Merrily we rolled along...

I will not bore you with many pictures of our recent trip across the United States.  But I have to say that I was constantly amazed at the sights and sounds of our journey west.  In these ten days, I visited four new states and visited three important national parks and/or memorials.  I am so glad that we decided to take a little extra time to include these amazing places on our itinerary.  We will remember them for a life time.

We did get to visit with family as we went to pick up Shawn's dad in Michigan.  Tim was such a great help to us, both in driving and in helping get the house unpacked in record time.  And as we begin our new life in Washington state, we look back fondly over the last several weeks and savor the time we had to just be...

After eating German food with my sister and her family
(minus nephew Zach who was at gardening camp)
Columbus, OH

Butterfly House, Columbus, OH

We are a little corny, don't you think?
Mitchell, SD

The one and only Corn Palace
Mitchell, SD

Not a cloud in the sky
Mount Rushmore National Monument, SD

Are you sure we'll fit through there?
Custer State Park, SD

Old Faithful was right on time!

Boiling volcanic mud 

near Old Faithful, Yellowstone

Bacteria, sulfur deposits and the sun make for beautiful colors
Old Faithful Geyser Basin, Yellowstone

And eye or a mouth?
Yellowstone National Park, WY

Lower Falls
Yellowstone National Park, WY

The happy trio
Mammoth Hot Springs, Yellowstone

Mammoth Hot Springs, Upper Terrace
where the rock grows at an average rate of 1/4 inch per day

Mammoth Hot Springs, Lower Terrace
Color means the rock is still growing, alive with bacteria and rock being
deposited - white means water is not flowing there and the rock
is not growing, at least this week - the landscape changes quickly

Norris Geyser Basin in the morning (about 50F)
In the afternoon it just looks like an empty field

I am pretty sure that I would not have seen all of these amazing things if the Air Force had not given us this opportunity to move West.  And while we are usually in the habit of pressing on without a break, this year we decided to stop along the way to see new places.  Ansad I'm SO glad we did.

I have lived most of my life on the East coast... the other side of the country felt very far away, and somewhere you'd only visit by airplane.  But driving through "new country," South Dakota, Wyoming, Montana and Washington, I was often speechless over the beauty and diversity of our beautiful country.  Mount Rushmore brought a new dimension to the idea of patriotism.  Our visits to The Badlands and Yellowstone National Parks helped me to appreciate both my science and theology roots - they seem to fit seamlessly together as I looked across the barren plains and sniffed the sulfur-filled air.

So this message is especially for people who think that Wyoming or Montana are too far away and/or not as interesting as Disney World.  Please reconsider!  This country is vast and beautiful and there many sights that cannot be truly appreciated through video, photos or descriptions.  I can't wait to visit Glacier National Park sometime soon, and to go back to Yellowstone, maybe in the winter.  There are so many new things so see.

Peace, Deb

The World is a book, and those who do not travel read only a page.  ~ attributed to St. Augustine


The traveler was active; he went strenuously in search of people, of adventure, of experience.  The tourist is passive; he expects interesting things to happen to him.  He goes "sight-seeing."  ~ Daniel J. Boorstin, Librarian of  Congress from 1975 to 1987


To get away from one's working environment is, in a sense, to get away from one's self; and this is often the chief advantage of travel and change.  ~ Charles Horton Cooley, sociologist