Four Scenic Byways in One Day

After an evening spent listening to the herd of elephants in the room above us I’ve decided I need to develop a new strategy on selecting hotel rooms – less emphasis on a pretty view and more on a quiet-room-on-the-top-floor-please! Overlooking theSawtooth Wilderness Fortunately the elephants settled down by 11…

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Nuclear craters…and more Potaters…

When you travel a lot in the USA there are times when you just have to embrace quirky Americana…. Getting up close and personal with the Big Potato The first stop for today was only 30 minutes drive down the interstate at the town of Blackfoot, Idaho.Blackfoot is the (self-proclaimed)…

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Waterfalls and Potatoes on the way to Idaho Falls

Our night sky photography session last night meant we had a later night than usual, but that didn’t stop Neil from jumping out of bed at 6.30 this morning. He had a sunrise on the mountains to capture! I decided that if you can’t beat ‘em  you should join them,…

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In and Out of Yellowstone

Another long one, 3 days in a row! Sunday, September 6 So 6 years after our first attempt, we finally drove the Beartooth! The sun was shining as we set off down the main street of Red Lodge, or at least, as we detoured around the main street as it’s…

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A Little Shopping and a Short Drive

A little variation to the plan today… We usually plan our holidays down to ( almost) the finest detail, however we do try to allow for a bit of flexibility. Our main aim over the next couple of days was to try to drive the beartooth Highway into ( or…

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In and Out of Glacier National Park

This will be a long one as I’m putting four days into one post! Tuesday 1/9/2015 Today we saw 4 seasons in one day! As we left Spokane the sun was shining but the air was cool. It’s not a huge city so it wasn’t long before we were out…

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The Palouse Scenic Byway

Bright sunshine and a nice warm day today, yay!  It didn’t take long to leave the downtown of Walla Walla and find ourselves in the countryside. Stephen, our GPS, did its usual trick of taking us down obscure back roads though, and led us past such scenic points as the…

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On the Border of Washington and Oregon

Cool and damp to warm and dry. That described both the weather and the landscape for us on today’s travels. We woke to persistent rain which was a little daunting as all the sightseeing planned for the first hour or two was outside! We decided to delay our start til…

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Another Shy Mountain.

We don’t seem to have a lot of luck with volcanoes! Last year in Hawaii we stayed in a crater view room overlooking the Kilauea volcano, most of the time we were there the crater was hidden behind thick fog. Yesterday, Mt Rainier, an extinct volcano, stayed “In” and didn’t…

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The Mountain was NOT Out!

On the road to Mt Rainier  In Seattle we learned that Mt rainier dominates the skyline so much that it loomms large in the minds of Seattlites, so much that they just refer to it as “The Mountain”, and they know it’s a fine day when “the Mountain is out”.…

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Seattle Continued…

Breakfast view Today was book-ended by two meals with a fine view of the water. Despite both of us being woken briefly by a snoring serenade from the gentleman in the next room, we slept surprisingly well and woke refreshed and ready for a busy day of sightseeing. It was…

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Heading to Seattle – The Emerald City

Christening the holiday at the Airport hotel We’re finally on our way back to the USA again!  We treated ourselves to a night at the Rydges Sydney Airport hotel the evening before the trip so that we wouldn’t have to wrestle with early peak-hour traffic on the M5 and it…

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