Day 70 - Wind Cave and Jewel Cave

Caves!!! After visiting the wonder of the world Carlsbad Caverns one month ago, I had high expectations for Wind Cave National Park and Jewel Cave National Monument.

Wind Cave is named for the howling wind that sometimes exits out of its small natural entrance and is famous for its boxwork, a unique fancy calcite formation. The highlight of this tour was actually the tour guide-- man was he good. Ranger Sam grew up at Wind Cave and his seventy year old father was still a tour guide here. He started the tour with a story about a bison pushing a white pickup truck back ten feet after the pickup truck bumped the bison at a road crossing, told stories about his family and about the families that started wind cave, and also stories about bikers on the cave tours. He was hilarious and a masterful storyteller-- and the boxwork was beautiful.

The next cave, 45 minutes away and possibly connected to wind cave, is the third longest in the world and famous for its crystals. This tour was more geology focused and seemed to cover more distance. You walked through the cave along metal walkways that were sometimes suspended twenty feet above the rock floor (former rock climbers designed the tour route) Pics.

I had originally signed up to do a wild caving, four-hour tour at Jewel Cave two days from now, but they needed another person to sign up and I didn't want to wait two days, so I drove four hours west back to Central Wyoming. Most of Wyoming is a giant oil field so finding a camping spot was hard, but I stumbled upon the Goldeneye Wildlife and Recreation Area about a half hour west of Casper and drove in. A mile-long dirt road led to lovely lake with rundown picnic tables and lots of birds. I decided to camp here as it was BLM land and nicey secluded. The sunset was wonderful.

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Day 104 - Glacier to Vancouver

The hike up Balu Pass was supposed to be fairly easy, beautiful and dotted with waterfalls, but when I talked to the park ranger and learned that Vancouver was an eight hour drive away, I decided to skip Balu and drive west. I left behind this pretty view. And drove many hours through pristine mountains, fewer and fewer snow-capped ones the further west I drove. Some of the valleys were flooded to make reservoirs, leaving scenic sights. I eventually made it to Vancouver and drove right on through to Point Roberts USA, a five mile by five mile coastal land just below the 49th parallel and thus in the USA. The park ranger had suggested this as a good place to camp but being late of the Thursday night before the Fourth of July there were no spots available. I drove around instead and stopped at a forested coastal park. After ten minutes of walking I came to my first grand Pacific view with Mount Baker 60 miles east. The San Juan Islands and Orca Islands could also b...

Day 122 - Mount Saint Helens

Mount Saint Helens is sinister and wonderful. I spent the morning at Rainier watching the end of the British Open on my phone, then drove south to Saint Helens. I arrived at the park's northeast entrance by early afternoon. A massive bulge of rock built up on the northeast side of the mountain before the 1980 eruption and then caused a tremendous landslide when the eruption started. I drove to the Windy Ridge at the end of the road, listened to a ranger describe before and after photos of the mountain, then hiked up to a high viewpoint. You can see the circular ridge with a notch missing where the landslide occurred, the desert-like exposed right-side where the landslide blew away life and covered 15 miles of terrain with 150 feet of dirt and rock, the greenery that was on the lucky side of the eruption, and Spirit Lake which was covered by dirt and slime and fallen trees for years. The mountain was over a thousand feet higher before it erupted. After taking in t...

Day 62 - Colorado National Monument

Established as a national monument early in 1911, Colorado NM is known for its high canyon "rim road" and sandstone spires of Monument Canyon. The canyons of west Colorado are pretty--as they have more green trees and shrubs than the more famous Utah canyons. This gives them a more alive feeling, although the sandstone spires were formed many thousands of years ago by erosion. Rim Rock road curves up the the top of the canyon cliff, goes through several round tunnels and is lined with scenic viewpoints. The best views were in he Monument Canyon section, and included in sequence, the Coke Ovens, The Kissing Couple (behind my head), and the most famous of all: Independence Monument, the tall spire in pic 3 and viewed from the side in pic 4. The original promoter and caretaker of the park, John Otto, was the first person to climb Independence Monument and now it's a climbing right of passage. Every July 4 climbers ascend and mount an American flag at the summit. Fun! ...

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