Posts from the ‘Parks’ Category

Sep 4

Loving the Yeti

the-downhill-was-worth-it_21147379425_o

When I was in college (a really long time ago) I used to mountain bike quite a bit. Then, I began flirting with road bikes … which eventually led to a full-on love affair with skinny wheels.

For the next 12 years I covered thousands of miles, but all of them via blacktop. But, every so often I caught myself dreaming about a day when I would once again ride the trails with a huge grin locked across my face, and enjoying every minute.

As we were preparing for life on the road, I sold my road and triathlon bikes, and in the process closed a chapter on an aspect of my life I will always look back upon fondly.

Recently, I bought a new mountain bike (Yeti SB95) and lucky for me our current boondocking spot happens to be about 20 feet from a trailhead.

The downhills are awesome.

Sep 4

Waking-Up To Perfect

7480d-11850414_1469993373328804_305990140_n

Generally we try to avoid driving at night – especially when venturing into unfamiliar locations like a mountainous national forest. But today, knowing that we would be venturing into a first come – first serve destination ahead of a what is sure to be a busy holiday weekend, we decide to go it.

Waking up this morning, it was clear that this boondocking spot about 90 minutes west of Denver is going to be awesome. Clearly, I have a weekend full of mountain biking and trail running in my future.

Thanks @sethkhughes for the recommendation!

Jul 20

Pesky Bugs

We’ve been settled at Big Sioux Recreation Area in Brandon, SD for the past few days and I continue to be impressed with South Dakota state parks – clean, well maintained, and offer spacious sites.

Kelly and I spent a lot of our youth in this area, so our time here has been busy catching-up with friends and relatives. I must say it’s been nice to see so many people.

In other news … the heat has broken here in the southeast part of the state and now the bugs are out in full force. Having been cooped-up for too many days in air conditioning, I was anxious to work outside while enjoying this nice campsite (electric only). So, in an attempt to level playing field with pesky bugs I purchased this screen room last night ($45 at Walmart).

Because I wanted something highly packable, it is not perfect and only time will tell if this cheap product can withstand the rigor of regular use, but for now it seems to be doing its job helping to keep the bugs away.

May 31

2 Comments

The Great Salt Lake

While visiting Page, AZ was very cool, the internet coverage very much sucked. This wasn’t a big deal initially due to our stay overlapping with the Memorial Day holiday, but by Wednesday that week we’d had enough – the slow data speeds were driving us crazy and impacting our ability to work effectively. Knowing that there was a great alternative state about two hours northwest near Zion National Park, we decided to leave Page and relocate to Sand Hollow State Park in Hurricane, UT.

The site worked perfectly for our needs and we had great views of Zion, but … it was a huge bummer to be so close to a fantastic national park and not have time for a visit.

Working while overlooking Zion National Park

With a looming deadline in Salt Lake City (Kelly’s long scheduled haircut), we pushed hard from Hurricane and late in the day arrived to Great Salt Lake State Park, which was our base for the week.

Located about 15 minutes from downtown Salt Lake City, this location was conveniently situated, but home to crazy aggressive – and big – mosquitoes. Further, the lake levels were quite low, which coupled with hot temperatures seemed to be an incubator for intermittently stinky sulfur odors … all of which took away from an otherwise ideal and quaint place to squat for the week.