From Desert to Green Forest

Went to the supermarket got the kids a couple of balls to play with, found a watch I could give Matt for his B-Day and loaded the camper with all the food and utilities one needs to make a BBQ, clean floors and sinks..., this is like moving into a new house, it is actually just that except for the size and the wheels.

We arrived at Lander into a mini campground the Twin Pines, nothing special about that apart the fact that after hours of desert getting somewhere with water green clean and immaculate bathrooms is a nice break. The kids are happy on the lawn and the play ground. They get along so well, i just whished they would listen after the first time we say something but hey I suppose kids are kids ..... still.

I made an attempt at BBQ to find out after beating myself on the head, that the coal I bought was really bad so instead of eating at 6:30 we ate at 9:00PM, the chicken was excellent and the Marshmallows was a brand new experience for the kids, one we will repeat often.. The slow coal did give nature time to darken and reveal what we in Belgium forget ever existed, the magnificent star show up above. Amazement struck us all as thousands of stars lit the skies.

Driving this 32fter turns out to be easier then i thought, U turns are a piece of cake as long as you have enough space and Parking will be hell as soon as we hit a big city but meanwhile space space space is what you get in Wyoming.

There is nothing around us but mountains and sand and dunes and sand and mountains. T he yellow sandy hills turn to yellow once in a while. I am driving looking into this nothingness and could perfectly see John Wayne and Clint Eastwood riding up.

The Indians where given a tough place to live, the biggest Indian Reserve is here, River Mountain, not a place I’d like to live, remote and dry, but I guess at the time it was better then getting killed.

We past Dubois after more desert and a few ghost towns, (imagine 8 streets empty houses maybe 20 habitants) a little Village set in a green scenery, all wooden chalets a mixture between the wild west and the little house on the Swiss prairie with red and green roofs. The Bank instantly made me feel like Jesse James but I abstained from getting in and robbing it.

Shoshone Falls Campground welcomed us by having a deer run away as we arrived. A short walk to the top of the falls and through the forest with sky high conifers to get back to the camper and find Matt and Djudju eatin in there neck by some kind of bug no one seems to be able to define.

Mosquito’s are everywhere thank God a 45 second drip drop of rain made them disappear. The new impregnated charcoal gets to cooking temp in no time we had some steak and salads and chucked the carefully selected found firewood on in the pit to get meter high flames, the kids where delighted using their wooden sticks to pin a Marshmallow and eating them half melted, with the occasional c’est chaud.

A few Games and a few Scary stories around the fire pit and of to bed after what felt like our first real camp out.

Did I mention the first thing we saw as we pulled into our parking spot.

Words are to little here is a picture, Val didn't like thisone at all.

The plan was to drive to Grand Teton National Park as soon as we would wake up and since we went to bed at 8 we would surely wake up around 6ish.

At 8:30am we left to Teton after a night of silence rarely experienced.

Grand Teton is amazing and we’ve seen nothing of it yet, the size of our Camper limits us to commercial parking’s which is a bit of a downer down here but the scenery as soon as you walk 250mt is fantastic. They also have full hook up, plug in the electricity, the water and the sewer allowing us to use air conditioning shower and toilet limitless with no worries of filling up the tanks.

Matthews’ Bday is tomorrow so Val and I decided to split up to treat him with a 3 hour white water rafting, while I’ll take care of Julian taking a slow float down a scenic river.

The walk around the lake was filled with beautiful scenery, close encounters with mummy deer(not dear) and two bambi’s, and cutting devices to stop the mosquito’s from sucking us dry. There is a reason why rangers wear shirts seemingly to thick for the outside temperature...mosquito’s don’t care weather you wear a T-shirt or not they’ll go right through it.

Sitting here having some quiet time writing, Djudju sleeps in the back, Val reads Shantaram, Matthew takled me into letting him play a memory game, cause it’s educational, on the iPad and I’m going to head to a wifi spot trying to post this.

Life is good when the only thing you need to worry about is nothing!