• Travel

    Mountain West Trip: Roadtrip from Jackson, WY to Vernal, UT

    June 9, 2020 - By 

    Today we’re continuing on our Mountain West Trip that I’ve been sharing. Click >>> Mountain West Trip 2019 Posts to see more about this trip. We got up, loaded the car, grabbed some hotel breakfast, and headed out for more open road! Not long after that we passed this sign that said Auburn, WY. Since we’re from Auburn, AL, we’re always interested when we see other states with towns called Auburn. It was hardly a town with a population of less that 400 people in the 2010 census. The first settlement in Auburn, WY was made in 1879. The bottom…

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    Mountain West Trip:Grand Tetons & Jackson Hole

    June 2, 2020 - By 

    Today I’m continuing on with another post about our Mountain West Trip. If you remember we left off on our Part 2 from Yellowstone. That night we stayed at the Head Waters Lodge at Flagstaff. This was a cabin like room with all the amenities you need except TV and internet. We did have a little bit of a walk from our car to our cabin, but there are sidewalks and luggage carts to help you lug all your stuff to your cabin. After a very hard sleep, we woke up and loaded the car back up and walked over…

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    Mountain West Trip:Day in Yellowstone-Part 2

    May 3, 2020 - By 

    If you missed my 1st post about Yellowstone click>>>>Mountain West Trip:Day in Yellowstone-Part 1 Part 1 is highlighted in Yellow. Part 2 is in Blue. Click map to see larger view. You can click again to zoom in even more. (Original Map Courtesy of https://yellowstone.net/) The next area we hit was Fountain Paint Pots Trail (map). This boardwalk is about a half mile (.8 km) walking loop. Some of the highlights of this area include: Silex Spring Silex is Latin for silica, which is a major component of rhyolite (extrusive igneous rock), Yellowstone’s most common volcanic rock. The clear blue…

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    Mountain West Trip:Day in Yellowstone-Part 1

    May 2, 2020 - By 

    If you missed my first few posts from our Mountain West Trip you can see those listed here. This post is from the 1st half of our epic day in Yellowstone with so many amazing sights, which means so many pictures to share. From traffic jams caused by bison crossing the road to geysers and hot springs. In this post, I’ve added some GPS coordinates and linked them to Google Maps. I kinda wished I’d done that previous travel posts, but never thought it would be that important. My Canon EOS 6D DSLR Camera has a built in GPS which…

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    Mountain West Trip:In & Around Casper, WY

    April 2, 2020 - By 

    This is another post from our Mountain West Trip. Day 3 we got up and Drew was in charge of showing us around Casper. First we drove up to the top of Casper Mountain. We saw this Coyote as we drove. Up on top of Casper Mountain is a small Ski Resort called Hogadon Basin Ski Area. Of course since it was summer it was closed, but it still beautiful up there. Beautiful views Before leaving the mountain we explored the other side, which has an Archery Range. Then Drew showed us where he was living and we got to…

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    Spring Training 2020

    March 26, 2020 - By 

    Earlier this month, before the Corona Virus became such a big deal in the U.S. we left work on Friday and drove down to Bushnell, Florida. We stayed at the Roadway Inn. Rob had enough Choice Hotel Points that we could stay for free. Saturday we got up and grabbed some packaged breakfast novelties and drove 2 more hours down to North Port. Since it was Alex’s birthday, he got to choose where to eat. We ended up at Bocca Lupos Pizza. They have one in the West Villages, which is just about mile from the new Braves Stadium where…

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    Mountain West Trip:Wyoming Road Trip

    February 28, 2020 - By 

    This post is continuation of our big Mountain West Trip we did. Here’s the first post in case you missed it>>>Mountain West Trip – Colorado Springs We got up that morning and checked out of our hotel in Castle Rock and headed to Wyoming, with romantic country music sang by a good Romantic country music songwriter playing in our car for a fun trip! Our final destination for that day was Casper, WY, where Drew has been since May. While I was so anxious to see him, I was excited to see more of Wyoming and explore it a little…

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    Mountain West Trip:Colorado Springs

    January 29, 2020 - By 

    Our older son, Drew, was in Wyoming for an internship for the summer so we planned a trip to the Mountain West; Colorado, Wyoming, Utah in early July of last year. We flew out on a Wednesday evening and landed in Denver, CO, got our rental car drove to Castle Rock, CO where we had a hotel for the night. Comfort Suites Castle Rock 4755 Castleton Way, Castle Rock, CO 80109 The next morning we got up and drove to Pikes Peak. Alex wasn’t with us when we went a few years ago, so we knew this was a must…

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    Pacific NorthWest Trip Page

    January 22, 2020 - By 

    This is the landing page for our Pacific Northwest Trip, where we traveled the Washington Coast, Seattle, Part of the Oregon Coast, Cannon Beach, Ecola State Park, Portland, and more! (Click on any of the pics below to see related post.)

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    Pacific NW Trip: Grand Floral Parade & More

    January 19, 2020 - By 

    When planning this trip and knowing that the Rose Festival would be going on we structured it so we’d be in Portland at the right time. We decided that since we were here during the Grand Floral Parade that we needed to go. I was glad we did. It was also Fleet Week, which is always a sight to see. We were hoping to get over to ships after the parade to get a tour of one of the US Naval Ships but we missed it by a few minutes. So instead we walked up to the near by bridge…

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    Pacific NW Trip: Exploring Oregon Coast

    December 20, 2019 - By 

    In this post, I’m continuing to share about trip to the Pacific Northwest. This is the day we spent on the Oregon Coast, which is always my favorite. We first drove out to Cannon Beach. There’s several lots where you can park for a small fee as well as free street parking, which is what we ended up doing. After we parked we looked up on the internet to see when low tide was, because if you want to look for sea urchins and star fish you need to plan ahead. Luckily for us, low tide was about to occur…

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    Gatlinburg Fun & Soccer Tourney

    December 13, 2019 - By 

    In early December we headed off to Gatlinburg for a soccer tournament. Follow your team’s journey with the detailed match reports by SportScore. Friday Friday we worked half a day and then went and check Alex out of school. Came home and loaded the car and picked up #5 to try and make it to Gatlinburg in time for their Christmas Parade. Our friends, the Farrows were there with their younger son, so we met up with them at the parade. Here I am with Julia. I loved that they had a car that looked like the one from Christmas…

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    Pacific NW Trip: UW Tour & Mt. Rainier NP

    December 11, 2019 - By 

    University of Washington Tour The last day in Seattle began with a tour of the University of Washington that was done for the conference attendees and their families. Walking the campus, I loved the mixture of —style and new modern buildings. Here you see Gerberding Hall (GRB) on the right and Suzzallo Library, which are both Collegiate Gothic style of architecture that is so beautiful. This library is probably the most iconic building on campus. This is the Graduate Reading Room, which takes up the entire western side of the library at 250 ft.long, 52 ft. wide, with a 65-ft.…

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    Trip to Kentucky & Ohio

    October 30, 2019 - By 

    This is a really long post, but I decided to include everything in this one post because I’m desperately trying to get caught up on all these travel posts. Rob had a conference in Covington, KY, which I tagged along for to add a couple more states to my bucket list. Saturday Saturday we left after Alex’s soccer game and headed to the airport. Flying above the clouds and seeing the sun go down. We flew into Cincinnati/Northern Kentucky International Airport (CVG).  They had some really cool skeletal replicas, but we were in a hurry so I just snapped a…

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    Pacific NW Trip: Riverboat Dinner Cruise

    October 19, 2019 - By 

    Here’s my 2nd post to continue Day 5 from our Seattle Trip. I did the first post about Alex and my trip to Snoqualmie Falls. That evening we met up with Rob to get on a Riverboat for a Dinner Cruise. We boarded the Virginia V behind the University of Washington School of Oceanography, which is a special location just for this private event. The water way near the School of Oceanography is the Portage Bay which connects to the Lake Union. After boarding we went to the open bar and got some drinks. Soon after that they stocked the…

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    Pacific NW Trip: Snoqualmie Falls

    October 16, 2019 - By 

    For today’s post, I’m continuing to share about our Seattle trip. I’m actually splitting this day into 2 posts. This post is about Alex and my trip out to Snoqualmie Falls, which is a beautiful waterfall about 30 miles east of Seattle. It’s located between Snoqualmie and Fall City, Washington. We parked at the Lower Observation deck. When we got there, I was happy to find a nice bathroom before walking to the falls. As we followed the trail to the sounds of the falls, I heard a woodpecker. I glanced over and saw a woodpecker through the trees. As…

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    Weekend trip to Mobile

    September 26, 2019 - By 

    Back in August, we took a quick little getaway to Mobile for the weekend. Alex had gotten the first few days of school out of the way and Drew and Caitlyn were about to start school. So one last little hurrah before the major grind for the fall. We left right after work on Friday, drove 3 hours, got checked in, and found a place to eat for dinner. We ended up walking to Von’s Bistro, which was within walking distance of our hotel. We stayed at the historic Battle House. I got the Southern Hog Tacos, which were pretty…

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    Pacific Northwest Trip: Seattle Sightseeing

    August 31, 2019 - By 

    If you missed my first 3 posts from our Pacific Northwest trip, here’s the links to those: – Pacific NW Trip: Quinault Rainforest to Olympic National Park – Pacific NW Trip: Seattle Mariners Game and the Waterfront – Pacific Northwest Trip: Sightseeing in Seattle We took the hotel shuttle to the Seattle Center, where we stopped the day before, but Alex wanted to play on the playground some more. As I mentioned in my last post, the Seattle Center is a really interesting place. The playground is like nothing I’ve seen before. On one side is the colorful and oddly…

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    Pacific Northwest Trip:Sightseeing in Seattle

    July 26, 2019 - By 

    If you missed my first 2 posts from our Pacific Northwest trip, here’s the links to those: – Pacific NW Trip: Quinault Rainforest to Olympic National Park – Pacific NW Trip: Seattle Mariners Game and the Waterfront Here’s Rob figuring out where to get breakfast in the hotel lobby, as well the Seattle Flat Iron building and a Target downtown. We checked out of the hotel and went to a Russian bakery called Piroshiki on 3rd 710 3rd Ave, Seattle We ordered their Meat Piroshki and a Raspberry Roll. We shared those 2 things and if it weren’t for that…

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    Pacific NW Trip: Seattle Mariner’s Game & the Waterfront

    July 2, 2019 - By 

    If you missed Day of our trip click here –> Pacific NW Trip: Quinault Rainforest to Olympic National Park. Today I’m sharing our 2nd day in Washington. We left Sequim after breakfast at the hotel and drove straight to Bainbridge Island to get on the ferry to Seattle. We had thought we would park and walk around, but it was still pretty early. Nothing was open yet, so we just decided to get in line and head on over to Seattle. The ferry we took was quite large with several decks just for cars. If you got out of your…