Rocky Mountain Wet - Colorado

Wyoming

Entering yellowstone national park. Bubbling things here we come. Yellowstone national park was actually one massive volcano a long time ago. Anyone who has watched the b grade movie, supervolcano, will already know that.

The first critter that we actually saw was very unexpected. A 1 foot long snake crawling across the sand.

The walkways make it very easy and safe to walk around the hot stuff without falling in.

But occasionally some children run off and can't find their mummy and daddy. Luckily that sort of thing would never happen to us.

The blue bits of water apparently the hottest towards the centre of the pools.

It is amazing how long you can stand next to a bubbling pool of mud taking lots of photos and still never capture it.

We were listening to arrange a talk about guys is when all of a sudden some steam started coming out of the ground behind her.

We didn't see very many bison. I had to chase this one a little bit to catch photo. Olivia likes to call them muscle man.

Just your everyday drive down the street with an elk across the front of the car

Straight out of jellystone we came across grand teton national park to the south. The weather was starting to get very rainy looking.

Before it rained we managed to set up the tent and start a fire.

That night after the storm we went for a walk down to the beach next to an awesome lake. Olivia was very excited when she found a brown rock.

The next morning we had several visitors on the tent obviously trying to get out of the rain.

Instead of standing around in the rain at grand teton we decided to blast through wyoming. We were heading for a climbing spot called wild iris. It is a set of cliffs at over 10000 feet.

We got in a couple of climbs before the weather started closing in again. As we were walking back to the car about 1 and a half miles we heard third lots of thunder and there was lots of lightning and rain.

Despite the storm and the fact that we couldn't see where we were going other than by the track, the walk back was very enjoyable.

Heading east once more through wyoming we noticed lots of different types of landscapes. This photo was of the granite mountains.

Further along near the continental divide there were lots of places where you could see the ground had risen up.

It is amazing what millions and millions of years will do.

end note. If anyone is ever thinking of stopping in a town called rawlings think again. But if you must never ever go into a diner called cactus jacks where sa heavily pierced waitress will grouch around and a very unqualified cook called Ernie will make you burnt steak, burnt salmon and inedible other foods. If you are in a place where the waitress never comes and ask the other guests how their food is, leave.

Rafting

Time to leave the camp ground near Aspen. The great thing about people with campers is that they can just stop anywhere and do some cooking or some sleeping. I would hate to be in the site next to this guy when he pulls up and fires up the grinder and circular saw.

We headed to a place called Glenwood springs to look at doing some rafting.
It wasn't until we were heading up the main street, an hour or so early, that Shannon noticed a sign pointing to the grave of Doc Holiday. It was a good ways up in them thar hills but we got there and found that there was a grave stone but that they didn't really know the actual spot where he was buried. We told Olivia that she should watch Tombstone when we get home so that she could hear something more of his life, albeit a little embellished. She simply replied, "I'm your huckleberry".

Speaking of cowboys, this was at the rafting place and this guy is one of the "dudes" from the rafts. I had previously mentioned something about some rafts having a dude that rows them. Now Olivia kind of thinks that it is the official term for the person regardless of whether they are male of female.

 She volunteered for a demonstration of what to do when someone falls out of the boat.

 We were in a raft with about 6 other folks. The lady at the back is the "Dude".

 We started off with some pretty easy stuff. Mild grade 2.

 Thanks to the rain, we got a bit more larger stuff too although any of the biggest stuff didn't make it to a photo for obvious reasons.

 Well, one of those reasons was that the dude, "Shana" convinced me to sit on the bow where I managed to get smashed by some big waves.

 After seeing the fun of it all, Olivia joined me where we went through some fun stuff. It certainly wasn't just for the flat bits.

Eventually, even professional dudes get tired and Shana asked if Olivia could help on the main oars.

2 hours later and we were on the shore, a bit wet and cold. Everyone had a great time.