TravelStream™ news feed for member 2jgstl on TravelPod's free travel blogs service http://www.travelpod.com/syndication/rss/2jgstl en-us Copyright ©2009 TravelPod.com Mon, 05 Oct 2009 22:16:36 -0400 http://www.travelpod.com http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/2jgstl/1/1254794155/tpod.html http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/2jgstl/1/1254794155/tpod.html#comments Travel Blogs http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/2jgstl/1/1254794155/tpod.html Mon, 05 Oct 2009 22:16:36 -0400 2jgstl's Great Adventure

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Chesterfield, Missouri, United States

We arrived home at 4:00 pm this afternoon. Along the way we stopped for carry-out barbecue ribs in Dexter, Missouri, and fuel in Pevely.

The great adventure has come to an end. This has been the trip of a lifetime, and we are not sure how we can possibly top this one – but we are definitely going to try. We drove the motorhome 11,935 miles and the car another 7,050 miles. Many of those miles were on dirt and gravel roads. Relatively few were on interstate highways. We have no idea how many miles we hiked and walked. We flew hundreds of miles in small airplanes, landing on gravel strips, beaches, short runways, and water.

While in Canada we experienced 9 national parks, 12 national historic sites, and 2 provincial capitols. In the United States we visited 13 national parks, 26 other sites run by the national park service (monuments, historic sites, scenic riverways, and preserves), and 6 state capitols. We enjoyed microbreweries, countless museums, 4 major gardens, whitewater rafting, and glaciers galore (walking on, flying over, viewing from boats, trails, and airplanes). We saw bears, caribou, wolves, lynx, musk oxen, moose, several types of bighorn sheep, mountain goats, eagles, numerous kinds of other birds, all of the varieties of salmon, puffins (and many more marine birds whose names we no longer can recall or spell), whales, seals, sea lions, and sea otters. We crossed the Arctic Circle, lived with the midnight sun, drank sourtoe cocktails, and became accustomed to fireweed blooming along the road.

Through it all we lived in less than 400 square feet and avoided killing each other. Our rig performed quite well under difficult conditions.

This trip has whetted our appetite for far more travel and adventures. We will keep you posted when we venture out again.
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Van Buren, Missouri, United States

We started this morning by enjoying the views around Big Spring (formerly Missouri's first state park). This water source generates 250 to 850 million gallons per day. We drove to the park headquarters and visitor center in Van Buren. We learned that the park contains more first magnitude (over 65 million gallons of water per day) springs than any area of the world. From Van Buren, we took the "Spring" Tour. We travelled to Round Spring, north of Eminence, Missouri, and Akers Ferry (a very popular canoeing put-in spot). Both of these are on the Current River.

Next, we headed to Alley Spring to see the Mill, beautiful spring, and one room school. This spring is blue colored because it is so deep. We found a beautiful picnic site in the large area that used to be the state park campground. Last, we drove to Blue Spring along Missouri Highway 106. The last three miles took us down a gravel road to the trailhead and a half mile walk to the spring. This deep blue spring is similar to Alley Spring and possibly even prettier.

By 4:00 we were home at the coach. We had driven 180 miles through some of the most beautiful forests of the Ozark region. Along the way, we picked up 6 passport stamps.

Suddenly we realized that our sightseeing for the trip is complete. Tomorrow we drive home (to our official place of residence). We are sorry to end the great adventure, but it is always best to quit while you are still having fun. Besides, we have all of those horrible things to do like dentists, doctors, financial advisors, etc. The coach will be emptied, winterized, cleaned (not looking forward to that job !!), and put into storage for a couple of months.
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Van Buren, Missouri, United States

We had originally planned to drive on to Jefferson City, Missouri, and collect another state capitol stamp. We decided to change plans and drive to Van Buren, Missouri, instead along US 60, to visit Ozark National Scenic Riverways. This was created in 1964 along the Jacks Fork and Current Rivers as the first scenic riverways national park site. It includes some of the former state parks (Alley Spring, Big Spring, Round Spring) where Jim camped in his youth. These are some of the finest canoe floating streams in the Ozarks.

We chose to stay in the Big Spring Campground in the park. This is much nicer than an RV park.
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Fort Scott, Kansas, United States

Just as we did yesterday for Tallgrass Prairie, we got up this morning and drove back west to Fort Scott, leaving the coach in the RV park in Nevada, Missouri. This fort is in the middle of the town. It had an interesting history guarding the Indian Frontier in the 1840s, escorting settlers along the Santa Fe Trail, sending units to fight in the Mexican War, and training soldiers for the Civil War. Most of the buildings have been restored or rebuilt.
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Nevada, Missouri, United States

We returned to Emporia, hitched up the car behind the coach and drove on to Fort Scott, Kansas. Our intention was to tour Fort Scott National Historic Site in the morning. Unfortunately, we could not find an RV park any closer, so we drove on to Nevada, Missouri, another 20 miles east. For the first time in many days, we were no longer on US 50. For the first time in 4 months, we found ourselves back in Missouri, our home state.
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Tallgrass Prairie National Preserve, Kansas, United States

We closed up the coach this morning so that it was ready to roll, but left it parked in our site at Emporia RV park. In the car, we drove back west on US 50 about 20 miles to Strong City and Tallgrass Prairie National Preserve. The land for this site was purchased by the National Park Trust and given to the Nature Conservancy, but managed by the National Park Service. The enabling legislation required the land to be held privately – Kansans are somewhat leery of the federal government and wanted to keep the tax revenues rolling.

We toured the large 3 story limestone barn and ranch house. The barn was built with ramps, so that horses and wagons could haul things into the upper floor. We then took a ranger led bus tour of the prairie. This is native tallgrass prairie – the flint hills area is much too rocky to plow. Some of the grasses are over 6 feet tall. For good ecology, the park service burns about 30% of the park each year. This fall they are introducing a small buffalo herd back into the area. The buffalo are coming from Wind Cave National Park in South Dakota.
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Emporia, Kansas, United States

We left Lamar, Colorado, this morning, headed for Emporia, Kansas. If you have driven across Kansas, you know how exciting today was. Jim had to hang onto the steering wheel, as we had strong southerly winds – cross winds, since we were heading eastward. We stopped for fuel in Dodge City, but otherwise there is little to report.
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Lamar, Colorado, United States

We left Alamosa, the Sangre de Cristo Mountains, and the sight of several Colorado 14ers. From an elevation of 7544 feet in Alamosa, we drove through La Junta, Colorado, elevation 4052 feet at about 10:00 am. It was just a few more miles to Bent's Old Fort National Historic Site. We made it just as a tour bus was unloading, so we tagged along with their tour. This fort was a fur trading post, similar to many others that we have seen. The national park rangers in period costumes and acting as interpreters gave a fantastic tour.

After the tour we had a quick lunch in the coach and continued on to Lamar, Colorado. We arrived here in time to check into the RV park, unhitch the car, hook up, slide out and level, and hop into the car for the 50 mile drive to Sand Creek Massacre National Historic Site. This site was just established two years ago. It memorializes the Cheyenne and Arapahoe Indians who were slaughtered by the US Army and a force of Colorado volunteers. After securing our passport stamp and chatting with the ranger, we walked the short trail overlooking the battlefield. We will have to return to this site in a few years to see how it develops.
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Great Sand Dunes National Park, Colorado, United States

The first order of business today is to wish Happy 86th Birthday to Jim's mother – Betty Grossman.

We dressed in hiking clothes, packed a picnic lunch and headed back to Great Sand Dunes National Park. After parking at the dunes parking lot, we left our shoes in the car and wore Tevas to trudge across the sand and climb up the sloped dune ridges. We saw people "surfing" the hills with boogie boards, snow boards, skis, and saucer sleds. Climbing the dry sand at 8,000 feet altitude is tough work.

We returned to the car and drove to the beginning of the primitive road (Medano Pass Primitive Road). The first few miles allow two wheel drive cars. After the “Point of No Return”, only high clearance 4 wheel drive vehicles are allowed. We have 4 wheel drive but not high clearance. Our plan was to drive to the “Point” parking lot and hike a half mile to the Sand Pit picnic area. We put water and lunch in a day pack and headed down the trail. Surprise, this was more hiking through the sand. We found the picnic area nestled in the willow trees and overlooking Medano Creek. This part of the creek has water year round. After lunch we hiked back up the trail to the car. It was time to drive home and relax for the afternoon. This is something we seldom do !
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Great Sand Dunes National Park, Colorado, United States

We left Montrose this morning heading for Great Sand Dunes National Park near Mosca, Colorado. Last night we debated where to stay. We knew that the park campground could not accommodate our 42 foot motorhome. We also got information on nearby San Luis Lake State Park. They had large sites with 50 Amp electric, but they only had one campground loop open, and we could not make a reservation this time of year. In addition, today is Public Lands Day, and we were concerned about overflow from the national park filling up the state park campground. The private campground just outside the national park sounded pretty grim. We decided to take the safe path and stay at the KOA in Alamosa, about 30 miles from the entrance. As it turns out, the state park was pretty empty and would have been the best choice.

The first part of the route to Alamosa was quite challenging. We had the ups and downs through Curecanti National Recreation Area. Then, on the advice of the rangers at Curecanti, we took Colorado 114 instead of US 50. This route is shorter and North Pass is 1200 feet lower than Monarch Pass on US 50. However, we had to deal with about 50 miles of continuous tight curves and steep grade.

We arrived in Alamosa around noon. After a quick lunch, we headed to the park. We quickly noticed the beautiful five panel stained glass window in the visitor center. The Secretary of the Interior had been here this morning for the unveiling of this work by the park's artist in residence.

The orientation video was quite good, explaining the geology of the dunes, as well as showing beautiful pictures of the park. The dunes, the highest in North America, cover about 33 square miles. The sand is blown from the west and stopped by the Sangre de Cristo Mountains. The creeks that surround the dunes also help return sand to the dunes. In the spring when the creeks are running strong, they actually pulse. This is an extremely rare phenomenon.

In another theater of the visitor center, they were showing excerpts of the Ken Burns film, which debuts tomorrow night on PBS, on the national parks. From what we saw, this should be a great series. Back outside, we enjoyed two nature trails near the visitor center and headed for home.
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