth of a cabin, but also once again in the radiance and glow of a big family.  They knew how to cook well for four post-college guys and we ate our fill.  The next morning, they helped us plan our route to Glacier and through their knowledge of the area and helpful atlases, we were ummm....ready... for our camping trip.   

Puyallup and Friends

We faced the worst traffic we had ever seen on the ENTIRE trip in Olympia.  Nathan nearly pulled the steering wheel off the car.  It took us an hour to move 17 miles.  It was NEVER explained. But, we did arrive in one piece and were greeted by Jody's parents.  It was a shame that Jody was in DC, but we got to see our housemates childhood home.  They were, of course, full of Jody stories, but so were we.  :)  They provided us with delicious snacks before our concert, and had advertised so well for our concert that we had our biggest crowd!  Plus, there were three Hillsdale alums there: Hans Zeiger and his family, Jules and her family, and Eric Blanchard.  Afterwards, we caught up with all of them.  Hans gave us a place to perform in Montana at a camp he had worked at near Flathead Lake.  Jules and the rest of us went back to the Lent's for dinner.  After a delicious dinner, Nathan and I went back towards Olympia to pick up Anna Stinogel and took her and Jules and Keaton up to the house of Jeff Myers.  Now, if any of you know anything about Jeff Myers... a very good time was had by all.  :)  Jeff is hilarious.  He told us about his future plans and we showered him with stories (mostly the ones embarrassing me).  We had good cheese, good beer, and some awesome conversations.  We returned home and hit the hay.  Idaho's panhandle was waiting for us.  We had many memories from Washington, but alas... not many pictures.  :(  Sorry.

Portland and Environs

And so we continued through the Pacific NorthWest, through the National Forests and deep into the Cascades.  Unfortunately, a fairly thick cloud-cover prevented us from seeing a lot of the volcanic beauty around us.  We crossed the border into Washington and found (eventually) the house of the Sims.  They live nestled in an old farm house with four grown kids and the youngest (Catherine) still romping around the grounds of an orchard, a delightfully British garden, a christmas-tree farm (or a piece thereof), and some delicious berries.  Catherine gave us the grand tour of the grounds and the house.  The house seemed to fit the family perfectly. One big bedroom for the five girls to line up their beds and books.  One small room for the boy to dream big and prepare his adventures to the center of the earth.  After our concert at Holy Rosary, Catherine and I slipped into Portland to have some fun.  As it turns out, neither Catherine nor I nor are GPS were very good at getting us around Portland.  That, however, did not prevent our having a good time... and even meeting some of her friends.  

While we didn't quite make it to the VooDoo Donuts place that KPay had so ardently recomended, we did stop at a coffee shop with a musical flavor called the Rimsky-Korsakoffee house.  It was filled with fruits and nuts, but I have come to expect that of the Left Coast which I called home for 18 years.  It's color had a certain appeal, though.  There is something I love about individuals being themselves and not putting up with a lot of pop-culture stereotypes.  I guess I think of it as them that much closer to real truth when they'll at least question the cultural air they breath.  But, many of them still don't.  We still have the working definition of a hippie as someone who will kill a baby before an animal.  And, yes, we cursed them frequently in the car.  "Damn hippies!" became our favorite apophthegmatic expletive to shout as if we were ornery old men. Perhaps the only adjective that doesn't yet apply is old.  :)

After the coffee-shop of fruits and nuts and some lively Catholic conversation at a level too loud not to give offense to the many free spirits in the room, we gallivanted off the a close Chinese restaurant with a couple of other friends of Catherine's and one of the older siblings of her brood.  Our gallivanting found us a parking lot more than 10 blocks from where we needed to be, which perturbed the older sister in this picture enough to complain vociferously... but we decided to love her anyway.  After some tasty Chinese food, we had not the energy to continue our adventures in the strange city of Portland... so we headed home.  The night continued well with good conversations turning over any and every examination of every good thought and read we had had that summer... but alas, Tom did not have infinite energy (take note, all ye who disbelieve it).  I went to bed, tired, but happy.  The Pacific Northwest God has filled not only with awesome natural beauty... but good friends with quaint houses and awesome land.  :)  The next morning brought the most beautiful mass that Allen and I had yet been to and a drive up to a very old friends house, our housemates parent's Jody.  And that was adventure full of other delightful friends.  I'm sensing a theme developing...a theme augmented with ornate variations.

In a totally random side note, while the Lutherans were waiting for the Catholic's mass to end...they went to see a waterfall just outside of Portland.  I leave you all with some pictures of their adventures.  

Nathan playing hide and seek in something that looks like a cave, but really wasn't:

And the waterfall itself.  Each one is so different, I don't know if we can tire of the beauty of all the ones we've seen, from Niagara to Multnoma.

Sisters and Bend - A Whole New World

And we struck off up the Oregon Trail.  Then our OXEN DIED!!  Ok, not really. But we were all headed toward territory none of us had explored before: the Pacific Northwest.  None of us had been to Oregon before.  We expected tree-huggers, hippies, fruits, and nuts.  We were a bit pleasantly surprised to find a lot of sane people in addition to the aforementioned motley crew of liberals.  After a rather boring drive through the desert side of Northern California and into Eastern Oregon, we noticed a subtle change.  Eastern Oregon began to give way to taller and taller foothills which separated long, flat, fertile valleys.  The beauty increased steadily as we approached the center of the state.  In the West, we had taken the least amount of Interstate.  Our serpentine route up the coast and into the heart of Yosemite required almost entirely state highways.  What a difference it makes,not only in terms of speed, but also in terms of what you see out the window.  These foothills joined up with a mountain range that is geologically connected to the Sierra Nevada.  The Cascades, however, differ profoundly from the mountains of the Sierra Nevada.  Much of the beauty in the Sierras was either carved by a glacier or happened naturally with tectonic movement. The Cascades announce their volcanic roots from the beginning.  Their perfect conical shapes, disrupted at the very top by a tangle of reaching rock, wretchedly barren, belies the glacier and volcanic influence in their development.  Their beauty if astounding, and we got to stay with our friend Katelyn Pay right in the middle of it all.  Sisters, Oregon is a resort town where many Oregonians go in the summer to vacation. Blanketed in snow in the winter, the summer meadows, streams, and mountains offer a beauty that I had not often heard advertised (read: never).  

KPay had arranged a couple surprises for us aside from the breath-taking beauty.  A graduate from our class, Cameron Wilkens, came out to hang out with us and see our concert.  Our concert was at an Episcopal Church in Sisters and had the three mountains which named the town as the backdrop to the altar.  It was a gorgeous country church with a good sound.  Afterwards, we chilled at Red Robin.  Waking up early the next morning, KPay led Keaton and I on a bike-riding/kayaking tour of the area around Black Butte Ranch.  We had to get up to Portland, but we were a little sad to leave all the beauty of the Three Sisters (Faith, Hope, and Charity are the names of the mountains) and their surrounding valleys.  But, in Portland (or just outside it), was waiting a dear friend and an area I had been longing to see for a long time.  :)  And thus we directed our Garmin to the house of Sims.  Pictured above is Mount Washington, the view just as we headed up to Portland.  

I shot a man in Reno... just to watch him die

As macabre as the title is, it is really just a reference to the Johnny Cash that we listened to on the way out of California (after a tasty dinner and stay at Allen's dad's house).  An old friend had arranged us a place to stay; alas, we did not have a venue in the wonderful rodeo town of Reno.  We noticed that it was a bit less seedy than Vegas, but we didn't stay long.  In typical Katie T. style, I easily convinced her (as I was already convinced myself) that we should show the guys Lake Tahoe and eat dinner there.  Lake Tahoe borders California and Nevada and is exalted to the skies as the largest, deepest, and arguably most beautiful alpine lake.  It is 1,644 feet deep and 192 square miles.  Thankfully, we now have the camera back and can show as well as tell about the lake.  We went to a great Mexican restaurant where we were strangely served by a Polish emigrant (only in America).  Nathaniel had a Lengua burrito... cow tongue in the vernacular.  It tasted a lot like liver (YES, we all tried it).  We then drove back watched Ocean's 13, sang a bit for Katie T., fixed her router, and went to sleep (not all in that order).  Here is our proof that we have in fact been to what Katie calls the "bottom of heaven" because it is so beautiful.  

Random side story evoked by pictures.  When in Missouri, we had been very close to the boyhood home and stomping grounds of a rather favorite author of mine, Mark Twain.  His biography of Joan of Arc I will recommend to everyone until I die.  It annoys my close friends how often I talk about him and that book.  At any rate, on the way to Tahoe, at a gas station, we MET Mark Twain. Ok, real story... a kindly old man with a wizened face honed for humor was sitting on the bench reading a newspaper.  He was clearly a gentleman in his white suit out-bleached only by his white mustache and head of hair.  I sidled up to him in  a manner that I knew would put him at ease, affecting my most gentlemanly southern accent, I asked him what he was reading.  He congenially told me about the weather in the places he had recently travelled.  He had apparently just spent the summer in San Francisco and remarked that he had never had a colder winter than his summer in San Francisco.  I chuckled at the witticism and joined him on his bench.  Here I am, basking in the salt of his wit:

And here I am, proving how fast we forged a friendship in minutes!