Yellowstone National Park and The Tetons

Perhaps my all-time favorite destination is Yellowstone National Park . Since I live in the SF Bay area, I guess you can say that getting there is half the fun, since we have to come all the way from the West Coast and include many stopovers along the way. I've been to the National Park 5 times...once before the fire, another just after the disaster and then 3 more times after that. We have only visited the park during the summer, but from what I hear, the winter is spectacular there, along with the other seasons.

Old Faithful is considered to be the main attraction, but the Park has a lot of other things to see. We hiked partially down to the River, but didn't go all the way down because the stairclimb was steep. What goes down, has to come back up. It's quite simple to drive through the Park and see quite a number of sights in 3 days. Great views of the Upper and Lower Falls, the Yellowstone River, Mammoth Hot Springs,

IMPORTANT!!!!

I am in the process of moving a lot of material over to this blog from my other travel blog. Too many weird things happening with it. So, enjoy what you have here right now and I will have a lot more in the coming couple weeks. You are going to love it.

Please visit my other blogs and websites:

Also: The Boston Sports Nut - a blog about Boston sports teams; baseball & basketball and general sports information.

This Ain't Paradise - about festivals, fairs, etc. We are vendors at over 40 events per year and I have a lot of information that I give and stories to tell.

Starving Vendors - a humorous look at the lives of many vendors; I tell the real stories behind a lot of events. You will find a lot of humorous (made up=Bull) material in here. Loads of information also.

DandL Creations - our main website. We shell custom-made shell necklaces at a great price and offer wrap-around skirts, shoulder-sling bags, fannypacks and a whole lot more. I have a listing of events that we do and provide reviews of our events we have participated in over the past three years. Serious reading material and funny too!!!

Death Valley National Monument

I've visited Death Valley twice over the years...once in late September and another in April...times of the year when the temperatures are quite cooler than in the summer. This area has its' own distinctive beauty to it and if you can deal with the 'remoteness' of it, you will enjoy visiting.Death Valley is the lowest, driest and hottest valley in the United States. It is the location of the lowest elevation in North America at 281 feet below sea level. It holds the highest recorded temperature in the Western Hemisphere. It has an area of about 3,000 square miles.

The valley was named for an incident around the time of the 1849 Gold Rush period when a group of travelers in search of a short cut wandered away from the caravan and perished in the desert.

Temperatures in the Valley can range from up to 130 degrees in the day in the summer, to below freezing at night in the winter. The lowest temperature on record at Furnace Creek Inn is 15 °F . The National Climatic Center reports that temperatures at Furnace Creek reach 90 °F (32 °C) on an average of 189.3 days annually and 100 °F on an average of 138.0 days annually

Columbia Icefields

Sno-Coach at Columbia Icefields

The Canadian Rockies

One of the world's most spectacular mountain highways. Unsurpassed mountain scenery paralleling the Great Divide, including the Columbia Icefields, Bow and Crowfoot Glaciers, Athabasca Falls and Peyto Lake. Grizzly and black bears, moose, caribou and other large wildlife

Lake Louise to Bow Summit - The first 40 kilometres of the Icefields Parkway climbs steadily north through a subalpine forest and tops out in alpine meadows at Bow Summit, the highest point on the Parkway. Highlights of this section include Crowfoot Glacier, Bow Lake and world famous Peyto Lake.

Bow Summit to Saskatchewan Crossing - The next 37 kilometres of the Parkway drops from Bow Summit down into a subalpine forest alongside the Mistaya River and then drops further into the montane valley bottom of the Saskatchewan River. Highlights include Mistaya Canyon, Waterfowl Lake, the Saskatchewan River valley, and the opportunity to see moose and black bears.

Saskatchewan Crossing to the Columbia Icefields - From the Crossing, the Icefields Parkway follows the Saskatchewan River and then begins a steep climb towards the Icefields. This 50 kilometre section is renowned worldwide for its spectacular scenery, including Mt. Athabasca, Columbia Glacier and the Columbia Icefields.

Columbia Icefields to Jasper - Mountain goats, bighorn sheep and elk are common along the final 103 kilometres of the Parkway. The road climbs Tangle Ridge, then drops down into montane forest and follows the Sunwapta and Athabasca Rivers into the town of Jasper. Highlights include Sunwapta Falls, Athabasca Falls, the Kerkeslin Goat Lick and the opportunity to spot grizzly bears and mountain caribou.

Sedona, AZ

Sedona's main attraction is its stunning array of red sandstone formations, the Red Rocks of Sedona. The formations appear to glow in brilliant orange and red when illuminated by the rising or setting sun. The Red Rocks form a breathtaking backdrop for everything from spiritual pursuits to the hundreds of hiking and mountain biking trails.

We've been to Sedona numerous times during Easter and the summer (hot) months. The area is one of the most scenic I have ever enjoyed and the red rock formations are spectacular. Most popular area is Cathedral Rock, the sight of one of many vortexes located in and around Sedona.

We have taken several jeep tours there, one of which is popular Pink Jeep Tours, which offer many areas to explore. Many years ago, we drove through many of the 4-wheel drive areas with our 4-Runner, which was loads of fun. There are numerous Jeep Tour businesses downtown and you have a wide selection of tours to take.

The Beartooth Highway

On several trips to Yellowstone, we made sure that we drove the Beartooth Highway in Montana, just northwest of the National Park. This road was totally awesome and this has to be one of the great scenic highways in the country as it breathtaking views of the Absaroka and Beartooth Mountains, and open high alpine plateaus dotted with countless glacial lakes, forested valleys, waterfalls and wildlife.

The Beartooth All-American Road provides easy access to Yellowstone National Park at its northeast entrance. Take time to enjoy this unique travel destination and all of the amenities, attractions and historic sites in the great Yellowstone area. Visits to the gateway communities of Cooke City and Red Lodge, Montana and Cody, Wyoming will complete an unparalleled family western vacation

The Boston Duck Tour

Perhaps one of the greatest tours we have ever taken was the "Boston Duck Tour" which was in a refurbished WWWII amphibious landing vehicle. Our tour came a day after we went on a bus tour which was pretty bad, as the driver sped by one site after another. As soon as you turned your head to look, he drove away. I recommend the Boston Duck to anybody who visits the city. People of all ages love the tour taking you through the streets of Boston viewing many of the landmarks and sites that the city offers. You also dip into the water and tour areas of the Charles River.

History of the DUKW Amphibious Vehicle. During the early days of World War ll, the allies were faced with a tough tactical problem: how could they unload cargo and men from their ships in places where the dock facilities had been destroyed or simply did not exist? The answer was to unload cargo directly over the beach. But how?

The demands of war, along with technical know-how and old fashioned Yankee ingenuity combined to create the perfect solution: a vehicle that was half boat and half truck that could run on land and water. Code-named DUKW (see where we get the name?), the first "DUCK" was actually a GMC truck enclosed in a water-tight shell.

Here's a PDF map of the actual tour here: Boston Duck Tour Map