2010 June 18th:

Mark:

We woke up this morning to a beautiful clear blue sky. The air was crisp with the temperature only 46°F. We were staying at a hotel that served breakfast so we got dressed and went to eat. We ate as much as we could. We went back to our room and started to pack up our belongings for another day of riding. We both got dressed for riding in the cold but once we started riding, we realized that it wasn’t quite enough. We had to pull over and put on glove liners to keep our hands from freezing.
We rode until we stopped for gas and we both wanted some real gloves for the cold. I asked a couple of the people at the gas station if they knew of any places that sold motorcycles or ATV’s. One guy pointed us in the right direction and we drove over to this place that sold snowmobiles. It was however a bust because they didn’t have any gloves that fit. The people at the snowmobile place suggested that we go to this outdoor place, but they only had gloves for skiing. We gave up and went back to riding. By the time we made it to Jackson, Wyoming the air temperature had warmed up enough that it didn’t matter anymore, at least not for today.
We stopped at the visitor’s center and stamped the national park passport, and then headed out of town. Somehow, and I’m not sure how, we made a wrong turn and ended up about 50 miles off of our route. We had stopped for fuel and I was looking at a map and saw that we weren’t where I thought we were. We turned around and rode back the way we came. The ride was wonderful and the scenery was great, but we lost about 2 hours.
We arrived back at Grand Tetons NP and found a campground to camp in. On our way through the park we saw many different wild animals. There was a bear, moose, and a couple of elk. We stopped and took a lot of pictures and I know that Niko was shooting a lot of video today. Once we found a campground, we setup the tent and got out the little stove that I bought before we left. We heated up some water and had some good old freeze dried food for dinner. The really funny thing about this camping thing is that I have never camped out with Niko at anytime during his childhood. This will be a different experience for sure.
Yesterday Niko and I put on 455 miles during our journey and today we stopped so many times that our mileage was only 342 today. Tomorrow we are intending to make it through Yellowstone NP. I have my doubts, but we will see.
Everything has been going very well with Niko and I. We seem to be getting along very well almost better than ever before. I know that the experience of this journey will be an important segment in both of our lives. I know that I have been enjoying it a lot.
It is starting to get dark now and I will have to post this at another time.

Niko:
This morning began with a nice breakfast of waffles, bacon, a hardboiled egg, and a swig of coffee, combined with the entertainment of Morgan actively replacing syrup, milk, and the like. We heard it was going to be very cold today, so we dressed in the thermal clothes we had packed little of. We quickly got on the road and rode north quickly, getting miles in before any headwind decided to whip us around. We arrived at a small town for gas because I had run out and we both were due. We both had cold hands and wanted some windproof gloves but after tons of searching we found none and dad settled for liners with rubber gloves under his gloves and I put a liner under the glove of my coldest hand… we only had three liners, you see. We actually felt a lot better with just that, since it had warmed up since then. We rode to Jackson and searched for a motorcycle shop to find gloves, but alas, there was nothing. So, on we rode to Grand Tetons NP!
When we got to Grand Tetons, we didn’t see any mountains as we rode up the hilly road and began to wonder where the Tetons were. Suddenly we rolled around a corner and they appeared suddenly, sharp and crisp against the sky. We rode through the park and took a right at Moran junction and rode over a cold winding pass to Dubois. When we arrived, we realized we should have turned left at Moran junction. So we rode all the way back… only much faster.
When we got back, we rode north to Flagg Ranch in the John D Rockefeller memorial parkway and camped because cabins were extremely expensive. We ate a freeze dried beef stroganoff (which was delicious, especially compared to the sour taste in my mouth after seeing plates at a restaurant priced near 20-33 dollars a plate! So a six dollar freeze dried meal and a protein bar was gourmet! We started a fire with old damp logs from unused sites and the smoke got rid of the swarm of mosquitoes. We talked with our camping neighbors, Jill, Keith and their kids, who were fun to chat with. I saw a bat flapping aimlessly just before the sun went down. Now I’m well ready to sleep and get warm again. It’s very cold here and our fire went out, so goodnight dear reader.