Road Trip 2009: Leg Two

After finding our way through the forests of WY, we continued on our journey towards Yosemite National Park.

The roads were straight with not a lot of traffic, so we decided to see what our car could do. Actually, it can go much faster than this, but our first time doing 100mph was definitely worthy of a picture.

She just loved being in the driver's seat!

We decided to take a bathroom break at a rest stop in Echo, UT. It was so beautiful!

There were so many ground squirrels! Sallie was afraid of them; she didn't chase after them like she does regular squirrels. Perhaps it was the sheer quantity! There were probably hundreds scurrying around.

We drove by the Great Salt Lake, but we didn't take any pictures. We were almost at the end of the Salt Flats before we decided to take a picture of them, so here is the one picture that we got of the Salt Flats in UT.

The Road to Yosemite continues...

At certain points in our drive, we just couldn't resist the urge to pull over and take pictures of what we could glimpse out of the window.

Here is beautiful reservoir that we stumbled upon.

Sallie found something interesting as well.

We finally arrived at Yosemite National Park!

Poor Sallie had to wait in the car whenever we got out to take pictures. :-(

The bottom of the Cascade Waterfalls

The water was so clear and pure looking. I really wanted to take a drink, but settled for dipping my hand into it. It was COLD!

There was this cool little cave near the bottom of the falls.

Bridal Veil Falls

We were right at the base of these falls--so close, we could feel the spray. Lots of people thought it was raining, but it was just the sheer force of the water hitting the river.

Here it is...El Capitan...the reason for the trip to Yosemite. It was spectular!

After spending a few hours taking in the beauty of Yosemite, we continued on our journey to Susanville, CA, to see Jeff's sister's family. They moved to CA about a year ago, so it was the first time we'd seen their new house. Here are a few pictures of Sallie riding in the car on our drive there.

It was on this trip, that Sallie first experience the thrill of sticking her head out the window. She LOVED it! Anytime we were passing through a town where we had to slow down, we would roll the window down for her. A little piece of doggie heaven.

Stay tuned for the next leg of our trip. It takes us through CA, along the CA coast and the Redwood National Forest, and up to Seattle.

Road Trip 2009: Leg One

Well, we've been back home from our road trip for two weeks, so I thought I shouldn't put off updating our blog any longer. We spent 12 days in the car driving through some magnificent areas of the country. We had so much fun and took so many great pictures! This post is of our first leg which began on May 29th and continued through Sunday, May 31.

Our first stop was in Sioux Falls, SD. I read about Falls park online and thought it would be great fun to check it out. Jeff and I LOVE waterfalls, so this park was a definite treat. While the magnitude of the falls were nothing compared to Multnomah Falls, there were so many falls in the park it was still so beautiful!

Something fun about these rocks were they did not look real. We had to literally knock on them to reassure ourselves that they were not painted Styrofoam. These pictures really do not describe how fake these boulders looked.

After walking through the park for a short while, we found a quiet picnic area and ate lunch. It was a great way to spend our first pit stop.

Our next scheduled stop was in Casper, WY. On our way, we drove past the "World's Largest Bulls Head!" This picture was taken from our car window.

Sallie is in the car with us all the time, but she was not prepared for a long trip on the freeways. The loud sounds of the higher speeds and the semi trucks were too much for her. One of the only ways that she would settle down at all was in Jeff's lap as he drove.

We spent the entire Saturday (5/30) with friends (Molly, Edis, and Amani) in Casper, WY. We spent the afternoon walking around Alcova Reservoir. It was so beautiful!

Amani is one of the most adorable little girls ever! You can't really tell in this picture but her eyes are gorgeous. So big and brown, with luscious eyelashes!

Amani found a real friend in Sallie. They played really well together both inside...

And outside!
We also learned that Amani loves to swing. Molly told us that she would be happy to spend hours out there just being pushed and pushed and pushed some more. Sunday morning we left Casper, WY, to continue our journey, heading to Yosemite National Park. Molly and Edis attempted to get us to look at an atlas before leaving, so we'd have a general idea of where we should go. We didn't listen and decided to trust Frannie (the GPS system in our car). Frannie took us down a road that took us behind Alcova Reservoir.
It was at this point that we really should have turned around to try to find a route that was more well traveled. Again, we decided to put our faith in Frannie. The paved road ended not too long after we passed Alcova Reservoir. We found ourselves winding through Seminoe State park on what could only be described as forest service roads. They were dirt. They were rutted. They were a bit scary at times. We were getting nervous that our car, with its fancy low-profile tires, would get damaged or something would happen and we would have no way of getting help. In the midst of our frustration we decided to say a prayer for comfort and guidance and to be able to enjoy the beauty that surrounded us.

Shortly after our prayer, we drove right up to this beautiful mountain. It was absolutely breaktaking!

Sallie and I got out and walked along the road for awhile. I was counting my blessings that the Lord had heard and answered our prayers. Being a MN girl, I was also fascinated at the sheer power of the mountains. I could feel such a power of peace as I walked along that mountain road.

We came across this spectacular reservoir! I believe it is the Seminoe Reservoir. It was gorgeous, and we never would have been able to see it, if we hadn't taken Frannie's route.

Stay tuned for the next leg of our trip. It takes us through the rest of Wyoming, Utah, Nevada, and Yosemite National Park.