Going to Park City

It's me, Sarah Ann.

This post is for Saturday, July 28. (We're almost caught up.)

Rachel didn't write about all of Friday because she just wrote about the part where she broke her foot. So, I'll start by telling you about Friday night. A lot of people on my grandpa's side (my mom's dad) came to visit my grandma and grandpa's house for a family reunion. There were lots of people there, even more kids than when my grandma's family came the night before. I played with lots of new cousins - some of that I didn't even know before. I went to bed late that night again. We had to say goodbye to our cousins and aunts because they were leaving early to catch a plane the next morning. That was kind of sad, but I was glad I'm going to see my Grandma Albrecht in three more weeks when she comes to Wisconsin to help us unpack.

On Saturday, we had to pack all of our stuff and we left my grandma's house. The first stop we a splash park in Herriman, Utah (I think that's the name of it - we had to drive about two hours to get there.) We met my mom's friend from college and her little daughter. Her daughter was two just like Christian and they had lots of fun playing togetheer. Taylor just played on the park and wouldn't play in the water. He didn't even get his hair wet one bit.

We ate lunch there and then left. We were excited because we were going to see my grandparents on the other side and my aunt. But best of all, we were going to see my dad. We hadn't seen him this whole trip. We drove to Park City where there is a huge reunion of my grandma's side of the family. Our car barely made it because the road is soooo steep and our van had to pull the camper. The car almost overheated. My mom was afraid to pull over because she was afraid that if she stopped, she wouldn't be able to get going again.

When we pulled in the condos in Park City, we saw my dad. I got to be the first person to hug him. Right away we went to the swimming pool and saw lots of cousins. Rachel couldn't really do much in the pool because of her foot. She can take the boot off and get her leg wet, but she can't put any pressure on her foot.

Taylor wanted to watch the Olympics. That night, we drove to Salt Lake City for my dad's great aunt's ninety-sixth birthday. My aunt told me lots of jokes on the way. Here's one:

Why does a flamingo stand on one leg?
Because if it lifts up the other leg, it will fall over.

The end.

(I'll add some photos later.)

Three Bones

This post is for Friday, July 27th. (We're almost caught up!)

Rachel here:
We started out the day by meeting some old friends from when my parents were in graduate school. My family met them at the park. At the park we played soccer until I went to play on the swings. I was jumping off them like I always do. After a while I decided to do a spin in the air.  I tried it a few times. Then once I landed and felt a pain in my foot. I sat there for a while holding my foot before hopping part way to the bench where my mom was sitting. My foot really hurt a lot. She came over and brought me some water. I continued hopping to where my mom was sitting. My mom tried to get me to swallow some Allieve but I couldn't seem to figure out how to do it. Then my mom realized there was children's Ibuprofen in the first aid kit in the car. We stayed at the park for just a little longer. I hopped all the way to the car.

Once at my grandparents' house, my mom had me elevate my foot and put ice on it. She did some research on the internet and called the insurance, then took me to InstaCare. There, they already had my name in the system from when I was a baby and got really sick when visiting Utah. My mom thought it was broken before we went. I REALLY hoped it wasn't broken because I didn't want to miss out on some of the other fun things coming up on the trip - especially hiking the narrows at Zion National Park.

Eventually they called me back. They made me sit in a wheelchair. At first I didn't want to, because I didn't want there to be a fuss. But I was getting tired of hopping, so I sat in the wheelchair. I talked to the doctor for a minute, and then they did an x-ray. A few minutes later, they showed my mom an x-ray. She told me that three bones in my foot was broken. Two of the bones were minor breaks (they were broken all the way through but still lined up). The other was not so minor. The ends of the broken bone were side by side. The doctor came back and said I would need to wear a boot for three weeks. That's when my mom told me that they had thought I would need surgery. The boot goes all the way to my knee. I can't put any pressure whatsoever on the front part of my foot for three weeks. My mom bought me crutches. It's a lot easier to move around with crutches than just with the boot. My aunt met us at urgent care and gave me a get well balloon.



I really wish I hadn't broken my foot. It hurts - but that's not the worst of it. I really wish I hadn't broken it because I can't run or hardly walk. I can't even sleep normally. Mostly, I'm sad about missing out on some things. In the future, I'll try to be more carefuly. But for now, I'm trying to look on the bright side.

Nerdy White Water River Rafting

This post is for Thursday, July 26.

It's Taylor.

You might have read Christian's blog post about going to old buildings and looking for gold. What he meant is that we went to Bannack State park. It's a ghost town. We went in some old houses. It was really neat.

Let me back up. We left the cabins in Melrose on Wednesday morning. We drove about 45 minutes to Bannack State Park. The story of the town is that there was this guy named Henry Plummer who was a bad guy. He was put in jail in California for shooting someone. Then, he moved to Montana. He became the sheriff there. Then they discovered that there were some outlaws that were killing the miners who found gold and stealing all the gold. Soon, they were suspicious that it was Henry Plummer. They decided to hang him. He said, "Stop. Don't hang me. In 24 hours I can bring you my weight in gold and I'll never come back to the town." But the didn't listen to him. They hung him anyway. They also hung his 24 friends.

We walked all around the town. Se saw a saloon, a school, a church, and some houses. At the end, we got to pan for gold. My cousin actually found a little sliver of gold. It was just a speck but they said it was the biggest speck they had seen all summer. A different year, someone found a piece the size of a pinky fingernail that was worth about $200.

After Bannack, we drove abother five hours or so to Nibley, Utah (by Logan) to where my grandparents live.


Thursday morning, we drove to Idaho with lots of cousins to go river rafting. It was just about 45 minutes outside of the border ot Utah. We got on this big, giant blow-up raft and went down the river. It was fun.The name of the company that we went down the river with was called Nerdy White Water River Rafting. At one point, we actually got to jump in the river. That was really fun. We went through some rapids that were really awesome even though they were only class 3. We went down two little waterfalls. Once my mom's cousin fell out of the raft and it took him a few minutes to swim and catch up to the boat and get back on. Afterwards, we got to drink homemade cream soda.

That night, my grandma's relatives all came for dinner. It was really fun. We played foosball and a really fun gamed called Snorta.

playing games with my cousins

The Wild West in Bannack State Park

This post is for Wednesday, July 25.

From Christian:

We see old buildings. We look for gold. My clothes get all west. We ride in car.

The kids in front of one of the abandoned buildings in the ghost town of Bannack

We played in the old jail!

Do we look mean hanging out at the outlaw's saloon?

We had fun playing on the old merry-go-round in front of the school.

We got to search for gold. I dumped my water all over my clothes and got soaked.

From Christian:

A Visit with Lewis and Clark

This post is for Tuesday, July 24.

Hi. It's Sarah Ann again.

Today we woke up and had to get busy. It was time to leave Glacier National Park. First, we were heading to the Lewis and Clark National Interpretive Center in Great Falls, Montana. We signed up for this juniot explorer program. Each age had a different packet. My cousin (who is one year younger than me) and I got a folder for us. It was really easy to fill them up. We did each page even though we didn't have to.

We went through a museum and watched a movie to learn about Lewis and Clark's trip to discover the west.  Before that, I didn't know ANYTHING about Lewis and Clark so the museum really did teach me a lot. They had to follow rivers west into areas that nobody knew about it. One time, there was a fork in thr river and they didn't know which way to go. The Native Americans had told them that the river would have a waterfall, so Lewis went ahead on one of the forks to look for that. I think it was the left fork that he took. He was proved right when he found the waterfall. Now you might wonder how they got over the waterfall in their boats. They had to get out of the water and built little carts with wheels to pull them over the hills. They had thought it would only take a day but it took a really long time. And it was really tiring. Two times a Native American woman saved them. One was Sacagawea. She helped talk to a tribe of Native Americans who weren't sure if they would help Lewis and Clark or not. They ended up giving them the horses they needed to continue their trip. The second Native American intervened when another tribe didn't like them so much. She said that she had met white people before and they were nice to her. We also listened to a talk about Native American games.

I'm dressing up like an explorer in the Lewis and Clark National Interpretive Center.

Then we had to drive some more. We drove to a little town called Melrose, Montana. There, we stayed in some cabins. We ate dinner really late and even took showers. The other place in Glacier National Park had run out of water so we could only take showers one day. My aunt even got in the stream by the cabins that had really cold glacier water and washed her hair there. After that, we went to bed because we had had a busy day.



Rachel and Taylor with my cousin at the cabins in Melrose. My cousin turned six months old!

The Big Debate: Grizzly or Black Bears in Waterton Lakes National Park

This entry is for Monday, July 23.

This is from Taylor.

Monday morning, we drove to Canada. We were going there to see more of Glacier National Park. Actually, it's Waterlake National Parks there. It's kind of a separate park, but they're also kind of together.

On the way there when we were right near the border, we saw a bear right by the car. The people there already watching it said it was grizzly but at first we thought it was a black bear. Later, we found out it was a grizzly. (Not everybody in my family agrees. Sarah Ann and Aunt Tarythe still think it was a black bear.) Then we crossed the border. They wanted to know where my dad was and if my mom had a note saying it was okay to take us across international borders - and that she wasn't kidnapping us. She didn't have a note but they let us go across anyway.

First, we went to Cameron Lake and rented rowboats. It was really fun. I was sort of bad at rowing at first. But then I got the hang of it. The lake was really pretty set right against a big, beautiful mountain. It was a little windy.

Then we went on a hike called Bears Hump hike. It's less than a mile each way but it was very steep and hard to get to the top. When we got to the top, it was very pretty and VERY windy. It blew so hard that it could blow a person off the mountain if he weren't careful. The way back down was simple.

We got back in the car and drove across the street to the Prince of Wales hotel - a famous hotel by the mountains and lake. We had high tea there like they do in England. The food was great. It was scones, tiny sandwiches, and little desserts.

The last thing we did was drive to Red Rock Canyon. On the way, we saw another bear. I think this bear was a grizzly bear also. Most people agreed but it was far away and hard to see. When we got to Red Rock Canyon, we went straight into the water. It was freezing but beautiful. It turned my feet red. My cousins' toe turned completely white from the cold water.

When we got home, we looked at the pictures of the bears. We still couldn't all agree. We'll post a photo below and you can vote on which type of bear you think it is.

Here's the first bear we saw. It was right next to our car.

Here I am rowing on Cameron Lake.

The view from the top of Bears Hump hike.

We're all about to get blown away by the wind next to the Prince of Wales hotel.

My toes got really cold wading at Red Rock Canyon.

Snow in the Summer on Going to the Sun Road????

This morning we got to sleep in. After that, we drove Going to the Sun Road. It took me a while to figure out that it wasn’t that we were going to Sun Road but that the road was actually named “Going to the Sun Road.” This was the scenic road that goes through the middle of Glacier National Park. Lots of people say it is one of the most beautiful drives in America and I can see why. Giant, steep mountains with snow-covered tops (and middles) stretched to the sky. Evergreen trees made their journey toward the middle but couldn’t make it all the way to the top – because the mountains were so tall that they reached way past the timber line. Rivers and lakes rested in the valleys of the mountains. Waterfalls cascaded down to meet the road.

The first thing we did was drive to the Logan Pass Visitor’s Center. Logan Pass is the highest point of Going to the Sun Road. There, we did the Hidden Lake Overlook Hike. It was 1.5 miles each way. It’s considered the best short hike in Glacier National Park. My whole family (except Christian), my cousins and their whole family, and my grandparents did the hike. When we asked about the hike at the visitor’s center, the ranger said we’d have to hike through a few snow patches. Well….it turns out that those snow patches weren’t really patches. They were more like snowfields. (Is that a word?) Before we even began a hike we saw a mountain goat with her baby. The baby was sooooo adorable. "Wow!" I thought. I couldn't believe we had already seen a mountain goat. The hike started on a boardwalk. It seemed like a normal hike. My mom even commented that she could have almost brought the stroller on it. Then we reached the first "snow patch." That's where the word snowfield comes in. There was a LOT of snow and it was steep going up. We kept loosing our footing, slipping and sliding. Eventually we reached a spot where there was about three feet of boardwalk before we reached the next "snow patch."  Eventually we reached this bend. On one side, it was almost a straight drop off with no railing. On the other side, it was straight up. And we were hiking on slippery snow. My cousin decided it might be easier to climb up the ridge and then get down from there instead of hiking around the bend. I decided to follow him. We got up there only to see that both sides were now way too steep to climb down. So, we had to continue walking along it until we reached a part where we could climb down. It was a bit scary and my mom wasn't too happy about our choice.

Throughout the hike, we saw several more mountain goats. Everyone else saw some bighorn sheep in the distance but I was ahead of the group at that point and didn't see them. Eventually we reached the overlook. It was beautiful. There was a lake and a valley with sheer, steep snow-covered mountains on all sides of it. There was a ountain goat there so close that we could have reached out and touched. I think the hike at Logan Pass was one of my favorite hikes ever (and I've been on a lot of hikes).

After the hike, we continued the drive. We didn't make it all the way to the end because we were running out of time. We turned around and headed back to camp. At camp, we roasted hot dogs for dinner over a fire. It was pretty cool. Then we held our own little church service (we were too far away to drive to an actual church meeting) before roasting marshmallows. I like roasting marshmallows almost more than I like eating them.

Overall, I went to bed feeling very content with the day.

Here's me with my Aunt Laura at Logan Pass

Here's some of the snow on the path on the Hidden Lake Overlook hike

The baby mountain goat. Isn't he cute?

Here we are at the overlook at the end of the hike

We stopped and put our feet in some freezing water on the Going to the Sun road