Time Outs and Awards

We are still alive and kicking here.  It only took us three weeks of being home to go on another road trip.  We went to Baton Rouge in September for my mother's birthday, which turned out to be a lovely celebration.  She was deservedly treated like a queen for the day.  I had not seen my parents since before our road trip this summer and we did our few weeks of safe isolation before we visited them.  It already seems like ages ago!  

It seems we have been living our life in 2 week increments.  Visit someone, then isolate for 2 weeks.  Visit someone else, isolate for 2 weeks.  I have started to call it "time out".   After our visit to Baton Rouge and our 2 weeks of  "time out" we went to California to see our daughter and her husband.  We also surprised her with a mostly virtual surprise baby shower!  Life in the time of Covid.

Baby's first bank account
and a virtual audience on the screen to the left.

Macarons and flowers....a girl's best friends.

Back home for a bit of  "time out" until the next venture outside of our Groundhog Day routine.  Random thought....have you ever noticed how your laundry is a reflection of how you spend your days?  I noticed this the other day as I washed nothing but golf clothes, exercise clothes and biking clothes.  That is our life....walk, ride, golf....oh, and one of us works.  This is the time of year I am happy I live down south where I can play outside most of the year...especially this year!

All that walking and golfing has kept me from finishing the blog post I started two "time outs" ago!  I was planning to wrap up the road trip with some National Park Awards. (because I am going to milk that trip for all its worth!) The categories are custom made for each park because everyone gets a ribbon in the Mahoney National Park Awards Blog.  Sadly, once this goes out into the blogsphere our trip will finally be put to rest and I will be forced to find something else to talk about and photograph.

Largest National Park (that we visited)

Yellowstone National Park

We probably drove 100 miles...in the park!  We also stopped about 30 times!  

                

Best Bike Ride

Zion National Park

I highly recommend riding your bike through the park instead of taking the shuttle bus.  We saw so much and it was at our own pace, which for one of us was much slower than the other.  An e-bike might be a good idea!

Most Photogenic

This one is a real challenge to choose just one!  Can I say all of them?  I think the one that surprised me the most in my photos was Bryce Canyon but the one I took such great delight in photographing was Teton National Park.  You can choose for yourself!

Bryce Canyon National Park

Teton National Park
It took my breath away!

Most Patriotic

Mount Rushmore
So many flags...so many presidents

Most Iconic

Arches National Park

When your hike ends at the sight featured on the license plate in the state of Utah, that's iconic.  The view was worth the hike.

Most Surprising

Zion National Park

I am not sure what I was expecting.  I had not heard much about Zion and had never seen the landscape of southern Utah before so maybe that is what surprised me the most.  The red desert, the mountains, the way the sun lit the mountains up in the morning, the clear blue water in the streams, or the pure majesty of the park.  I mostly rode my bike with my mouth agape looking up in awe.  

It had it all... mountains, streams, trees and wildlife.

Scariest Drive

Mesa Verde with a close second by Flaming Gorge.

Flaming Gorge
The road was so curvy and high with many drop-offs that I had to relieve my vertigo challenged driver on the way there and also got to do the drive out.

Almost 9000 ft. and the drive was narrow and steep but worth it!
Mesa Verde National Park
We took turns doing this drive....

Hottest National Park

No question in either of our minds on this one....Canyonlands National Park.

Add to the 106 degrees the lingering smoke in the air from the wildfires in the west and this was less than an ideal time to visit this park.  I suggest the spring or fall and a time when there are no fires!

Perfect for a hike....it did go up to 106 believe me!

I imagine in better light this is spectacular!  Not bad as it was.

Best Sunrise

Arches National Park
Best and only sunrise....for me!

Best Sunset

The bar for this category has been set very high because sunsets are my true love.  It may surprise you that in 50 days of traveling to so many spectacular locations, fantastic sunsets seemed to allude me.  I was vigilant in my pursuit though, just ask TJ.

The Badlands
This one keeps coming up on my photo reel and makes me sigh.
I love the dust trail behind the car and the contours of the land.

But honestly, the best sunset was from my friend's deck in Park City.

There you have it, the winners of the Mahoney National Park Awards 2020 edition.  Stay tuned for the next installment....some time in the future when we find ourselves with seven weeks of time to drive around and look at stuff.  I do think once you start with the parks you get the bug and find it hard to stop at just 9...or 10.  Ten down, 52 to go!

Stay safe out there!  

Plan B is Pretty Good so Far

When it became very obvious that summer in Nova Scotia was not going to happen this year, TJ and I began making Plan B.  There have always been parts of the U.S. we have wanted to see but never put forth the effort to see.  If I think about it carefully, I have been to all but 7 states.  Those states, other than Alaska, are concentrated in the north central west part of the states.  There are places we needed/wanted to experience.  Also, thanks to some friends, or friends of my kids, the National Parks suddenly seem like places I need to see before it gets too late, if you know what I mean.  Plan B was shaping up nicely.  We figured since we were so far north visiting our kids and grand kids in Wisconsin, why not continue the road trip and visit a few new states, national parks and long lost friends while avoiding summer in Houston.  All plans, of course, with appropriate care and caution to keep our social distance and stay healthy.  Never in our wildest dreams did we expect to visit these places for the reasons we ended up visiting them.  Thank you Covid for making us think outside of the box and allowing us to experience some of the most breathtaking spaces in our country.

Badlands National Park

We left Madison, Wisconsin and the grand kids and headed west on July 20th.  We drove to Sioux Falls, South Dakota.  To get to Sioux Falls we had to drive through Minnesota which checked off a new state for me.  We crossed the Mississippi River up north which I found interesting having been raised only miles from it in the state of Louisiana.  It is a mighty river for sure. 

The mighty Mississippi, welcome to Minnesota

We continued on to Sioux Falls and were pleasantly surprised.  It was only an overnight stop but we managed a lovely dinner and a post dinner walk to see "the falls".  South Dakota so far is winning me over with its beauty.  Driving long distances lost its allure to me many moons ago after 40 something drives to and from Nova Scotia.  I am totally over long distance driving, so the fact that I was more than willing to take on this adventure was proof enough that desperate times require desperate measures.  Funny thing though, driving through new places that just happen to be beautiful did not feel as mind numbing as the 40 something drives over the same highways through the same states year after year.  Thank you Covid.

Downtown Sioux Falls

"The" Falls

Our minds are not numb yet!

 The next morning we headed to a rest stop of all places!  I had read about this sculpture of a Native American woman and just had to see it for myself.  The name of the sculpture is Dignity.  It is magnificent!  She stands 50 feet tall and is framed by the Missouri River in the background.  The rest stop is also one of the stops for Lewis and Clark on their westward expedition.  I felt like I was walking on history.  Best rest stop EVER!

She is magnificant!

A sacred stop and well worth the trip.

This was not mind numbing at all!  Look at how blue the sky is....
how green the grass is....
how straight the road is....you can see forever!

Our goal for the day was Badlands National Park.  We/I wanted to arrive with plenty of time to see the park and then take a break for dinner and go back for sunset.  I am very lucky to have a willing co-pilot!  He is the best partner a wanna-be photographer could have on a road trip.  If I want to stop for a photo, he pulls over and off we go.  If I want to break for dinner and go back to the park and sit and wait for sunset, he is more than willing.  There are not many people who would do that.  We stopped a lot of times in the Badlands!  The park was surreal!  What an amazing geologic phenomena.  I could sit and look in wonder for hours.  How does a place like this just pop up after miles of green grass and flat land?  We stopped, we hiked, I took lots of photos and we sat with our mouths wide open in awe.  South Dakota for the win!

I go out on the edge and he documents it.

Lifetime Senior National Park pass.
Totally worth admitting I am 63.

Yellow Mounds

Everywhere you look the colors and formations amaze.

Jagged and smooth

Wall Drug...the "See Rock City" of the west!

I wish I knew this family so I could send them this great 
photo of their picnic dinner.  I love it!

Thank you TJ for partaking of the golden hour with me!

Not spectacular but still memorable.

We left after sunset and drove another hour to Rapid City, South Dakota.  Yes, we were tired.  It was a day full of visual delight.  If you ever think of going to see the Badlands, do not hesitate.  I still look back and thank God for the opportunity to see such an incredible place.  I can only imagine what the native Americans thought when they came upon that "land bad".  What do you do with such a place but sit in awe?  It was the first time we got to use my National Park lifetime pass and I already felt like I got my money's worth.  

Last night, coincidentally, we watched a PBS show about the National Parks narrated by Ken Burns.  I highly recommend it.  I had tears in my eyes by the end because the beauty that has been preserved by the National Park system is a national treasure worth saving.  Having only seen a small portion of the parks I look forward to another and another.  After only two days of our westward adventure, I can say I am so glad we took a leap and did this.  I will take a break here in Rapid City, South Dakota because it deserves its own post to be written on another day.  Stay tuned.