Seattle to Denver

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Well that was fun.

Picked up the new rental, have moved away from Avis and using Enterprise as they are 40%!c(MISSING)heaper. Headed east from Seattle towards, uh I don’t know, maybe Ontario, Oregon. That’ll do. So headed for Denver via Ontario. From there I visited the Craters of the Moon (http://www.nps.gov/crmo/index.htm). What a place. I don’t think this place would be open to the public in Aussie, as the bits you want to see, which are the caves, are too put it mildly dangerous at best. I have been to cave sites before that have walkways, low level lighting etc. This place had none of that, and if you are on your own and something untoward happens you are pretty much “on your own”. Anywho, pretty eerie place and the caves are scary and very dark and cold. A lot of the rocks you walked on in the caves were covered in ice, very slippery. What surprised me was the Grade 4 kids (108 of them) on an excursion, kudos to the teachers and parents, you could lose them quite easily. A very physical visit and if you ever get to go there take a BIG TORCH because it’s frickin’ dark down there and the torches they sell at the visitor’s centre just don’t cut it.

Made it to St Anthony so next is Old Faithful

Headed off early and made it to Yellowstone (http://www.ypf.org/site/PageServer?pagename=home) . What an amazing place with stunning landscape and plenty of free roaming bison. Got to see Old Faithful which was a little underwhelming with thousands of people present. All over in about 1 minute. So back on the road but had to take the long way round as the pass direct to the east exit was closed so had to go the long way round to get out. Drove to Gillette for an overnight stay. Up and onto Mt Rushmore (http://www.nps.gov/moru/index.htm) which was pretty cool. An amazing piece of art cut into the side of a mountain side. Well worth the visit with the nearby Keystone a small town full of hotels, bars and souvenir shops. Went via Deadwood which is where Wild Bill Hickock was shot. Wandered round and stood at various points of interest where he was shot and the shooter was caught.

From there the road led to Fort Morgan for overnight stop. Drove through 4 states doing 766 klm’s which included a lot of rain and once again stunning scenery. It’s amazing where they have built some of these roads as they wind through, up and over mountain ranges.

Headed off early Saturday to Denver arriving at about 11:30, too early to check into the hotel so parked the car and caught the hotel shuttle to Coors Field for a double header between the Rockies and the Giants. Got to the ground at midday as the weather started to close in and ultimately delayed the first game by 2 ½ hours, this included a Tornado warning with 1^st pitch at 4:30 and was amazingly played in mostly sunshine. Giants won 10-8 and just as the game finished it rained again with game 2 being delayed by bout 1 ½ hours. Rockies won 5-3. Got a cab back to the hotel and checked in at just after midnight making it a very long day but worth the effort.



Next leg is off to Texas for Astros and Rangers. Lot of time to be spent on the road





More to come

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