Friday 30 July 2010

Westward Vacation - Day 6

I woke up in Couer d'Alene Idaho in a Holiday Inn. We walked out of the hotel and down the street to where we were able to walk around the downtown area. It was great! There were all these little stores that I went into! There was a Del Sole store that i went to and bought a keychain and a frisbee.

Then we drove for 9 hours. During the trip we saw: Mountains. Flat. Hills. Flat. Flat. And then some more flat.

Finally we arrived in Seattle. SEATTLE! I officially love Seattle! My mom has a friend Marc who took us to a great restaurant and showed me the campuses of one of the colleges that I am interested in (in Seattle). He's hilarious and I would like to adopt his as my uncle!!! After dinner we went to an outlook where we could see all of downtown Seattle including the Space Needle.

I am in love with a city. I don't want to ever leave here on Sunday, I just want to stay here forever!

<3 e

Thursday 29 July 2010

Westward Vacation - Day 5

Today was another driving day. We woke up at 6 and then left at 8 (it takes us a while to actually leave, plus we had to eat breakfast).

I slept for the first hour and then my parent's woke me up to look at a view. Do I dutifully got out of the car and looked at the over look. It was impressive, but there was something else that caught my attention. Chipmunks. Now, I have always liked chipmunks, I think they are adorable little animals. But these chipmunks were something else. They had run up the side of a mountain to where to over look was so that they could come up to the people. And when i say "come up" I mean they would walk right up to you, only about an inch away and look up at you and say with their little cute eyes "FOOOOOOOOD!!!". It was the cutest thing I have every seen. They kept walking up to me, and I was able to take some great shots of them. They even ran over some kid's shoe!!

Over the course of the next 10 hours we continues to see different kinds of animals, including:
-Crazy tame chipmunks
-Cows just hanging out by the side of the road munching on grass
-A bear from very far away, but I was able to take pictures of it with my dad's long range zoom camera
-Many herds of buffalo
-Deer that had walked right up to a house and were just hanging out
-Elk who were lounging in the middle of someone's lawn
-A moose (technically my mom saw it and i didn't but i'm still counting it!)

Other than seeing more mountains we saw the Mammoth Hot springs, which were cool looking but there wasn't actually any water in it like there was supposed to be. There was actually a sign for "Trucks will flip." That was scary!

We had dinner at this great place called Moontime where i had cheese filled ravioli that was super good!

All in all the city of Couer d'Alene ID is a very nice city! But i can't wait to be in Seattle tomorrow!
<3 e

Tuesday 27 July 2010

Westward Vacation - Day 4

Once my parents were finally able to drag me out of bed so that I could get ready, we headed to the lobby. The lobby was where the continental breakfast was held, and it was full of tables, people and food.

The only problem with the lobby was all of the animals. There were elk, deer, bears, geese, wolves, goats and even a buffalo head. All of the animals were dead (obviously). So I ate my breakfast surrounded by animals, starring at me. There was one goat in particular whose eyes made it look like he was in pain and about to cry. Let's just say, I lost my appetite.

Soon after, my parents and I left to go to Yellowstone. Most people spend a week in Yellowstone, but we spent 6 hours. It was still a lot of time though.

We went to go see Old Faithful. I wasn't extremely impressed. I dunno, I think everyone made me believe it was going to be the best thing I've ever seen, but it wasn't. Truth be told, it was very cool. The idea that something controlled by the Earth has a schedule is an odd idea. I did see two pairs of twins. That were dogs. That was very cool!

Also, Yellowstone proved to be a good place to get some of my remaining states on my hunt for all 50. I have six left and I'm determined to get at least one more, if not six.

While my family and I were driving down one of the roads, there was a sign (not unlike many of the others) saying that there was road construction ahead. So when the traffic ahead of us came to a complete halt, we weren't suprised. We were suprised when we figured out that it wasn't construction, it was a buffalo walking on the road. Buffalo are big. And when I say big, I mean HUGE!! And they also have eyes that look dead and sad. It was very odd, and creepy...

One thing that did impress me was Yellowstone Lake. It was possibly one of the most beautiful things I have ever seen. When I first saw the lake, I thought that something was wrong with it. But actually, it was just ridiculously clear. I got to stand by the water and skip stones into it,

I have offically decided that I am, in fact, a water person and not a mountian person. Though, when looking across a crystal clear lake and seeing the mountians in the background, one has to admit that they are pretty spectacular. I am really looking forward to going to the ocean later this week!
<3 e

Monday 26 July 2010

Westward Vacation - Day 3

This morning my parents and I packed up all of our stuff and left Rapid City, but not before we had breakfast at Tally's Silver Spoon, my new favorite restaurant. I couldn't decide between the French Toast and the Eggs Benedict so they let me have half of both! The French Toast was pretty good but the Eggs Benedict... It was the most amazing thing I have ever eaten in my entire life. It was perfect in every way. The hollandaise sauce was perfect. The bacon was great. The egg was done exactly how I like them to be. Even the English muffin was toasted to perfection. It was amazing. I don't know if I will ever be able to eat Eggs Benedict ever again, except at Tally's Silver Spoon.

Moving on: My family and i went to see Devil's Tower, which is this giant piece of rock that is jutting out of the land (if you have ever seen Close Encounters of the Third Kind, you will know what I'm talking about). It's super weird looking. It was also really hot and sunny.

We also saw a lot of prairie dogs which are officially my favorite animal. Of course, even with all the signs posted EVERYWHERE saying "DON'T FEED THE PRAIRIE DOGS!", what did people do? That's right, they fed the prairie dogs chocolate Teddy Grams. Even though this is probably super bad for the dogs, it was nice because they came up closer so i was able to get much better pictures than I normally would have.

We also crossed a very impressive set of mountains. We got up to an elevation of 9,430 feet, which was beautiful. There were a few towns where the elevation was actually higher that the population number.

I know this is random, but I saw a llama. Yeah, a llama. Just hanging out in a field. A llama.

In Lovell, Wyoming we went to a convenience store that had mac and cheese on once side of the isle and bullets on the other which I found hilarious.

Also, there was a place called "Pub, Liquor and Taxidermy". Yes, very odd things to put together...

On my hunt for license plates I have 8 more states to go: Alabama, Kentucky, New Hampshire, Vermont, Hawaii, Maine, Rhode Island and Delaware Wish me lick finding them tomorrow at Yellowstone!!!
<3 e

Westward Vacation - Day 2

We woke up with a promise of a continental breakfast though technically it was a room with four tables and a counter with coffee, cereal and mini donuts. As much as i was dissapointed, it was quite good and did it's job.

The next 8 hours, my mom and dad and I spent in Custer State Park and in the Black Hills. Here's a list of all the things that we saw or did (roughly in order):

- While my dad got gas my mom and I went to this small little park off to the side of the gas station. It had busts of three presidents: Bush, Regan, and Kennedy. Apparently there is something called "The President's Park" which is a trail in the middle of the woods that is full of 44 busts of all the presidents. I wanted to go so that I would be able to get lots of pictures of said busts but NOOOO, it was TOOO far away. Hmph.

- I decided to start the liscence plate game (you know the one, where you have to find as many different liscence plates as you can) with myself. So I have been walking around taking pictured of people's liscence plates. Yes, I'm very creepy, thank you.

- Then my family and I went and visited Mount Rushmore. Honestly? I thought it was cool, but kinda stupid. I mean no disrespect to anyone who finds it amazing. But, it wasn't AMAZING. These people took 14 years to blow up the side of a mountain so that it would resemble the faces of some important people. Yes, it's an amazing feat, but I was mostly annoyed at the fact that Mount Rushmore was originally part of Native American land. Yes, all of America is part of Native American land. But this land was sarcred to the Indians. It was part of their religion and we blew up one of their sacred mountains so that we could have some faces on the side of a mountain. But i digress, it was kind of cool. Even though it involved a lot of walking.

- Once my family and I had finished our tour, we left and went to Custer State Park. We had a map that the guy (Jay) at our hotel had given us, telling us where to go and what to do. Custer State Park was actually one of the most amazing things I have ever seen. There were so many things there and overall it was just really well kept, and it was just plain beuatiful.

- In Custer, my mom had found a highway called "Needle's Highway" which turned out to be spectauclar. It was right on the edge of these mountains, and it was just breathtaking. There were parts where the road had to go through parts of mountains, so there were these tunnels. They were so narrow that they could only fit one car at a time, so when you were about to go in them you had to HONK your horn in order to let the people on the other side know that you were, in deed, going to drive through the ridiculously narrow tunnels. While driving in another part of Custer we saw a tour bus. Now, the thing that wondered about was how this TOUR BUS was going to fit into the tunnel. I have recently looked up the dimesions and have found that a typical tour bus is 8 feet across. One of the tunnels that we went through was 8 feet and 4 inches across. And that wasn't the narrowist one. We were very worried for the safety of these poor people.

- My family and i decide to have a picnic, so once we had gone through one of the tunnels (above), we pulled to the side and sat on the side of a mountain and ate peanut butter and jelly sandwiches, apples and granola bars. The most amasing thing was the fact that after cars passed us, it was silent. And not city silent, but actual, dead silent.

- There was an outlook point that my dad and i found that was truly spectaular. There were views all around you and the view you got were amazing. It was breathtaking.

- At one point my parents and I pulled off to the side of the road and I took them off on a nonofficial trail. Actually, it wasn't a trail at all. But i paid attention to where I was going, and I only headed in one direction. Once i finally reached the highest point, we were a fair ways away from the car, but we were sourounded 360 degrees by mountains. It was sooooo cool.

- We saw a herd of buffalo which was also really cool. The noise they make is sort of like a tiger growling which was really creepy, but funny.

- There is this pact called the "Begging Burros" and it's a group of burros (donkeys) that walk on the road and stick thier head into your car asking to be petted and to be fed. I learned that I have a fear of burros. I'm totally fine with them being in someone else's car, but the second they start coming near my car i start to freak out. Of course, the other people wanted to know if i wanted to feed it (HELL NO) so they brought it over to me (thanks a lot). It was cool though to have these animals just walk up to your car. They were everywhere too, so it was hard to escape them.

- While my parents and I were heading out of the park, we found this place called "Elk's Haven and Horse Camp" which was a little convience store that was also horse camp (Bring your own horse!). So we went inside and bought some ice cream and sat outside on this huge wrap around porch and listened as people played checkers and told stories. It was great. And then we noticed a sign that said "For Sale". For about 20 minutes, we seriously considered how we could buy this place. It was beautiful. But we finally reasoned and realized that it would never be able to happen, so we piled back into the car and drove away.

For dinner we ate at the Firestation Brewery Co. which used to be a Firestation. It was really cool, but not as good as Tally's Silver Spoon!

See ya tomorrow!
<3 e

Saturday 24 July 2010

Westward Vacation - Day 1

HOLY. SHIT. THAT WAS AMAZING. I MEAN, IT WAS JUST--- Wait. I'm getting ahead of myself. Let me start from the beginning:

My mom woke me up at the ungodly hour of 4:30. It was painful. I staggered around for a while until we finally climbed into the car at 6. Let me tell you, Minnesota at 6 in the morning is not one of the most amazing sceneries you have ever seen. After an hour or so, I gave up on trying to stay awake and finally gave into the sleep.

While my parent's let me sleep, they did wake me up once so that I could see The Jolly Green Giant. No, it's not as amazing as it sounds. It was a billboard. Yeah. Even though they felt that I needed to be woken up to look at a billboard, they didn't feel it was necessary to wake me up for Minnesota's Largest Candy Store, with 56 different kinds of licorice alone. Great choice, huh.

On our way out of Minnesota, we did stop at Walnut Grove. When we arrived we got excited because there were people outside, meaning that it had to be good! No. You had to pay to go into the gift shop. No thanks. So we piled back into the car and left.

Our next stop was at some wind turbines. My dad was wondering what kind of sound they made, considering many people have complained about living next to them because of the noise. All I have to say is, 'What noise??' It was beautiful. And tall. SOOOO tall. When I stood underneath it and looked up at it it made me nauseous.

The next stop along our way was at De Smet, which is where the surveyors house from Laura Ingalls Wilder. It was really cool to see the house and think of little Laura living there. The house was very nice, and gorgeous along with the house that Pa built. There was also a beautiful gray cat with ice-blue eyes who ran away from me every time I tried to go up to it.

We also stopped at a place called Wall Drug, which is pretty much just a giant drug store/souvenir shop/restaurant/clothing store. In the store there was a mechanical gorilla playing the piano and a cowboy marionette band, along with a water park out back. It was hilarious. And confusing. They had a map so that you knew where you were going.

At this point, our trip sort of blends together, but here's a list of things that I saw:
-A boat being pulled by a trailer
-Hundreds and hundreds of hay bales. They were EVERYWHERE!
-Perfect clouds. The kind of clouds that you only see in pictures and paintings. They were beautiful, and i took many pictures of them
-A camel. Oh yeah. A camel. I don't know why, but in one of the pastures along the way, there was a camel. So there.
-A dinosaur metal skeleton cutout being led by a human metal skeleton cutout

Then we went to the Badlands (please look at beginning sentence). It was beautiful. And amazing. It stretched forever, and then stopped suddenly. The mountains (or hills) seemed like they were completely fake. They were too big and too beautiful for my brain to comprehend. I could go on forever talking about them, but I won't bore you.

Finally, after 14 and a half hours of driving, we reached our hotel. Which is more of a motel, than a hotel. It's not the best place in the world. Except for the view. The view at night is of the entire city of Rapid City. It's great. Our dinner matched the view. We went to this little restaurant called "Tally's Silver Spoon." My parent's had a Peanut+Beef+Vegetable soup that was amazing. Then my mom and I split a burger that was good, but not amazing. And then we had desert. Oh god. The desert was the best food i have ever eaten in my entire life. It was a flour-less chocolate cake with an avocado fluff around it, drizzled with a key lime syrup. Oh. My. God. It was SOOOOO good. I feel as though my stomach is about to explode, it's so full, though I would make room for another one of those chocolate cakes. I'm seriously considering how I can move Tally's to Saint Paul...

Well, that was a long post. I plan on doing a diary/journal/vacation log for everyday that I am on vacation, so beware:Long posts ahead. But for now, I'm exhausted and feel as though I cold fall asleep at any moment. I'll post more tomorrow!!

<3 e

Tuesday 13 July 2010

Proud

I'm so very proud of myself!! I got my sheet from the AP Board... place... thingy... BUT! Guess who got a FOUR on her AP Geography test?? That's right!!! I did!! I spent hours studying for this test and it all paid off!!! HA!! SUCK IT AP TEST!

<3 e

Saturday 10 July 2010

NEW BLOG!

As you might be able to tell, my blog got a makeover, thanks to the help of Delphine! I have separated my Doctor Who stuff, from my personal stuff, which many people will like :P

Also, my family and I are going to be taking a trip out west in a few weeks and I will be posting once everyday letting you know what's going on with me on my travels!

More to come later!!
<3 e

P.S. Thank Delphine by reading/subscribing to her blog!!
http://drawmeunmouton.blogspot.com/

Wednesday 7 July 2010

Dreams

I have decided something. I've made up my mind.

What's the point of dreaming if you don't believe that you can make them come true. So I have decided, any dream of mine, I am going to fight for.

Starting with a huge dream of mine. I WANT TO GO TO COLLEGE IN THE UK!! I don't want to visit the UK, I want to LIVE there. I want to eat, and breathe, and just BE there.

I've decided that I'm going to work for it. I'm going to work insanely hard and I'm going to go to frickin' college in the frickin' UK!

I'll post more dreams of mine later,
<3 e