picture the scene. the fourth of july. at one of the busiest national parks in america. we prepared ourselves for a frustrating day. but we also took preventative measures to be as successful as possible. so, we planned to get up at the crack of dawn, drag the kids out of bed, maybe change them […]
unschool
yellowstone.junior rangers and artist paint pots.
on our second full day at yellowstone, we took it pretty easy. derek had to work, so it was just me and the three kiddos, so we decided to hit the junior ranger station closest to our entrance and then stroll around the artist paint pots boardwalk and take in some geothermal activity. the junior […]
yellowstone.upper loop drive and mammoth hotsprings.
our trip from salt lake city-ish to west yellowstone was a long one, at around 5 hours and 40 minutes. we usually like to stick to about 2-4 hours. add in packing up, bathroom, gas and food breaks, registering at the campground and setting up, and we had a long and not fun day. i […]
denver botanic gardens(alt title: a million pictures of flowers)
after much deliberation and planning, we decided to use derek’s day off on memorial day for a trip to the denver botanic gardens. and as a bonus, my friend chris, who you’ll meet in a future post, let us use her guest passes to get in for free!! i was pleasantly surprised with how much […]
albuquerque day (explora and breaking bad).
for our spontaneous one day stay in albuquerque, i was faced with a pressing decision. free science museum OR petroglyph national monument. since we had already seen a bunch of petroglyphs at three rivers and had just visited a national monument the day before, i figured the kids wouldn’t be super excited about petroglyph that […]
three rivers petroglyhs (mostly).
yesterday (saturday), we took a family excursion to three rivers petroglyph site, about an hour north of our campsite. so, naturally, on the way, we stopped for a ginormous breakfast. and then we were off for adventures. three rivers petroglyphs is on BLM (bureau of land management) land. it contains over 21,000 petroglyphs (carved rock […]
new mexico museum of space history.
today (sunday) we hit up the new mexico museum of space history. we had free admission, so we decided to spring for a trip to the planetarium. the museum was mostly a little over my kids heads, but still pretty cool. outside, there were rockets and planes and various space travel artifacts. this giant rocket […]
guadalupe mountains national park.
on sunday, we woke up bright and early, ready for our second adventure of the weekend. this time, we drove past carlsbad caverns into texas, where guadalupe mountains national park is another 30 minutes down the road. (technically carlsbad caverns national park is in the guadalupe mountain range). guadalupe mountains is home to the highest […]
big bend. hot springs canyon.
warning. this post is at least 50% pictures of anna posing with beautiful landscapes… so, in my last post, i said that the kids wanted to go back to the hot springs. i managed to convince anna to hike there with me this time, instead of drive to the quick little path. she could earn […]
big bend. santa elena canyon.
due to slow internet, travel days, and an untimely round of the stomach bug (is there ever really a timely round?), i’ve fallen behind on my big bend posts. allow me to take you back to last thursday. after a day off from exciting expeditions, mostly due to hazel being sick, we were back at […]