Road Trip!

Since I am in charge of my family's reunion this year, I was the one who made reservations at a campground for our group. Having never been there before, and knowing that this year's snow experience was quite large, we decided we'd better go check it out.

Initially when I made the reservations I thought the campground was down by other campgrounds in the same canyon. I was wrong. While the other campgrounds are maybe 10minutes away from a town called Huntsville, the campground I made reservations at was 1 hour away from Huntsville. 1 hour! Who knew?

When we got to the campground, the gate was open, but the signs hadn't been put back on. I never knew that they took the signs off in the winter, but it makes sense. So, we drove in, went around one loop and found where there were two big group sites.

Now, you need to realize that we were at 9,000 feet, just over the summit. So, we were pretty impressed that there really wasn't all that much snow. I guess in my mind I thought that there would be tons and tons of snow still, but there were just a few snowbanks left, and it was actually rather warm.



There was one small snowbank that was covering part of the road, but there were tire tracks all the way through, so I gunned it and made it. Woohoo for me right? So, we stopped and walked around.

At one group site there was a rather large snow bank still completely covering the fire pit. At the other group site the fire pit was uncovered, but most of the tables were still covered with a big drift.

Once done with all that exploring, we decided it was time to go. So, back into the car we went. On our way out we decided to just go look at the other loop just for kicks, and that's where things really got exciting.

We came upon another snow drift across the road. I stopped, but Shane told me to go closer for a better look to see how big it was. For some reason that equaled...try to drive through it Melissa! Maybe it was the euphoric sensation that I had going through the other drift. Whatever the reason, we got stuck!! I mean, WE GOT STUCK!

I know it's hard to tell from the pictures, but our car was in at least a foot of snow (I'm not exaggerating!), and it was high centered.


I have to admit though, that it was a nice experience in that, instead of getting upset, I grabbed the camera and started taking pictures!
Harrison and Hazel thought it was great!



So, after about an hour some other people came driving into the campground. First they tried to help push us out, but once they realized how badly stuck we were, they offered to go get the forest rangers, who were conveniently located at the ranger station which was just across the highway from our campground. (Yes, I had thought of going over there myself, but I had to let Shane at least put some effort into feeling like our knight in shining armor, which he is anyway...but you know, it's a guy thing, it's like asking for directions...)

Once the rangers came over, it was easy peasy. They just hooked a chain up and pulled us out. Yeah, I admit to feeling somewhat stupid for having gotten stuck in the first place, I mean, I definitely KNOW better! OH well, that comes with being human right?

When we were on our way again we decided to finish going over the mountain, since we were probably never going to be going that way again. We learned a few things...there is ANOTHER way to Bear Lake. Who knew? And, there are no stores in Woodruff, even though it is a half hour to Evanston.

On our way to Evanston Wyoming, we saw antelope. It was pretty cool! I've only eaten it, but apparently I've seen pictures somewhere, because I knew they were antelope.




Also, we learned that Evanston, is a somewhat odd place. Mainly in that, there are a few chain restaurants, but not many restaurants that are unique to the area. For a city the size of Evanston, I thought there would be more. Oh well. We ate lunch at a very overpriced restaurant. It cost more than Maddox costs for lunch! And, the food definitely wasn't as good. Big disappointment.

Then, of course, we had to stop at a fireworks store, because, we were in WYOMING! Boring me, I wouldn't let Shane get any fireworks that aren't legal for our state. We got some good deals though, so that was something to be happy about.

We finally got home about 6:30 PM. It was a LONG day. But, it was fun.