Wednesday, June 29, 2011

Mosquitoville, USA

This place is seriously thick with mosquitoes. We have had to be well-armed and sticky with layers of bug repellant and sunscreen before leaving the house. The boys really want to make s’mores every night, but no one was willing to stay outside with all the bugs, so the s’mores operation was moved inside tonight. Nothing says camping fun like roasting marshmallows on an electric stove in the kitchen.

We’ve spent two days exploring Yellowstone and torturing Simon along the way. We saw a lot of interesting things (at least I thought so); Simon had a different viewpoint. His looked something like this…

IMG_0946

this…

IMG_1376

this…

IMG_1501

and even this…

IMG_1597

I thought he might enjoy all the wildlife we saw in the park, and he was sort of impressed with the bears.

IMG_1609

The buffalo in the middle of the street was mildly entertaining.

IMG_1558

He missed out on the snake because he stayed in the car.

IMG_1623

He wanted to take the ground squirrel home for Freckles to play with.

IMG_1646

The elk was just ho-hum.

IMG_1664

He really wasn’t impressed with Yellowstone until the very end of day two. After multiple slow-downs while people stopped driving in the middle of the road to get out and take pictures of the buffalo, Torsten lost his patience and was getting upset with the slow drivers in front of us. “It’s just a stupid buffalo. We’ve seen like a million of these,” he said. Then Steve looked over and said, “But how many have you seen pooping?” And that was it. Simon was finally impressed. When we got back to the house and someone asked how his day at Yellowstone was, he replied, “It was awesome!”

P.S. Here are some of the cool things I saw. Simon was too busy complaining to notice.

IMG_1119 IMG_1133 IMG_1172 IMG_1276 IMG_1285 IMG_1320 IMG_1585

Friday, June 24, 2011

Middle of Nowhere, Idaho

He we are in the middle of nowhere, otherwise known as Island Park, Idaho. It’s rustic, but pretty. Day one included a float trip that required more paddling than anticipated. I did not do much of the paddling, but it was a lot of work for those who did. I mostly sat back and enjoyed the scenery.

IMG_0008

Boys in one boat:

IMG_0014 IMG_0017 IMG_0025

Moose:

IMG_0032

Baby moose:

IMG_0036