NikonJohn Loc: Indiana U.S.A.

These are scans from slides and negatives of a trip out West that my wife and I took in May of 1999. We were celebrating her finishing her PhD (though it was not quite done at that point :) ). We went to The Badlands, Yellowstone, Mt. Rushmore/Black Hills, Tetons, Capitol Reef, Arches, Red Canyon, Bryce Canyon, Zion, Garden of the Gods, and a few other minor places in two and a half weeks. It was quite a trip, complete with several problems with our Plymouth minivan. :) This was a camping trip in our little Scamp trailer (it's in one of the shots). We had a blast and would love to do it again someday with our daughter, who was a planed result of this 1999 trip. :) Maybe that's why she loves that little trailer so much... ;) 14 photos total, hope you enjoy them and or that they bring back memories of your own trips. :)

Happy Thanksgiving all you Hogs!

Arches - Delicate Arch


Arches - Double Arch


Badlands


Black Hills SD near Mt. Rushmore


Bryce Canyon


Capitol Reef area


Capitol Reef - Panorama Point (yes I did take a pano here but it's huge)


Cedar Breaks overlook


Road into Red Canyon pano (near Bryce)


Our campsite in Red Canyon


Yellowstone (through the windshield)


Inside Yellostone Lodge


Yellowstone - At the edge of Yellowstone Lake (frozen over)


Zion National Park

jeanbug35 Loc: Jonesboro AR

Looks like quite an enjoyable trip. Nice set. Would love to go there one of these days.

Jay Pat Loc: Round Rock, Texas, USA

Nice set of images!
Beautiful country!!
Pat

NikonJohn Loc: Indiana U.S.A.

Thanks jeanbug, yes the American West is just gorgeous you should definitely get out there someday. We ran into a couple from New Zealand in Yellowstone who were touring the West in a van camper.

NikonJohn Loc: Indiana U.S.A.

Thanks Pat for your kind remark.
Yes beautiful country indeed!

Erv Loc: Medina Ohio

Wow John! They look awesome! And it looks like you had a great time. Love your little camper. Janny and I have a Tear Drop.:) What time of year were you running around Yellowstone? Looks like it still had snow. We are thinking about going out that way this next sumer.
Thanks for sharing your trip with us!!!
Erv

White Wing Loc: Lee's Summit, MO

Very nice set John, thanks for posting them! Now I am really anxious for our next road trip to cover those places you mentioned that we didn't have time for on the Yellowstone trip. A lot of your photographs look very familiar...it is such beautiful country. Other than Grand Tetons & Yellowstone we did manage to get to Devils Tower, Mount Rushmore, Crazy Horse, Badlands and a bit of the Black Hills on this years trip. We will for certain go to the rest of the places in your photographs next year or when ever we take our next road trip. Thanks again for posting them.

NikonJohn Loc: Indiana U.S.A.

Thanks Erv for looking and your kind remarks. :)
After some research we decided to go in May. It's late Winter/early Spring in the park then and it's not crowded yet (kids are still in school). The park service lady we talked to on the phone (who was extremely helpful and nice) said there is a break in the weather then and animals are starting to come out. She said it's a good time to visit. There were so few people that we actually stayed at the lodge one night without a reservation! The only hitch is that it's still a little cool then and the thermal features sometimes hide from photos in steam clouds. ;) Grand Prismatic Spring was so bad we could only see the edges of it, not all the way across. We did have a pass snow shut for a day or two while we were there but they get them open as soon as they can. Here is a photo of one of the passes after they re-opened it. :) This was light spring snow. ;)

Yellowstone snow levels in a pass

NikonJohn Loc: Indiana U.S.A.

You are quite welcome! Thanks for your kind words.
We were going to go to the Devils Tower but it was, as I remember, 200 miles one way out of our way and we decided to pass on it. You can post some of your pictures so we can see what we missed. :)

They were talking in 1999 about closing Zion to traffic and taking people through in busses. I don't know if they ever did that or not. If you like to hike I'm told you can do long day hikes and get into some really beautiful places most people don't ever see in person. We almost scratched Zion off the list after getting stuck at Mt. Rushmore for a day and Red Canyon for two days with car problems, but we were really glad we didn't when we got there. We ended up calling my boss from Yellowstone and adding three days more to our vacation instead. :) He was very understanding and nice about it. :)

Erv Loc: Medina Ohio

Thanks John! It looks like we will go later in the year.:) My Janny can't take to much cold and enjoy it. But it would be nice to not have a lot of folks around.:):) I would love the snow.
Erv

NikonJohn Loc: Indiana U.S.A.

Just to add to the story here is the list of issues we had on the trip:
1: Transmission overheated on my little truck before we even got 60 miles from home. When my dad found out what happened he let us take his minivan the next day, which was already set up to tow the little trailer (he was the previous owner of the trailer). When we got back from the trip we just bought the van from him. ;)
2: Flat tire on the trailer in Montana. We put on the spare and got to a tire store in a little town just before they closed for the weekend and he put new tires on the trailer for us.
3: All the gauges on the van would "stick" every time we went over a mountain pass. (never got that fixed as we don't have mountains in Indiana :lol: )
4: Exhaust system went out on the van at Mt. Rushmore.
5: The climb up the mountain to Cedar Breaks caused the engine and the little electric fan motor to get so hot that the plastic fan melted when we got to the top and stopped the engine. If Chrysler had designed the fan to continue to run when the engine was off till it was cool this would not have happened. We didn't know till coming into Red Canyon that this had happened, that's when the fan kicked on again and started shaking the whole van! :) Though I must say we both thought it was the most beautiful place we have ever been stranded for a car repair. :)
6: About 40 miles out of Colorado Springs the back window exploded on the van. We don't know why it broke for sure but a highway service supervisor came by about five minutes after it happened and said it might have been teens on horses with 22's that shot it out :shock:... After that we drove straight through till we got back to Indiana with a tarp taped over the back window. :roll:
With all the things that happened to us there was always someone to help within minutes of it happening. Except for the trucks transmission, that took hours waiting for a tow back home. A friend with a hitch came out late in the night and towed our trailer home for us. We think that all that was a "God thing". We felt quite blessed for all our rescues. My dad even nocked the cost of the repairs off the price of the van when he sold it to us. :)
My wife's sister said; "whenever you take a trip you either have a great time or a great story". We had both. :lol:

NikonJohn Loc: Indiana U.S.A.

Either way go, it's an amazing and beautiful place. Hope you have a great trip, without issues. :) :lol:

Erv Loc: Medina Ohio

That is quite a list John.:):) But I bet you look back and have a smile for everyone of them.:) I took 4 summers to see the US. I cut the map into 4 sections and did one every summer. The first 2 years were on a small Honda450. No plate on it and no driver license. Try that today. I was 14 on the first trip.:):) You want to talk about car trouble.:):) But it was a blast and I took over 40,000 slides on the 4 trips.:):) I saved and took 300 rolls of slide film on each trip. But was really stupid and sold them all to Kodak, and all the rights to them too.:( But it helped me get my first home.:):)
Erv

NikonJohn Loc: Indiana U.S.A.

:lol:, See you have a great story too Erv. :)
I have this habit of editing after I post if I think of something to add. Sometimes people quote me before the edit... Comes out interesting sometimes. :lol:

White Wing Loc: Lee's Summit, MO

I will look that up about Zion and see if I can find out if they have changed it to buses only. Gosh, I took so many photos it would be difficult to choose just a few to put on here but I will go thru them and see if I can select a few sets to post here maybe by Friday if I can't get through them all this evening. It was all so beautiful!