Boulder, CO

On our way to Boulder from Custer, South Dakota, we stopped for a night in Fort Collins, CO. Our only reason for going there was to visit the Shambhala Mountain Center. This Tibetan Buddhist retreat center is located on 600 acres of pine forest and meadows in the mountains near Red Feather Lakes. It was founded in1970 by Chogyam Trungpa Rinpoche.

Central to Shambhala is the Great Stupa of Dharmakaya. It contains relics of the Buddha, Chogyam Trungpa Rinpoche and other great teachers, that are sealed into the 108 foot gilded structure. Countless mantras and fragments of sacred objects are held within the massive base and walls. Unlike most stupas, there is a meditation room inside the Stupa, complete with a 17 foot tall Buddha, and we were able to spend time there soaking in this sacred and peaceful energy.

In Boulder we set up camp at St. Vrain State Park. It was a lovely location on a pond but we had no internet access. The weather was fantastic and we spent time walking around downtown Boulder, visiting friends in the city and also in Evergreen, CO.

An old friend of mine took us on a spectacular hike into the mountains behind Boulder. We started at around 9,300 feet and hiked to the tree line at 10,500 feet. The views were astounding and we were amazed at how acclimated Bob and I are to higher elevations. We were hardly huffing and puffing.

Another highlight of this stop was a tour of the Celestial Seasonings tea factory. I have been drinking their tea for decades and it was great fun to see how it’s put together and do a tasting in their shop. If you’re ever in the Boulder area, put this on your must do list.

Black Hills

I went to the Black Hills when I was a child living in Minnesota, but I don’t remember much about it. Bob had never been here and was excited to see several things in the area, so off we went.

Mount Rushmore was bigger and more impressive than I remembered. They have a great new visitor center and a wonderful trail where you can walk under the sculptures. It was a lot of fun to be there.

We also went to the Mammoth site in Hot Springs, SD. This is a working archeological dig that has been covered by a building. They think that this site was a sinkhole that 55 or more mammoths fell into and couldn’t get out of. There are remains of many other animals in the site as well. This is a very interesting place to visit if you’re ever in the area.

Custer State Park is fabulous. It’s filled with bison, pronghorn, prairie dogs, burros and great trails. We hiked the 7-mile roundtrip Harney Peak Trail and really enjoyed it. This is the highest peak (7,742 feet) between the Rockies and the Alps and gave great 360 degree views. It was little tough for me since I’ve been suffering from a virus with laryngitis and coughing, but I made it to the top.

This is an area we would visit again. We only scratched the surface.

Yellowstone & Tetons photos

When I was trying to post our Yellowstone and Grand Tetons blogs, the internet access we had was awful, so I was unable to post many photos. Since they are such spectacular areas, I thought I'd post a few more now. Hope you enjoy them.

We may not have internet until around July 6th, so if you don't hear anything, that's why. Have a wonderful 4th of July!!!

Devil's Tower

Devil’s Tower. the large monolith featured in Close Encounters of the Third Kind in Northeast Wyoming, was a must see for us. The site is sacred and significant to many Plains Tribes, and we were interested to see what spiritual energy we would find there. The tribal legends about the creation of the tower involve seven young girls running from a bear, and the seven girls get lifted onto the tower and then into the sky becoming the Pleiades. Many tribes including the Lakota conduct ceremonies and prayer offerings at the tower. We were honored to spend the summer Solstice here.

We hiked three trails in the park. Two of the trails circled the tower, and the third was on a ridge with some great views. The park and the area surrounding it are absolutely gorgeous. Beautiful green rolling hills and pastures with scattered forests and occasional sandstone and even red rock ridges.

The park also includes a huge “Prairie Dog Town” in the lower pasture. There must have been at least a couple hundred of the critters, and they were very active and fun to watch.

We were able to get a campsite right in the shadow of the tower. The weather was warm and sunny during the morning and midday, with clouds and thunderstorms in the early evening. The campground has a showing of “Close Encounters” every evening, but we experienced thunderstorms and lighting each of the evenings, so we didn’t get to see the movie. The storms were a bit scary, but also fun to watch and we didn’t experience any big hail or real strong winds, so all was OK.

The Tower definitely evokes an energetic feeling. For Mary and I the energy was very grounded, peaceful and calm. Not the high, turbulent energy of the Big Horn Medicine Wheel, but still a powerful, deep and kind presence.

Yellowstone

Mid-June in Yellowstone - cold rain, wind, snow and beautiful warm sun all in four days.

Yellowstone for us is about the thermal water features and the wildlife. The scenery is not as dramatic as the Tetons, Rainier or Zion, but the geysers, mud pots, hot springs and fumaroles are amazing. The scenery is excellent too, especially up in the Lamar Valley and Dunraven Pass areas.

We found a short trail into some thermal features off the Firehole Lake road near the Great Fountain Geyser, and I managed to put my fingers in some hot springs without burning them off. Mary was not quite so brave (or stupid). Most of the features have a very high sulphur content and can be quite caustic as well as very hot (200+ degrees). Some are very cloudy and smelly while others are clear and pure with no odor. The bubbling mud pots and the clear pastel blue hot springs are my favorites. The Upper Geyser Basin, and the Norris Geyser Basin are great spots.

Bison are almost everywhere in the park, sometimes alone or just a few scattered across a meadow or hillside, or even along the road. In Lamar Valley we saw a large herd of nearly 100 gathered in a meadow. The females have their calves with them and they seem very used to close quarters with cars and humans. Elk are almost as prevalent as Bison, and they are also mostly scattered in small to medium sized groups of 3-15, yet we only noticed a very few elk calves - they are probably just now calving. In the Lamar Valley we saw several small groups of Pronghorn Antelope including a lone mom with two calves wandering along a hillside.

Our first day in Yellowstone we saw Grizzlies from a distance on three separate occasions as we drove around the park. Today we also saw bears three different times - a very large Grizzly mom and two cubs from a distance on a hillside, a Black bear mom (brown) with one cub right on the road and a large Black bear right next to the truck as we drove by. We never got to see any wolves this time around, but we did see a coyote, eagles, osprey, and some very large Sandhill Cranes that almost look like emus from a distance

Yellowstone is very high in altitude with the lowest elevations above 6,000 feet, most of the areas are above 7,000 feet and some road passes are as high as 8,850 feet. This helps explain why it can be so cold one day and warm the next during the summer months.

One day this week the temperatures never got out of the 30s and we had snow on and off all day. We were headed for the Lamar Valley to watch for wolves, but a major road was closed due to snow, so we missed our good window for sightings.

Tomorrow we head east across Wyoming toward Devils Tower. We hope to stop at the Bighorn Medicine Wheel on our way across the state and to be at Devils Tower for the Summer Solstice.

Big Horn Medicine Wheel

Up in the northern Wyoming high country are the stunning Big Horn Mountains. Snowy peaks with rolling hills, stands of pine and fir and big green meadows that stretch forever. We saw 7 moose in an hour of driving, grazing in the meadows. The scenery was absolutely gorgeous.

We drove up there (without our RV) to visit the Big Horn Medicine Wheel, a sacred, historic and archeological site. It sits atop Medicine Mountain above timberline at 9,642 feet. The 1.5 mile trail to the wheel still has snow over several sections. It was cold (42 degrees) and the wind was howling, but the views were spectacular. From this mountaintop you can see high peaks in the distance and the vastness of the Big Horn Basin.

The Medicine Wheel was designated a National Historic Landmark in 1970. It was probably constructed between 1200 and 1700 AD, but they haven’t been able to determine an exact date. It is 80 feet across and has 28 spokes radiating from the center to the circle. This site is sacred to the Native Americans and has been used by many tribes over the years. There are several legends about it.

The Medicine Wheel is surrounded by a fence that has many prayer cloths and bundles attached to it. We walked the perimeter three times and then sat in silence. It is a very powerful place. We shared the solitude with bluebirds and marmots and just a few other humans.

Grand Tetons

I’m still thinking about Lava Hot Springs, and what a great place that was. You can tube on the Portneuf River that runs through town, and there were a few hardy (crazy) kids doing that in the rapids of the cold spring runoff. When we left there, we went to Heise Hot Springs for a night, but they only had one cloudy, sulphery hot pool. Made us appreciate the clear pure waters at Lava.

Grand Teton National Park is a very special place. Bob and I had not planned on visiting here until we saw that the weather in Yellowstone was going to be very cold and this seemed like a nice place to stall for a few days. I am so happy we did!! The scenery is gorgeous with jagged peaked mountains, crystal clear lakes and tons of wildlife. This place also has some of the best services we’ve seen in a National Park – gas, service stations, good groceries, laundry, showers, RV camp ground, restaurants and lots of visitor centers.

We stayed 3 nights in the park at the Coulter Bay RV campground, which was expensive but very nice. It was great to be nestled among the lodge pole pines and just a short walk from the visitor center, all services and the lake. We went to several evening ranger programs and learned some new things about beavers, wolves, elk and grizzlies.

There is great hiking in the Tetons. It rained on us when we were out on the Swan Lake and Heron Pond trails, but we got sunny warm weather for the ferry across Jenny Lake and the hike on the Cascade Canyon trail. This area reminded us both of the North Cascades and Sierras with granite cliffs and deep forests.

Wildlife viewing was exciting and excellent. We saw three black bears, two grizzlies quite close, elk, bison, pronghorn, weasel, bald eagles, blue heron, grouse, white pelicans and a moose that was less than a block from our RV. Jackson Lodge has a great viewing platform out back and we were able to watch another moose and her tiny calf from there, and off in the distance some wolves chased two elk into the lake. Unfortunately the wolves looked like white and black dots moving back and forth on the shore. Hopefully we can see some wolves up close in Yellowstone.

I wish we had planned more days here, but this will be a great place to come back to in the future.

Lava Hot Springs

Even though we spent the last week in Bimini, we wanted to have more time in the water, so we headed to Lava Hot Springs, Idaho. What a sweet place! There’s not much to do there other than laze around in the sun and the hot mineral baths and that’s just what we wanted to do. So it’s been a nice re-entry and we’re feeling relaxed and calm. Four days of soaking will do a lot for you, especially when there are no chemicals involved. They also have a very large swimming pool complex with slides and high-dives on the other side of town, but we didn’t get over to it.

A wet cold front moved in today. We’re heading to Grand Teton National Park on Saturday, and then up to West Yellowstone on Tuesday for four nights. After that we’re off to Devil’s Tower, SW South Dakota, then down to Colorado for a few days around the Denver area. If you’ve got any suggestions of things to see and do, please let us know.

Bimini

We just returned from my Swim with Wild Dolphins Adventure in Bimini, Bahamas. It was fantastic getting to know the 20 participants from all over the country, and even Norway and England! Our group ranged in age from about 34 – 86, with a variety of interests and experience, and we all had a great time together. So many interesting and fun individuals!!

I taught animal and nature communication sessions each day and by the end of the week, everyone had excellent skills. It’s really fun to teach such talented and open students.

The staff at WildQuest was great (as usual) and the food was really marvelous. I gained four pounds while we were there!! The weather was sunny and warm with a few evening showers.

The waters of Bimini are unlike anywhere else I’ve been. There is a large bank, or shallow area that extends for miles around the islands where the water is about 20-40 feet deep. The water is the most brilliant blue and green hues and changes with the depth. We spent about 6 hours a day on a 41 foot catamaran, skimming over the water, stopping to snorkel at the “road to Atlantis” and other reef areas, and of course looking for dolphins. Bob was in heaven when they put up the sails for a few hours.

We had two really good encounters with dolphins on this trip. One day it was an older spotted dolphin and her 2-year-old calf and another young dolphin. They were very curious and playful, coming to each of us and looking into our eyes. Another day we encountered 5 spotted dolphins that were having a great time together. As we floated with them, 5-6 more came and joined in the fun. They all had a very sensual time together and it was a real honor that they were comfortable with our presence. They also connected with each of us in the human pod.

We left our truck and 5^th wheel in Kamas, Utah, near Park City, while we were gone, at the home of a friend who also came on the trip. It was great to have a safe place for our home when we were out of the country.