In August of this year, Kerrie and I set out on our longest road trip to date. 10+ days living the #vanlife out of the back of our #hotelement. Our original goal was to take the long way to a family reunion in Central Idaho, where we would leave early in order to check out Grand Teton National Park, Yellowstone National Park, visit my sister in Helena, MT and then loop back into Idaho to meet the rest of the family.
We would quickly learn, however, that fire would play a major role in this vacation and drastically alter our plans on more than one occasion. This will be a three post series, starting with our adventures in Eastern Oregon and Grand Teton National Park.
As with any trip, we got a later start than anticipated, but eventually got on I-84 East towards Boise, on planned stop over for the night. The plan was to hit a series of breweries on our way to Boise, progressing from Prodigal Son in Pendleton, to Barley Brown's in Baker's City and ending with Sockeye in Boise. However, coming into the Pendleton, we were informed that 84 was closed in both directions due to fires. After scouring maps for a possible re-route our only option was to head north to Lewiston, ID and loop around back south. Not ideal since it would add another 3 hours to the drive.
Luckily we only made it about an hour north before I noticed that they lifted the closure on 84 so we pulled a 180 and cut through the Blues towards La Grande to catch 84 again. Back on the road and seriously delayed, we kept pushing for Boise and ended up crashing at a rest stop just east of Boise. Not the best start to the trip, but the adventure was just beginning.
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| Our bivy site at the rest stop. Thankful for the #hotelment |
The next day we headed towards Crater's of the Moon National Monument and into Grand Teton National Park. From here, I'll let the pictures tell the rest of the story.
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| Desperately needing some food. |
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| Traffic in rural Idaho |
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| Coming into Craters of the Moon National Monument |
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| It was a little windy |
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| Smoke filled vistas will quickly become a theme of this trip |
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| The famous antler arches in Jackson, WY |
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| Our third National Park of our quest to see as many as we can. |
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| I think this was Kerrie's favorite spot on the whole trip. |
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| Couldn't help taking a quick dip. |
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| Wildlife! |
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| Tatanka! |
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| Kerrie pondering the next day's adventures |
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| The trip to this lake was Kerrie's first 10+ mile hike, and she killed it no problem. |
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| Hey Bear! |
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| More smoke filled vistas |
