New York and home

Spent a great week with Auntie Jacqui in New York (and since no one is reading this, I won't write about it - just some part of me needs closure ...), then flew home via Dusseldorf. Now Jenny and I are suffering from adjustment to the fact that everything resumes as before.

Would we do it again? Yes, like a shot - but no, because we can't afford to and we promise the children we wouldn't.

Favourite bits? Everyone has their own views, but mine would include:

Yellowstone walks, Batu Caves and Kuala Lumpur, giraffes in South Africa, volcano in Guatemala, surfing in Hawaii, Cuba (just because it was so different), Tikal and Palenque in Guatemala/Mexico, fireworks in Sydney and probably much more I can't think of now.

If there was one country I'd go back to, it's South Africa: cheap, same time zone, wonderful food and so much to see. I think we'd both go back to see more of Mexico and Yellowstone too.

That's it - byeeee!!

Journey from hell 2 - to New York (2/3 August)

Our flight to New York with US Airways was meant to take off at 13.05, and at 12.30 things were going well (they'd started pre-boarding). They then announced a delay, followed by cancelling the flight about an hour later - all down to storms and bad weather in New York. Since several other flights were cancelled at the same time, it was clearly going to be impossible to get to New York by plane that day, and the next would be tricky. Poor Auntie Jacqui would be arriving in a tropical storm with no one to meet her and no accommodation booked ...

Good thing we're resourceful. We booked a hotel for Jacqui on Expedia, then investigated Amtrak trains (way too expensive) before booking an overnight Greyhound bus (journey time - 14 hours). Finally, through VRBO (Vacation homes Rented By Owners) we found a last-minute accommodation in NY for the next day, at only $210 a day, an absolute bargain by NY standards. If ever anyone wants to go travelling, Expedia, TripAdvisor and VRBO would be my 3 most recommended sites.

The Greyhound bus journey was horrible - a crowded bus (Mexican ones were better) full of people eating fried food and worse, with a compulsory stop at Richmond at 2 am while they swept out the bus. Amazingly, the girls slept through everything (except when they had to get off at Richmond, of course), although Jenny and I didn't do so well.

Got into NY at about 10am, and sat in a Starbucks frantically checking our accommodation was booked before Jacqui arrived to meet us! And it's now 12.30 at night, so I'm stopping and will let Jenny do New York. Sorry if the above doesn't make much sense ...

The Aves family - 31 July to 2 Aug

What a lovely break from travelling! For those who don't know, I (Andy) know Jon (or Jonathan, as he now likes to be called) from University. Jon and Jane live with their two impressive children, Brittany (13) and Marissa (11) - I only hope our girls grow up with half their maturity and self-confidence. Not forgetting Molly the doglet, of course, with whom our lot immediately fell in love. Time to read "10 reasons why we shouldn't get a dog" again ...
Helped coach the Winston-Salem Girls All-Star team on the Friday night (well, joined in a bit anyway) - jeans weren't the best thing to wear in jungle levels of humidity. The next morning we all went to Krispy Kreme doughnuts: it turned out that Winston-Salem was the world HQ of Krispy Kreme! So we've now been to the 3 major US centres of business: Boeing, Microsoft and Krispy Kreme.
On Saturday Jon and Jane took Brittany off to a pre-arranged birthday party, while the Browns wilted in the heat and went to a public swimming pool staffed by officious lifeguards (who took a 15-minute break every 2 hours to "rehydrate"). As we were leaving the lifeguards had to close the infants pool while they scooped out someone's poo from the water (serves them right ...).

In the evening we all gate-crashed Brittany's birthday party (part two) and went to the local swimming-pool, which was 100% more relaxed. It was strange watching a lot of 13-year-old US girls patting Pippa, getting her to speak in her cute English accent and passing her round like a pet dog!

When we got back, I chatted to J and J while Jenny frantically tried to find accommodation for New York the next day. Everything was coming in at $400 a night or more - way outside our budget.











The next morning we said sad goodbyes and set off back to Charlotte airport. It was SO nice to see Jon and family again, and I hope we manage to sort out a holiday together some time soon. Many thanks for your hospitality, everyone!

Journey from hell 1 - to Winston-Salem

How do you get from Glacier National Park in Montana to Charlotte in North Carolina? It's easy really: just catch an overnight train to Seattle (heading east: the wrong way), then a quick hop to Charlotte Airport via Atlanta, then a brief two-hour drive. As it turned out the journey was even longer ...

We caught the overnight Amtrak train from Whitefish (near Glacier National Park), having fittedi n watching the 6th Harry Potter film first (we didn't think it was that good - but then neither was the book). Had a lovely breakfast on the train in the morning, after the girls slept perfectly (the adults, less so).

In Seattle, we caught a bus to the airport, then uneventfully caught the afternoon plane to Charlotte with 37 minutes to change at Atlanta late at night to catch the last plane to Charlotte, where we'd booked to stay the night. The lady on the check-out desk told us that the Atlanta plane was delayed 20 minutes, so we decided to accept Delta Airlines' kind offer of a free hotel for the night at Atlanta, from where we'd catch a plane the next morning to Charlotte. The lady also assured us that someone would be waiting to show us where to go. I didn't believe this, so the lady went to get her supervisor's name and wrote it down for me, and assured me that Delta would provide a hotel for free and would meet us. Can you guess the end to this story?

We landed at about 11 pm in Atlanta to absolute chaos: hundreds of passengers who had missed connections being fobbed off with worthless hotel vouchers, and not a Delta Airlines representative in sight. We decided to stay the night in Atlanta Airport (we hadn't got a lot of choice), and after eating we queued up at 2.30 to try to persuade the airline staff to check us in (no dice). We eventually managed to check in at 4 am, and after clearing security looked up our gate number.

Atlanta airport is huge (it's one of the main US hubs), and is divided into different terminals called "concourses", each of which has a different letter. Our tickets said that we would leave from gate B16; the departures board said that we would leave from T1; when we walked about a quarter of a mile along endless corridors to this concourse, the departure board there said we'd leave from a gate in F terminal (can't remember the number). In despair at 4.45 am we lay down to sleep for a couple of hours on the seats: the first sleep that Joanna and Pippa had had all night. What more can will our children have to cope with?

We got up refreshed (!) at 6.45, and checked in to the flight to Charlotte, which actually took off and landed only about half an hour late. Rented a car and drove to Winston-Salem!

Glacier National Park - 24-29 July

What a monster! The RV, that is. You can see the photo above, which also gives a good idea of life on a US National Park RV site. This internet connection won't give me time to post the video we took - we played a little trick on the girls. The side of the RV slides out (you can see this above), but the girls didn't know this, so Jenny set up the camera on the side and we got the girls to sit down at the table. Gradually they realised that the table was moving (it slides VERY slowly), and their reactions are hilarious (Joanna twigged what was going on first).

We had a quiet day relaxing, then drove to Glacier National Park on the following day to drive the beautiful "Going-to-the-Sun" road - the only road which crosses the National Park. We got to the gate and saw the sign "Maximum vehicle length 21 foot". Just 9 foot too long then. Neither of us remember reading THAT in any of the tourist info.

We drove to Avalanche Creek, and managed to get a spot for the night (and to light the fire for kebabs, too). Since we couldn't take the Rv any further we hopped on the free shuttle bus and went on up through "The Loop" and on to "Logan Pass" where we hiked up through the patchy snow to "Hidden Lake" passing many a mountain goat (strange-looking animals).

The next morning we went on a trail up to Avalanche Lake - when you got to the end of the trail you were suddendly faced with a huge cliff-face peppered with waterfalls - very impressive. I (Andy) went swimming for a few seconds - it was FREEZING.

That night we went out of the pass, drove round to the other side and spent the night at the eastern entrance (it would have been easier to drive through ...).

The next day we took a boat-cum-walk tour which consisted of:

• A short boat trip across a lake
• A quarter mile walk
• Another, shorter boat trip across a second lake
• A one mile walk to another lake lying beneath spectacular cliffs

The most impressive thing about the lake, though, was the mosquitoes, which blanketed us, so we hot-footed it back to the lakes and boats. We also finally spotted a moose - minus the antlers as it was female - taking a dip in the lake.

We now had to return the RV the next day, so we drove halfway back and stopped at Glacier Meadows RV Park, one of my favourites: far smaller and far more spacious. There was a small playground there with satisfyingly high and dangerous bars and trapezes (the girls are changing ...).

Finally, we gratefully returned the RV on the 29th. We finally worked out that to drive it you have to pretend you're driving a huge bus or coach - yuk!

The Hiawatha trail - 22-24 July

We left Yellowstone (all feeling a bit sad, which is unusual - we're normally ready to move on), and spent the night in Paradise Valley RV Park before our long day's drive back to return the RV (we had to cover about 400 miles in a lumbering RV in one day). The only interesting stop was in Missoula, where we went on a carousel made by the local community.

Spent a second night in an RV park in St. Regis (we'd stopped there on the way in), then drove up to rent bicycles and do the Hiawatha Trail! This was another rail-trail conversion: 16 miles gently sloping downhill through pristine Bitterroot Mountains scenery, beginning with a 2-mile pitch-black tunnel. Even though it was about 80 degrees outside we were all chilled to the bone by the time we emerged.

The ride wasn't as good as the Galloping Goose (which regular readers -are there any? - will remember). The surface wasn't as good, there were far more people, the scenery was less varied and it was VERY hot, all of which meant for slightly less happy children and hence slightly less happy parents. We caught the shuttle back up to the mountain-top to return the bicycles, had lunch in the car park there, then drove on to our final RV park near Coeur d'Alene in Idaho.

The next day was a bit of a nightmare. We had to return our RV then somehow get across the Rockies to pick up another one (a 3 or 4 hour drive) all within one day. This was made harder by the fact that there were no buses or trains doing the route. In the end we drove to Spokane airport to rent a car, then returned the RV, then drove as fast as we could across to Kalispell to pick up the new RV, getting there ten minutes after the depot closed (fortunately we'd called ahead, so the man stayed behind to show us it). And what was the RV like? Well, that's another entry.

18th - 22nd July: Yellowstone National Park

Bad connections and no connections - sorry for late updates!! Will add photos when we get a better connection.
18th July:
We entered Yellowstone from the North entrance, quite early to try and secure a spot big enough for our monster RV at one of the Parks' campsites. When we got to the entrance, several were already full according to the update board! Yikes! Pleased to say that we made it before checking out time and grabbed a spot at Norris. To think that we'll be repeating this early campsite hunt every time we want to change sites - hmmm... Did all the trails at Norris Geysers (we saw a LOT of geysers and hot springs) and enrolled the girls on the Junior Ranger programme (thanks to Dominic and Helen in Broadbottom - this turned out to be a real winner for the girls). If you ask the girls about the best thing during our time in Norris they will without a doubt say the trailer next door to us - they had 4 girls!! We finally met some play friends for the girls. Didn't see much of them after that... They were from Houston, Texas and we enjoyed chatting to their parents too.

19th July:
Old Faithful. Yes, it was touristy (I took a photo of the 500 odd other people watching along with us). We saw Old Faithful errupt twice (girls had a project to do for their Junior Ranger badge), shame about the crowds... Also stopped off at "Grand Prismatic Spring" - very colourful hot spring and a bunch of others I've forgotten the names of. We are now officially geyser/hot springed out!!! The day was saved by sausages cooked in the fire pit and toasted marshmallows. Forgot to mention the animals we have been spotting so far: Coyote, chipmunks and squirrels galore, yellow-bellied marmot.

20th July:
Changing campsite routine not too bad as we managed to book ahead for Bridge Bay; arrrived 10.30 ish to grab a good spot and then went off the do the all important washing. Raining on and off - very much on. Hiked the "Elephant Back" trail - rewarded with a lovely view of the lake and mountains from the top - then we started hearing the thunder and seeing the lightning. Managed to return safely without getting too wet. Animals: Mule deer and Bison. Joanna is now an authority on Yellowstone wildlife. We bought a book which she has devoured and memorised and will now recite facts about any animals we see. Our own Junior David Attenborough along with us.
21st July:
Decide to only spend 1 night at Bridge Bay so its up (not too) early to repeat the "find a campsite routine (we got a spot in Tower Junction camp site). On the way, it was very misty - we see a bear casually walk across the road on his/her way to the river. Also got a quick look at the "Grand Canyon of the Yellowstone and its waterfalls. Animals: Osprey and its nest, longhorn deer, loads more bison.
After staking our claim at the campsite, we went on another hike past secret/hidden lake (yes we found it!).
22nd July:
Determined to see elks/moose so we drove out of the Eastern Valley to the plains are saw huge herds of bison and more proghorn deer, but still no moose or the elusive elk. Hiked along the canyon rim and saw lots of bright blue mountain bluebirds and another osprey nest and a pair of osprey feeding their chicks. Stopped by Mamouth Springs on our way out of the park to collect the girls' "Junior Ranger" badges and wat should we find but a huge herd of elk just sat in the town on the grass in front of the health clinic! Stayed at our first KOA campsite (Butlins with tents and RV's!).

So that was our Yellowstone. Likes = the hikes, wildlife, Texan Mum and Dad and geothermal sites. Dislikes = the crowds of people at every tourist spot, the "find a campsite" routine and the wrteched MOSQUITOS!!!