Canada! and home to AK

Lake Louise, Canada

By: Lars

It was the second time my family and I went to Canada together. Twas once again an amazing experience but the only difference was the first time we were in Canada, it was the winter. My sister already covered the first little bit about Waterton National Park, so let's start with going to Lake Louise. One of the things we did at Lake Louise was we went to the Lake Louise Inn, we didn't stay there though, we just went for the swimming! It was a very nice pool with three hot tubs! The only thing that wasn't very fun at our campground was the trains on the tracks right next to our campsite! That was a loud experience. After our second visit to Lake Louise, we were headed to Jasper where we went to a place called Miette Hot Springs. The hot springs were in a pool but the water was from the actual springs. The next two days were long drives and on the second day we got to our destination, yet another hot springs called Liard Hot Springs. This one was amazing. My family must've felt in a hot springy mood because we went to yet ANOTHER hot spring called Takhini Hot Springs. Sadly Takhini wasn't a very good hot springs due to the fact that the pool needed a new paint job and had weird stuff floating around in it. The next three days were long drives, as we were determined to get back home. My mom and dad decided we could drive extra long on 1 day to get back to Anchorage in 2 days because of how smoky it was! On the first day of the drive we ran into a road closure because of wild fires. We had to wait almost an hour before it opened again. Now we are home sweet home!

P.S. We really appreciate those who commented and those who couldn't because we understand a lot people had problems posting a comment on the blog. Thank you everyone sssoooo much for reading our blog and have a great rest of your summer!

First time on the Alcan for everyone except Ray and Kiska
Beautiful drive despite the clouds and smoke~

Canada   By: Ilsa R.
❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️

You probably have read my last post, where I wrote about Waterton and riding the Surrey bikes. Even though that was in Canada, we decided to space things out a little bit. Lake Louise was our next stop after Waterton. Recently my family and I had paid a visit to Lake Louise on a skiing trip, so it was cool to be back again. We didn't do much at Lake Louise because we were only there for two nights which is about the average number of nights we usually stay at a campground. However, we made the most of our time and decided to go swimming at the Lake Louise Inn. The inn was super nice. They had free mints at the front desk and they also had a built-in Starbucks! The pool was nice too, including the three bubbly hot tubs! Back at our campsite, sleeping was harsh because of the trains buzzing by all night long (super painful). After the campground where we got a lack of sleep, we went to Miette Hot Springs. The hot springs there was pretty much thermal water that was placed in a pool and cooled down. It was an OK hot springs. The campground near it felt like a jungle. when I went to the bathroom, I saw this weird looking butterfly that pooped on me!😂 After we stayed at the "jungle campground" as I called it, we headed to the world's greatest hot springs ever called Liard Hot Springs! The hot springs was completely natural if you don't count the granite rocks that they put on the bottom. In the hot springs, there were tons of little caves that you could explore around. At the end of the hot springs it got really skinny and you could go down this weird river-like stream. If you looked up, you could see vines and trees about eight feet above you. After the amazing Liard Hot Springs, we drove to the world's worst hot springs ever which was so bad, I may remind you,  that this sentence does not even deserve an exclamation mark, but a period. One, it needed a new paint job, two, it was super rusty, and three, there was weird brown stuff in it and I don't want to know what it was. After that hot springs, we had only three days of driving to get back home! After we started driving again, we ran into a wild fire! The forest fire company made everybody wait in a line for the fire to jump the road. While we were waiting, I tipped out my guitar and started playing. Time passed quickly and soon we were driving through a massive wild fire! Once we had passed through, our family made a decision to keep on driving and get back home in two days instead of three! We went to a pull-out to sleep and then pretty much from thereby went back home. THE END!      

Liard Hot Springs - kids swimming under the bank in morning sun

Liard Hot Springs

Wood Bison with calves - lots of wildlife on the drive!
We saw a ton of bears, a fox, coyotes and baby sheep

Sign Post Forest in Watson Lake, Canada

Wildfire in Yukon - Ilsa played the guitar while we waited an hour for the okay to drive through the fire
It was flaming and smoking on both sides of the road as we went through behind the pilot car

Glacier - Waterton National Park

Back at Many Glacier Hotel!

Hidden Lake at Logan Pass

Ilsa with her horse Mongo

By: Ilsa R

After our visit to Missoula, we drove to Glacier National Park. Being in Glacier reminded me of home because of the similar plants, animals and mountains. We drove Going-to-the-Sun Road and went on a hike to Hidden Lake. On the way down, Lars and I did a lot of glissading on the snow. We swam in Lake McDonald after the hike, which felt really good! We were in a few campsites in Glacier National Park before we landed at Many Glacier Hotel.  Almost 30 years ago, my mom worked at Many Glacier Hotel as a waitress. Once we got there we went on a short hike that was 5 miles and pretty much right after, my mom and I went horseback riding. In the morning, we went to a huge breakfast buffet which had all the breakfast food you could imagine! That same morning, we drove to Waterton (the Canada side of the National Park). Later in the afternoon we rented bikes and biked around the town. At the bike shop they had a specific bike called a Surrey Bike. A Surrey Bike is basically a car and 2 bikes put together. It had a steering wheel and a lever that you pulled down as brakes. Lars and I were able to drive in the road with it and I felt like I was driving a car!

Biking in Waterton

The Surrey Bike - huge hit with the kids

Yellowstone!

By: Lars
The departure from Leigh Creek wasn't all that bad because my whole family and I were sssoooo excited for Yellowstone! The drive was not that bad and once we entered Yellowstone and saw our fist thermal pool, we all got super excited! That night we went on a boardwalk hike getting a feel for what Yellowstone was like. The day after that, we did more boardwalk hikes but these hikes were different because that day we saw geysers. If you don't know this yet, the reason there are so many geysers in Yellowstone is because lava is closer to the surface of the Earth so every pool of water there is extremely hot from the heat from the lava. This is what makes thermal pools bubble. But geysers shoot up super high because the lava is rising shooting the water sky high! The most popular geyser is called Old Faithful. The reason it got its name is because it's a very old geyser and it is very predictable so the time until it goes off can be estimated and will vary only in a 20 minute range. Old Faithful was the fist geyser I had ever seen and it was astonishing how high the water went! We saw some other geysers and headed to camp for a nice fire while Ilsa played the guitar. That next day, we went on a hike stopping along the way to see amazing waterfalls fall into the Yellowstone river. The hike was like any other hike we do but at the turn around point, we got to Hellroaring creek (the name of the hike) and we dipped our feet in. It was very refreshing! Sadly, the next day we had to pack up and leave Yellowstone heading towards Montana. In Montana we made a stop at Missoula where we met our old friends Darin and Jenn and their 4-year old girl Kaia and their 2-year old girl Makenna. We spent 1 night there with the family that once had a house in Seward, Alaska (that's how we knew them). After the nice reunion, we were headed to Glacier National Park.

Thermal pools bring out the microbiologist in Ray

Great campsite on Yellowstone Lake

By: Ilsa R.

As you know, we recently visited Yellowstone, which Lars wrote about in this post. Since reading the same thing is totally boring, I have decided to write about the things he hasn’t written about yet. So, after Yellowstone, we did a 7-hour drive (very painful) to visit our friends in Missoula, Jen and Darin and their two daughters, Kaia and Makenna. Kaia was four years old and Makenna was two. They were both SOOOO adorable! We stayed with them for one night and in the morning we visited the Saturday market and went out for breakfast.  It was hard to leave them but I think I might go to college there!

Lower Yellowstone Falls

Yellowstone River

Even for Alaskans, seeing a bear this close was fun! 

Ilsa with Makenna in Missoula

Corn Palace, The Badlands, Mount Rushmore

By: Lars

It's been awhile since our last post so we have a lot to catch up on! Our first stop was the Badlands! One of our stops we made before the Badlands was the Corn Palace. At the Corn Palace, we saw huge frames filled with different colored corn creating a picture. After this corny stop we were heading straight to the Badlands. This was a cool experience because I got to see and eat bison! The amazing thing about the Badlands is that before you're just driving on hilly and grassy terrain and then, BOOM! You see these giant sandy mountains similar to Bryce Canyon! We stayed at the Badlands for one night, for dinner. As I was saying before, I got to eat a bison burger with bacon, lettuce, tomato, and pickles. It was very scrumptious! The next day we packed up and started heading towards the campground called Leigh Creek campground. We made another stop before Leigh Creek, and that stop was at Mount Rushmore! The mountain with the presidents, George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, Theodore Roosevelt, and Abraham Lincoln carved into the mountain. That was probably one of the most amazing little stops we've ever made on both of our road trips. After that mountainous experience, we were headed to Leigh Creek campground. Turns out, Leigh Creek campground is inside of Big Horn National Forest. Leigh Creek was a small campground but good enough that we could manage until the next day where we will be heading to Yellowstone National Park!

The Corn Palace!

All The Amazing Things!  By: Ilsa R

Ok so, we have seen a LOT since we last posted and we are not in South Dakota anymore. Let me tell you about it. So the first place that we visited was The Badlands, which to be honest, was not exactly my favorite, so I will just skip that one. However, I will tell you about where we went on our way to The Badlands. We went to the Corn Palace!  The Corn Palace is basically a big building (not made of corn) that has a design on the front that is completely made of corn! Also, the inside is well... pretty much a corn-everything visitor center. The second stop that we made on our way to the Badlands was an old-fashioned 1880's town! It was so interesting to look at old saloons, a school, a church, a grocery store, a doctor's office and so many other things! After visiting The Corn Palace, the 1880s old-fashioned town, and The Badlands, we headed to Bighorn National Forest where we stayed in a campsite for one night. Our campsite was pretty much a usual campsite (if you don't count big rock walls going up the sides). On our way to Bighorn National Forest we visited the famous Mount Rushmore. I think our luck was pretty good that day because it happened to be the day that we met Nick Clifford, the only person who created Mount Rushmore who is still alive!  Make sure you don't miss the next post, on Yellowstone National Park!

P.S.  I am now going to highlight all of the places that I have been to!

Ilsa at the 1880s Town - School Room

The Badlands - lucky to time it with the fields of yellow flowers

Mount Rushmore - meeting the only surviving driller

Mount Rushmore

Camping in Bighorn National Forest

Leaving Minnesota - On the Road Again!

Our water dog Kiska is also sad to leave Minnesota!

Minnesota!  By: Ilsa

Doing our usual trip to Minnesota this year was not the same as it was years before. For one, it's June! Usually our trip is in August which is WAY warmer.
 Spending time in Minnesota was so much fun even with the colder weather! There are always fun activities to do and having Kiska there with me just put the icing on the cake. Some of the activities that I did on the lake were tubing, water skiing, fishing, paddle boating, swimming, and many more! It is sad to leave the lake and my grandparents but I am excited for the planned adventures ahead! Also, my whole family was at the lake with me which puts the sprinkles on the cake after the icing! My three uncles and aunts were there including my cousins. Make sure to keep following my blog and we also enjoy comments! See you again in South Dakota!

By: Lars
Remember how I always write about how it’s so hard to leave a place that we’ve visited for a while with our Scamp? Well, leaving Minnesota to start our road trip was probably the hardest of all the other places that we went to. The reason this is is because Minnesota is where most of the families on my mom’s side come to my grandparents' lake. This is also a time to meet my cousins Reece and Keegan! Every summer Reece, Keegan, and I go tubing, swimming, and other activities in the water and in my grandparents' yard. This year was a lot more different though because we came a lot earlier than we usually do when we come in August. One, it was colder so that meant less sun, a colder lake, and more wind than usual. Two, we had Kiska accompanying us on our trip to Minnesota. And lastly, we still have our Scamp here from our last trip! This made our 9 day visit to Minnesota less and more fun at the same time! It was fun to visit our family in Minnesota but now, it is time to go on our real road trip and like I said before, it's not a road trip if we're not on the road!

Ilsa with her cousins and Grandma and Grandpa

Lars and his cousins Reece and Keegan

Baby loons hatched while we were here!

Scamp Trip Leg #2 - Day 1

Seattle

Final destination of the first leg of our road trip - Seattle!

 This is actually going to be the last post of the first leg of the trip. After we made it up the coast of Oregon, we headed to Seattle to meet up with Jack and Sandy and their 2 sons, Tommy and Jimmy. That evening, Tommy and Jimmy, and Ilsa and I all had a nerf war on the block... it was probably the best nerf war I have ever had! The next morning, we went to Mighty-Os donut shop. The donuts there had so much flavor! After Mighty-Os, we walked to Tommy and Jimmy's school where we had to depart. I hope I get to see them soon because I had lots of fun with them! My dad, my sister, and I are headed back to Anchorage. My mom will be driving Kiska and the Scamp to Minnesota so it will be waiting there for the next leg of the trip!

Lars, Ilsa, Jimmy and Tommy

Mighty-O Donuts

California Wildflowers

California Wildflowers

by Ilsa

The flowers on the coast of California were in beautiful bloom when we arrived. This winter, California got more rain than expected, which caused the flowers to be spectacular.  I couldn't help but borrow my mom's phone to take a lot of pictures.  I have never seen such a variety of flowers in all different colors!

California Poppy - State Flower