Acadia has a great Park Loop Road that shows you some of the amazing views in the park. There are several spots for pull-offs along the way for views and trailheads. We somehow turned off of the Park Loop at an intersection and had to find our way back in from one of the little towns. Cell phone signal is very spotty around the park, so get your GPS started while you have a good signal. (NOTE: You can get your park pass at the Hulls Visitor Center, Jordan Pond House, or there is a ticket booth area on the Loop.)
We saw wild turkeys, the water hitting the cliff areas, and lots of lakes and ponds. We stopped at Sand Beach and walked down to see it. It was a beautiful area with a sandy beach. Most of the beaches in Acadia are rocky, but this one had a nice fine sand.
Since we were in Miami, we decided to do an overnight in the Keys. We had looked a few months ago for RV parks, but they were completely full. We decided to just drive down and stay in a hotel for night. We were excited to see the Keys; we had heard such good things and the pictures looked amazing.
No one prepared us for the drive.
I-10 is a long two lane highway, which at times gets down to a single lane each way. Maps/Waze claimed the drive should be about 3-3.5 hours. They were wrong.
We were stuck in bumper to bumper traffic, often standstill or 5 mph in Key Largo. It was a Tuesday morning in February! The Main Street in Key Largo was lined with dollar stores, sandal outlets, and snorkel shops. You could not see the water at all. Drivers were aggressive and we were in slow moving traffic for an hour and a half. We went 3 miles in that time. We even saw people turning around through the hilly grass median.
We had our bottle of Blue Lizard sunscreen out for Ben to put on his arm (he was driving for the first part). It turned a deep blue right away. (If you are not familiar with the brand, their bottles or caps turn blue in “harmful UV light”). The sun is intense here in Florida!
Once we got out of Key Largo, it seemed to clear up a lot and we were also treated to the gorgeous views of the water. It did rain on us for a little bit of the drive down.
The drive back up was much the same, steady movement until around Key Largo where we ran into more traffic.
The boys were working on school work during the drive, so they were occupied. Once I switched to driving, I kept Ben occupied with a new car game: Find The Coolest Mailbox! Florida had some crazy mailboxes. We saw one in Miami that was a horse rearing up on it’s hind legs while holding a mailbox.
We missed capturing the outboard motor mailbox and the horse in Miami.
We had a good start, finished packing up inside and worked on the outside. I went to line up the truck and bumped the hitch into the trailer. It wasn’t raised up with the jack yet. I obviously needed coffee and to not rush. Luckily nothing happened, but not a great start to my morning.
The drive was uneventful (thank goodness) to our next campground in Hurricane, Utah. We checked in and they led us to our campsite. It was a back-in and they helped direct us in. We set up the RV. It was pretty hot out (104 degrees F), but at least the site had some shade! I am so glad we had a 50 amp site and could run both A/C’s.
The town was bigger than I thought it would be. There were several restaurants and grocery places close by. The one grocery store was within walking distance!
We ran into St. George (about 10-15 minutes away) to go to Costco. This Costco was not very different from others we have seen, although they did sell ice and had diesel at the fuel station. It was very crowded. It was the least amount we had ever spent: $34, including a pizza!
Yes, I do get a picture of Will at every Costco 😉
We unpacked the groceries and Ben took the boys into town to try to find a replacement cup and forks. I got to read for an hour by myself! It was so relaxing. The boys came back, but didn’t have much luck at the nearby store. We called it a night and settled in.
After Colorado, we headed to Utah. We had had mostly hazy skies in Colorado during the last of our stay due to the wildfires. I was really worried about our route, as the highway we were originally going to use had been shut down. Luckily, it opened a couple of days before our departure.
Our drive was pretty uneventful, although long. We passed several signs that said “Wildfire in Area. Do Not Call 911.” and “No Stopping On Highway”. We saw some smoke in the distance, but no large fires. However, we did pass where the fire burned next to I-70. It was immense amounts of burned trees and shrubs. It was crazy. We did get stopped in traffic for about 20 minutes or so. It was standstill, but next to a creek, so at least it was pretty.
Wildfire smoke in the distance
We arrived at our campground after hours, so our paperwork was in the outdoor box waiting for us. This time we had a pull-through spot (YAY!), so it was a little quicker getting settled in. We got everything hooked up and did a quick grocery run in town.
It was almost sunset, so we drove into Arches National Park (about 15-20 minutes down the road). We missed a lot of the sunset, but managed to catch the end. Arches looks pretty neat and I can’t wait to explore it more.
We woke up a little early so we could drive up to Pikes Peak. I still felt dehydrated from yesterday.
Ben and Nick packed a lunch for us and we were off.
There was construction at the peak, so you can drive to mile marker 13 or 16, park and then take a shuttle up to the top.
I drove on the way up. There are some amazing views! It’s beautiful. (Ben drove on the way down so I could take pictures! 🙂 ). There is a video of the drive up on the You Tube Channel. Right now I can only post 15 minute videos, so I tried to grab the best parts of the drives up and down the mountain. (I had 2 hours of footage!) There are a few things to see besides the mountains in the video, so I have a Video Scavenger Hunt if you want to try it: Bigfoot/Sasquatch Crossing, Scariest Portalet, Tutus, Marmot Sunning, Overheated Car, Injured Biker, Race Cars, Santa.
On the way up, we saw several groups of bicyclers and also a lot of trucks with trailers. Apparently on 8/30, there is a race to the top of Pikes Peak (the Pikes Peak International Hill Climb) and the cars were doing test runs that morning. We saw all kinds of cars coming down the mountain! That must be one scary race. There were no guard rails on a lot of the edges!
We parked at mile marker 16. Parking was frustrating. The two attendants didn’t communicate very well. The one had me turn down a lane that was full. The other attendant told me to wait and then forgot about me for 10 minutes. When I finally started backing up, then he directed me to a new parking area.
We got in line for the shuttles. The upper restrooms were locked, but the lower ones were open. The line moved relatively quickly thanks to all the shuttle buses they had working.
We caught a shuttle up to the top and walked to the visitor center/gift shop. We wandered around looking at the items. Ben and Will headed out and Nick and I got in line for donuts, coffee, and hot chocolate. We all walked over to the rocky area near the end of Devil’s Playground trail (aka Crags Trail). We walked/climbed towards the middle to enjoy our treats. When we were done eating, we moved closer to the edge. The views were incredible. We saw a plane flying by and we were higher than the plane!
The normal viewing platforms were closed, as was the train. I would definitely recommend walking towards Devil’s Playground trail area for better views. It was hazy (later heard it was due to wild fire smoke from our bus driver down), and you couldn’t see much of anything besides construction equipment at the viewing area in the back of the gift shop area. It is a bit of a climb and harder to get to, but the views are definitely worth it near the rocky area.
We saw a few marmots on our drive up and back. They were sunning on the rocks. There were a few birds around as well. Unfortunately, we did not see any of the Big Horn Sheep. Our driver down said she normally sees them on her trips, but hadn’t yet today. She thought maybe the test driving scared them away this morning. She did have a tip though for spotting them, as they blend in with the rocks. Look for white moving objects. It will be their tail end, but she said it’s the easiest way to spot them. Also on the way back down, she pointed out Cheyenne Mountain and NORAD.
After getting back into our truck, we headed back down. (You need to use lower gear to drive down and Ben took advantage of the truck’s awesome exhaust brake.) We had a couple of stops on the way to the bottom. They stop you at mile 13 to do a brake temperature check. If your brakes are too warm, they make you park and let them cool off for 30-45 minutes. Our first stop was the Halfway Picnic area. We found a table in the shade with some nice views. We saw a ground squirrel sunning on a rock nearby.
It’s been a few days, maybe even a week, since an injury! Our streak came to an end when Nick decided to take a “short-cut” over a drainage ditch and didn’t quite make it. Now, it wasn’t a large dip, just very rocky. He scrapped his leg up pretty good. I didn’t have any of the really large band-aids, so used gauze instead.
After lunch and a little first aid, we continued our descent and stopped at the Crystal Reservoir. There was a wood statue of Bigfoot, a gift shop, and nice views of the reservoir.
Toward the bottom of the mountain is the North Pole. It’s a Christmas themed amusement park. Admission is free, although it does cost money to ride the rides. There were only 3 or 4 rides running when we were there (not sure if due to social distancing restrictions or not) and the wrist band costs $10. We didn’t ride any rides, but did enjoy walking around and shopping. It was a cute area with several neat little shops. We picked up a couple of things for Christmas. It’s a cute place, especially with free admission, so don’t pass it up on your way down from Pike’s Peak!
Once home, Ben made us breakfast for dinner with the new double sided cast iron griddle we bought at Cabela’s. It was the first time we had used it, but it worked amazingly with the bacon. It is the Chef Camp Reversible Cast Iron Griddle*. We found the 14″ at Cabela’s and Amazon has the 16″.
We decided to drive back to Garden of the Gods. Not for hiking, nope not ready for that again. I am still thirsty from yesterday. This time we just drove through and enjoyed the sunset. The landscape and the colors changed in the setting sun. The sunset behind the rocks was amazing. The sunset also brought out several mule deer in the park.
