Roadtrip Day 15 - Flastaff to Home - 6,100 miles since we left!
0 comments at Wednesday, June 18, 2008
We headed west passing back through Flagstaff and down through Sedona, around Phoenix and back on I-10 to Riverside. We finally made it home - 6,100 miles, 15 days, and only 1 speeding ticket!
Road Trip day 14 - Durango, CO to Flagstaff, AZ via Grand Canyon
0 comments at Tuesday, June 17, 2008
Flagstaff.
Later, we passed through the town of Ouray on the the 550 (going south). Leaving town, the road climbs a snaking path up the side of the mountains with huge drops of the side just a couple feet from the road with no guardrails. Too bad it was dark during our drive, it seemed like it would have had really cool views. There were still lots of deer along the way and we finally got to Durango around 11pm. We stayed in the
Durango Doubletree hotel with the Animas river just a few steps from our room balcony.
We left Bigfork and started our 1,400 mile drive to Merrillan, WI. The drive is nice through western Montana, crossing the Continental Divide but starts to flatten out by the eastern boarder and startes to get pretty boring. We made it to Glendive, MT (just near the Montana/North Dakota boarder) where we stopped for a few hours sleep before continuing the rest of the way. We finally made it to Wisconsin late in the afternoon.We started off today with a run up the "M" trail just east of the University of Montana campus. It was windy and cold, but it was still a great but steep run. The picture is of Anne and me just below the M. 
Interestingly, the University of Montana is the home to the
Skaggs School of Pharmacy UM - I graduated from the
Skaggs School of Pharmacy UCSD at the University of California San Diego. Missoula seems like a really cool town, I think if things don't work out for us building a home in Wisconsin, this might be a place we would consider moving to.
From Missoula, we headed North towards Glacier National Park. Along the way, we drove along Flathead Lake which appeared bright emerald green due to the rain clouds overhead.
Although we didn't plan on it, we side tracked to the Hungry Horse Dam. This dam was built in 1953 to create a reservoir on the south fork of the Flathead River. It really is a beautiful dam with the way it is situated in the steep valley and the reservoir behind it. This was the best part of our trip so far.
Finally, we headed up to Glacier National Park which was just a few miles away. The road through the park was closed just 16 miles past the entrance, so we were here just a short time and then headed to Kalispell, MT where we are staying the night.
Tomorrow we'll be going to see Anne's cousin in Big Fork, MT and then making the longest leg of our trip so far - from Big Fork, MT to Merrillan, WI.
We left the hotel this morning and took a drive through Teton National Park and then over to Jackson just a few miles away. We drove around the town for a while and actually came across a pair of modern loft style home that we saw on the television show "What You Get For The Money" last year.
After Jackson, we headed to Rexburg, Idaho to see the
Teton Dam museum. I'm sure nobody would be surprised to hear that I got a speeding ticket along the way. I was going 65 in a 55mph zone - the court date is set for July 1st in Jackson which I'd love to go to, but the $90 fine is just a little cheaper than returning to Jackson.
The Teton dam (an earthern dam) was completed in 1975, but started to develop leaks on June 6, 1976 just 8 months after its completion. The leaks lead to the dams failure later that day completely releasing the 240ft deep reservoir beh
ind it and flooding several small towns down river. The remnants of the dam are still in the river valley and you can drive up to an overlook just above it (picture).
From Rexburg, we drove 300 miles to Missoula, Montana. The drive was really nice and the views in Montana were the best we have had yet - Giant green rolling hills giving way to dark snow and cloud capped mountains behind them. It rained on and off pretty heavily along the way but the traffic was light and we made it quickly around dark.
