Slowly traveling eastward

Traveling from ND into SD today seeing some of the following weird stuff


Prong horned antelope in a cornfield


Grasshopper about to eat Nita


40 foot tall ring neck pheasant


Monster farm family

Theodore Roosevelt National Park, Medora, ND

The park has a primitive campground about 5 miles up from the entrance on the Little Missouri River that flows through the park. Beyond the campground is a 20 some mile loop up and down through the Badlands in the park. We spent about 3 hours doing the loop while stopping to take pictures and taking some hikes.


4 prairie dog pups


Buffalo gorging on the yellow sweet clover


This rattler was on a hiking path that I first mistook for a buffalo chip


Badlands scenery in the park


Nita went to bed early and I took a walk, when I returned we had a visitor right behind our motorhome.

We got away from the loonies and came to our cents

Yesterday morning we departed Drumheller for Medicine Hat, Alberta. It rained all the way to MH, when we got there they said they were under a flood warning due to heavy rains north of there. We decided to pass the attractions at MH since it was raining and we didn't want to float down stream. Went straight south on a road called wild horse and crossed the border at wild horse into Montana. Spent all our loonies before leaving MH, the Canadian dollar is a coin with a loon on it, nicknamed a loony.

Wild horse road from MH to Havre, Montana was well over 120 miles with no fuel stations nor much of any thing else. What few homes there were were collapsing and abandoned, no power lines in sight, some cattle. It was kind of a weird scene like the movie North by Northwest where Cary Grant was out in the empty plains by himself and all of a sudden was attacked by and airplane. Fortunately we weren't attacked and had enough fuel to get to Havre. We were boarded by the US border patrol and they confiscated our tomatoes, I complained that they were US tomatoes we brought into Canada, they asked for proof, had none, bye bye tomatoes.


Wild Horse road, it goes on to infinity


Old abandoned church on wild horse road


Gertrude gopher bribed out of her burrow with cantaloupe


In the dinosaur town of Drumheller there was a different Dino on about every corner.

Dinosaurs at Drumheller, Alberta

After talking to a native in the Drumheller rv park last night he convinced us not to miss visiting the Royal Tyrrell Muesum. The title Royal means it was commissioned by the Queen who has visited there. If you are interested in fossils starting 730 million years ago this place is outstanding. Alberta geology is one of the many places very productive of fossils and dinosaurs. There is a large preparation lab here where workers are actively removing stone to reveal the imbedded creature.

I could have spent a few more hours there but my partner who hung in there for almost 3 hours had enough. We then took the 40km dinosaur trail loop requiring a ferry ride across the Red Deer River. Add in some shopping and doing some overdue laundry finds us in Drumheller for another nite. Will leave for somewhere in the morning.


This is a massive Museum with several floors


Preparation lab


Ammonites are extinct hard shelled, coiled, squid-like marine creature. This one is about 2 feet across and preserved in this manner are both fossil and gemstone.


I don't even come up to the 1st leg joint of this Dino


Terrain here that yields fossils and dinosaurs

Banff to Drumheller

We spent the morning roaming around Banff. It's location with the mountains and Bow river is stunning. The town keeps the place immaculate as do the home owners. It draws folks from around the world and lots of money flows in to keep it attractive. The Fairmont Banff Springs Hotel is a landmark and has almost 800 rooms.

We departed Banff and headed over to Calgary, the geography changes from mountains to plains. Calgary is a big city and as we got closer the traffic got congested and we decided we didn't want to fight it, so headed north east and ended up in Drumheller, why in the hell did we do that. The Canadian government has information offices scattered about the country designated by a ? mark, they are great, any thing you want to know about attractions, accommodations, etc, they can answer. You come away with maps, brochures, books and other stuff. Anyway, a lady at one office recommend Drumheller as the dinosaur capital of Canada. As we came in to town there are dinosaurs on every corner doing something, one was on a motorcycle. The one shown below at the Drumheller ? is reputed to be the largest one in the world. Another claim to fame for Drumheller is that Clint Eastwood made the movie Unforgiven in the area. So here we are camped out for the night in beautiful downtown Drumheller, not really, debating if we should visit the Royal Tyrrell Dinosaur museum tomorrow?


Fairmont Banff Springs Hotel. How would you like to raft down this white water, a good 15 feet drop just behind the center fir trees


There's that ? shown on the side of the info office. Big dude isn't he.

Misc photos

mountain goat motor home


Nita has a little trouble with the altitude and walking, as I walked up to the glacier she kept her eye on me with binoculars from the motorhome. Many years ago the glacier extended down to the parking lot.


Not sure what kind of deer this is, has a white tail and kind of stripes on his neck


Crow foot glacier with frozen lake below


Street scene in neat little Banff

Rockies continued

All of the animal photos were taken as we drove along, sometime we spot them in the woods and turn around, some come out and stand near the road and the long horn sheep will walk right down the road and pay no attention to humans or cars. Those who hike the trails see many more animals.

We stayed at the campground in Lake Louis last night, the tenting section is surrounded with an electric fence to discourage the grizzly bear, they can destroy tents if they want in. The section for hard sided trailers and motorhomes have no fence, one strolled through this morning. As we checked in this evening at the Banff campground they warned they had bears.


Spotted this grizzly about 40 feet off the road eating something in the grass, there was water in a ditch between us so felt kind of safe, he paid no attention to me.


Aqua colored glacial lake


This girl walked into this icy water in her sandals, asked if I could take her photo, said yes, then boyfriend wanted in the picture. Don't know how they could stand in that icy water.


Buck elk munching on some tender grass, his new antlers are still velvet


Long horned mountain Sheep oblivious of their dangerous situation

Canadian Rockies

We entered BC, Canada, drove north and spent the night in Golden. Friday morning we crossed over the mountains and down into Lake Louise, Alberta. From there we drove north on the Icefields Parkway toward Jasper. The scenery and animals are spectacular.

More than half of the motorhomes on the road are occupied by Europeans and Asians that rent them in Victoria and tour western Canada.


This is Lake Louise by the Chateau Lake Louise. The lake is a beautiful aqua blue with the sun shining, however took this photo while it was cloudy and sprinkling.


If you click to enlarge this picture you will see 8 white mountain goats in the middle. I took this with a telephoto lens, they were well over a mile away and several thousand feet up.


Athabasca glacier, it was a good hike up here.


Big horn mountain sheep, this is a ewe and they have small horns, she had a lamb with her but it scampered off when I approached.


This is the male, you can tell their age by the major grooves or rings on their horn, this one about 3 years old. They are loosing their winter coats. They were eating small shoots of a plant growing up through the gravel.

Shoup to nuts

Wednesday we followed the Salmon river going north from Challis on 93 past the town of Salmon. We stopped at a nice campground right on the river where Chris and I walked around the river and later played Cathy's game of Pig with dice, she gets wild playing the game.

Thursday morning we decided to take a trip Shoup, 18 miles of back roads along the white water Salmon. Part of the road was gravel and you had to duck the sharp rocks on the road that had fallen from the mountain, we were nuts. The scenery was beautiful in the valley along the river, along the way we went past a group of elk. Shoup is basically a country store with a couple of cabins. It exists due to seasons of activity of rafters, hunters and fisherman. We were the only visitor this day, Chris treated us all with a milkshake made by Dan the proprietor.


Relaxing along the Salmon river


Wild game of Pig


This is Shoup. Nita enjoying a milkshake. According to Dan these gravity gas pumps are the only in use in the US.


The cabin comes with this chair set on the veranda.


This morning we sadly parted company with Chris and Cathy who had to return home, we had a great time with them. We stopped for the day on Flat Lake just south of Kalispell, Montana. Tomorrow we will cross into Canada which is about 2 hours from here.

Layton, Utah

Saturday we arrived at Chris and Cathy's home in Layton, Utah, our son and daughter in law. They have a camper and we have been looking forward to travel with them up into Idaho and Montana. Before we left Chris and I loaded up on groceries and he let me drive his beautiful Corvette, wow does it go. We departed Sunday morning, drove through lava fields near the Craters of the Moon Natural Monument. Monday we drove the Sawtooth Scenic byway up through Sun Valley, Stanley and Clayton. This is beautiful country to travel through with sights of antelope, elk and mule deer.l



Chris and Cathy's dog, Ellie. Poor Ellie didn't get to go on the trip.


Picnic with the Sawtooth mountains in background


Galena summit at 9000 feet


We have been following the Salmon river for many miles. This is the town of Salmon, note the wooden owl mounted on the front of the Owl Club on the left.


The poor owl gets shot at by bow hunters who may have had too many drinks, note the one arrow that missed the mark on the right. According to a local the owl club removes the arrows from time to time, but the owl hunters come right back.

Off to a good start

Colder than h... in Telluride last night, 36 degrees. Woke up and the clock said 7:45, still not very light, figured the surrounding mountains reduced the light. Got Nita up and said its late and let's hit the road, then discovered our faithful atomic clock went haywire and it was 5:45. The city park has no electricity and you can't start generators till 8, so, no coffee, we got on the road early and stopped for breakfast at a cowboy cafe, friendly folks there.

When we left the cowboy cafe we had to cross a culvert at an angle, this rocked the boat too much and, according to Nita, our unbreakable Corelle dishes flew our of the cabinet for a stress test, half didn't pass.

We arrived in Moab, Utah mid morning and decided to take a trip through the Arches National Park.



Unbreakable Corelle dishes.


Hope that balancing rock stays in place


Cactus in bloom


One of the many arches


3 wise men?