After our trip to Petrified Forest in August 2013, Ryan and I headed to California for a week of camping and exploring. We were able to visit Sequoia, Kings Canyon and Yosemite. Two years later, these parks are still some of our favorites, you can see our rankings here. I’m working on a few posts about the trip, but it’s taking me a while to go through all the pictures, journal entries and GPS files. In the meantime, I put together this fun infographic to share some of the highlights! More to come! (more…)
National Parks
Petrified Forest National Park
Before we started this blog, Ryan and I would sometimes bring a journal on our trips to the National Parks so we could remember our visit. On July 27, 2013 we went to Petrified Forest National Park, our first park since we started on our journey to visit all of them. Here is an excerpt from Ryan’s journal entry. (more…)
Glacier National Park Part 2: Going to the Sun Road, Logan Pass & Many Glacier
Glacier National Park – Hidden Lake
On our second day at GNP the whole family piled into our Tahoe and drove the Going to the Sun Road. Any book about National Parks highlights the Going to the Sun Road as one of the most scenic drives in North America. The road is 52 miles long and starts out like many other park roads, winding through trees along the lakes and rivers. After passing the Avalanche trailhead the road starts to get pretty amazing and quite intense. You gain a lot of elevation in a short time, which means there is a steep drop off on one side of the car at all times. The drive is not for the faint of heart or people with vertigo, there are many sharp turns and there is no guardrail to separate your car from the glacier carved valley below. (more…)
Glacier National Park Part 1: Lake McDonald and Avalanche Creek
Our first day at GNP was a quick visit after driving from Coeur D’Alene to Whitefish. We were staying on Big Mountain in Whitefish, which was beautiful, but unfortunately not very conveniently located for exploring the park. The running joke the whole trip was that it was close in Montana miles, since everything is expansive and wide open. The drive to the park from our condo was about 45 minutes, and that was just to the west entrance, driving across the park adds another one to two hours depending on traffic and the destination. (more…)
Channel Islands National Park Part 1: What does the fox say?
Summer has officially arrived in the valley, which naturally means all Phoenicians are heading to SoCal to get out of the heat and enjoy some time on the beach. This week I’m sharing a little bit about our trip to Channel Islands National Park off the coast of Ventura, California. Ryan and I visited Channel Islands in December 2013 right after Christmas. Before sharing about our experience, there are a few logistical things to mention about CINP. Getting to Channel Islands is not easy, there are five individual islands and getting to the closest islands, Anacapa or Santa Cruz, requires a one hour boat ride. (more…)
Olympic National Park: Hiking in the Clouds
I love visiting National Parks. Ryan and I started visiting the parks two years ago, and it’s kind of become our thing. I don’t know what it is about the parks but there is something truly magical that happens when you visit one. For that brief moment all your other cares have disappeared and everything is good in your world. Maybe it’s the stillness of it, the views, or the wildness, whatever it is, I was reminded of this feeling when we visited Olympic National Park last week. (more…)
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Goolds Gone Wild 