Rozworld’s WebLog

This brought tears of happiness. I can’t wait for a President who actually believes in Science.

http://www.sciencedebate2008.com/www/index.php?id=40

Day 1 August 3rd, 2008 Sun. – We began our trip driving through Minnesota and into South Dakota. I think the first instance where I thought we were far from home was when I saw the Missouri River. With it’s wide banks and clean looking water surrounded by miles of endless plains it was a very attractive river. We arrived at the Badlands not knowing if there would be any camping spots open but we lucked out, there were plenty. We did a little bit of site seeing before we setup camp. The wind was really something that night. It was so strong that it blew the camp stove off the picnic table. Luckily nothing exploded or was broken. The mosquitoes were terrible at the Badlands campsite. They were undeterred by the strong plain’s wind. We noted all the motor biker traffic on the highway that day.

Day 2 August 4th, 2008 Mon. – We did a little bit if hiking into the Badlands. I’m always fascinated by the geology of an area, especially places like the Badlands. We drove around and got to some of the locals also, including prairie dogs, Pronghorn, and bighorn sheep. We drove to Wall, South Dakota, and went into Wall Drug. This place has become a lot larger in the 11 or more years since we’ve been there. After Wall, we drove to Mount Rushmore. There were thousands of bikers there. When we got back we later found out that Surgis, South Dakota, which is in the Black Hills, was having its annual biker rally. We stopped by the crazy horse monument, but once we got there we decided not to spend the $27 to see an unfinished mountain sculpture, especially when Rushmore was only $10 to park and see the monument. We drove through the northern part of Wyoming for the rest of the Day. We crossed the Bighorn mountain range and traced the geologic ages with signs along the winding road. We went through Cody, Wyoming and into Yellowstone National Park. On our way out of Cody we turned on the Information Radio and found out that there were wide fires in the National Forest leading up to Yellowstone and that there could be delays. As we drove further up the highway we could see small fires and smoldering embers in various spots. I think we arrived at our Yellowstone Bridge Bay campsite around 10:30 PM.

Day 3 August 5th, 2008 Tue. – We did the grand tour of Yellowstone on this day. The road system in Yellowstone is shaped like an “8”, so we started the drive near Yellowstone Lake and drove clockwise around the park. We stopped by Old faithful which roughly blows every hour and a half. We heard a nice talk about bears by one of the park rangers, had lunch, and watched the geysers. We found out that in Yellowstone it is illegal to keep just about anything outside in the campsite except sleeping equipment, most of all anything that has a smell because bears have 7 times greater smelling than the best bloodhound dogs. We moved on and saw Biscuit Basin, Grand Prismatic Spring, Mammoth Springs, Tower Falls, and the Dragon’s mouth. We didn’t see any animals until we got to the eastern road heading south. On that road we saw hundreds of Bison; one was even walking on the road as cars cautiously went past. We also saw a few mule deer along the road. I don’t know how it is normally in the park but there were just a few spots where huge crowds. The traffic was not that bad either. Perhaps people did stay away because of high gas prices. We finished the day back at the same campsite. I think we arrived around 7 or 8 PM.

Day 4 August 6th, 2008 Wed. – In the morning we saw some people stuffing the dumpster across the way with camping gear and we wondered why they were throwing away perfectly good equipment. I think they were foreign campers who could not take the equipment on the rest of their trip. So we went over and picked out a nice sleeping bag and Jean liked it and decided to keep it. We drove south out of the park and into the Grand Teton National Park. This was a very scenic drive along the Teton Mountains that ended in Jackson, Wyoming. Jackson was packed with tourists. It was jammed with pedestrian traffic, art stores, and cafes. We drove into Idaho and into Utah. We drove along Bear Lake, which appeared to be a large lake in the basin between mountains. At the southern end is Garden City. This town has numerous new and fancy houses being built on the buff overlooking the lake. We figured this was another vacation spot being bought out by rich folk. We drove in a pass that wound around into a canyon on the other side and ended up in Logan, UT. The mormon churches became more numerous here. We drove pass Salt Lake and the traffic ground to halt at one point. There were many rainbows in the distance driving along the mountains. Our destination was a Hot Springs near Monroe UT. We arrived there at night around 9:30 PM.

Day 5 August 7th, 2008 Thru. – In the morning we woke up and explored the hot springs. Furthest up the hill behind the cabins where we were staying there was a natural large conical “beehive shaped” fountain of hot spring water. Next to which they had placed two outside bath tubs with the hottest water one could barely stand. We soaked in these and less hot one further down the hill. Near the bottom they had two nice sized pools which we also enjoyed. It was fairly reasonable to stay there. It was $65 which included the night’s stay and soaking in the hot springs, which we need after being on the road for the last four days. It was nice because there weren’t a lot of people there. After having breakfast in near by Richfield at a diner, we headed south on highway 70 and joined 15. We drove through the corner of Arizona and into Nevada. Instead of going straight to Las Vegas we took another road that took us through the Valley of Fire State Park and long Lake Mead. It was a long and beautiful drive through the desert culminating with us going across the Hoover Dam and back again. We arrived in Las Vegas in the evening and we checked into our room at the Flamingo. I called Erik and he said that they were having were having dinner down stairs, so we joined them.

Day 6 August 8th, 2008 Fri. – Today is 8-8-08, which is a lucky day in the Asian calendar. That’s why the Chinese chose today as the opening day of the Olympics. This is also one of the reasons Erik and Natalie chose this day for their wedding. They are “not real Vegas people” but to them it seemed like a fun thing to do and get married in Vegas. Most of the day was taken up by the wedding. The ceremony was really nice with the whole family poring colored sand into a flask and creating a unique sand design. Afterwards they had a nice reception dinner. That day also Jean, Rosalind and I did some sight seeing in Vegas. We took the rail down the strip. We walked through Paris, MGM, Luxor, and Excalibur. The temperature outside was 107 F. It’s amazing that each mega casino has it’s own mall shops, restaurants, casino, etc. Each building is huge. We saw a couple of 4D movies. That night Rose joined us for dinner at the Paris buffet. It was really good food but expensive. Later I wanted to try the blackjack tables so after Rose , Jean and Rosalind went back I came back to Paris and played for a ½ hour. I wanted to try the card counting technique and in the end I came out $42 ahead.

Day 7 August 9th , 2008 Sat. – In the morning we hooked back up Erik and Natalie at the restaurant Margaritaville where they were having breakfast. After visiting we took Rose back to the airport and we started home. We drove on highway 70 through Utah. There was some fascinating geological scenery on our way through Utah. We camped in Green River Utah at the state park there. Green River is an oasis at the intersection between the Green River and the highway. At night I saw a fishing owl and Rosalind and I tracked these large beetles flying around. Just a few misquotes there.

Day 8 August 10th , 2008 Sun – We made our way through Colorado for most of this day. We right past Denver and into Nebraska. This night we camped at the Johnson Lake State recreation park. This was a very nice quiet camp ground.

Day August 11th, 2008 Mon – We drove through Iowa and could see the down town of Cedar Rapids from afar. We wondered how the residents were still coping with the bad floods earlier in the year. We arrive back in Madison around 7:00 PM. We were happy that we had a nice and safe vacation.

What worked on this road trip:

• Mountain High dried dinner pouches - Just add hot water, wait 10 minutes and serve. Jean even agreed that these were delicious and she’s a tough food critic!

• Packing all the camping equipment into a large tarp. This reduced a lot of clutter.

• Packing all the food and cooking equipment into the canvass grocery bags instead of a large cook box. The bags were much more flexible.

• Taking turns driving every 200 miles.

• The Blackberry and Google Maps – We knew we would have to service the car somewhere on the trip but we didn’t know where we’d be. When the service light came on in Utah, I did a search for Jiffy Lubes in Cedar City, the next town on the highway, and found the address of one. I then mapped it in Google maps and found where to go. No driving around and wasting time. I also was able to find the Hot Spring we stayed at in Utah in Google while on the trip.

• The Prius – Despite gas being anywhere between $3.65 and $4.25 (in Yellowstone) a gallon, we did the whole trip, 4100 miles, for around $300.00 in gas. Not bad, considering a plane flight would be around $900 or more and we saw so much more!

Could have we done without all of these things? With no doubt but they all made the trip more efficient and smooth going and as a consequence a lot more enjoyable.

Here are some pictures from our road trip to Yellowstone National Park and Vegas with many stops along the way.

Click Here for Pictures

Here’s a video I shot of a bison walking down the road in Yellowstone. I’ll be publishing pictures shortly.

Here’s an article on the resale value of the Toyota Prius. I think here’s an opportunity to stay in new cars for awhile now. All we have to do is order a new Prius and sell our old one at or above the dealer price!

http://blog.wired.com/cars/2008/07/supply-and-dema.html

We had a nice vacation in Chetek over the 4th and the second week in July. We got to do a lot of visiting and spending some quality time at Huldrestua. Here are some pictures from our Chetek vacation:

Chetek Summer 2008

Northland Wildlife Studio now has a new Website! We’re currently adding more content to it, so check back periodically for updates. This will help the gift shop and taxidermy reach out to their customers.

http://northlandwildlife.com/

Rosalind has been talking about having fish as pets this summer, so we decided to put together the aquarium again. This is a multi-day process that insures everything that goes into the aquarium is clean for its inhabitants - both animal and botanical. The rock collection we have available for the aquarium includes rocks from 5 different U.S. States. They all blend into the environment seamlessly. I get most of the water from our dehumidifier, which works pretty well since I know the water is pure from condensation. This year I purchased some live native aquatic plants including Hornwort to give an added touch of realism. After we had everything ready we went down to the park to catch our pets. Within a couple hours we caught a bunch of pumpkinseeds, bluegills, and a green sunfish (these are shaped more like a largemouth bass). We picked out 2 bluegills, 2 pumpkinseeds and the green sunfish to be the occupants of the aquarium. The fish adjust quickly to their new surrounding. Last time I had bluegills they liked eating a pet store bought food called tubefex worms but this lot was rather indifferent. They liked red worms and wax worms but I prefer to get non-live food for them to eat on a daily basis. It’s just easier and cleaner to deal with. So I’m trying dried meal worms now. They seem to really love those. The fish get use to people coming into the room and will swim to front and wait to be feed. They are very smart fish. They have a definite pecking order. The green sunfish seems to be on top followed by the others by size. I really enjoy keeping fish. It will be sad to see them go back to the pond after the summer is over.

We had a wonderful time in Alaska! It was a quick trip that came to end too soon after we arrived. I stood up for Mike and Corine’s wedding as a groomsmen and Rosalind got to be a beautiful flower girl with her hair all done up. The wedding went really well and Bride and Groom are very happy together. We wish them luck! After the wedding Jean, Rosalind, Roger and I headed up to Wasilla to stay at the Agate Inn. We got to pet and feed their reindeer and explore the Matanuska valley. We went up to Sutton to the Jonesville coal mine where we found tons of great Eocene Age leaf fossils and petrified wood. I also found out that the health care professionals in Wasilla are top notch, since I had to go to the ER to be diagnosed with acute conjunctivitis. I am much better now and we are enjoying all this wonderful water/rain back in Wisconsin.

Pictures:
Alaska 2008 and Mike and Corine’s Wedding.

YAKESH FAMILY REUNION

SATURDAY, JULY 12, 2008
Robert and Sandy’s Place - Cornell Lake

• Bring your Favorite Homemade Dish

• Bring your own Refreshments

• Time to eat will be 1:30 P.M.

• Donation Box will be out for whatever you wish to drop in to help Defray expenses of the chicken, plates, cups, ice, utensils, napkins, etc.

• Drawing will be held for a few door prizes to be given away, Please put your name & family members in attendance in the jar for the drawings.

• Let all your family members know about the place & date of this picnic.

Hope to see you there!