Police Cadets at "Law Enforcement Challenge"

Once again this year Caitlyn got to travel with us to the coast with Mike's police cadets for a competition at Camp Rilea in near Astoria. We traveled to the Army Base on Friday and checked in before the kids spend all day Saturday at different scenarios they have trained in. On Sunday we finish up with lunch and an award ceremony. A tradition for Mike's post is to take the kids camping afterwords for a couple days as a "reward" for all the hard work they put in all year long. Caitlyn was trying to get a jump start on her driving career. Unfortunately for her she is not approved to drive a city car yet.

Here Caitlyn is getting maced (with training mace - not the real stuff) when she came at one of the advisers with a bat during a break in between scenarios.
Trying to be like daddy and all the big kids, Caitlyn playing with one of the police radios.

Nothing better then your first ice cream cone on a hot day!

The last days

Day 7 was traveling from West Yellowstone to Missoula, MT.

Day 8 was traveling from Missoula to Walla Walla, WA.

Day 9 was making the last bit of journey back home. We did make a stop at Maryhill Museum where Caitlyn & Mike fed some peacocks.

So Yellowstone proved to be a great vacation. I figured out it had been 28 yrs since I was there. Now I have many memories and hope they do not have to last me another 28 yrs before I get to go back.

We ended up seeing everything we wanted but a moose. We say deer, elk, buffalo, grizzly bear (we saw 3 just after our buffalo encounter), 2 bald eagles, big horn sheep and even a tiny chipmunk. Before we got to Yellowstone we saw antelope, more deer and elk, llama, horses, quail, donkey and even a three legged goat.

In the end we traveled 2500 miles, but the best part was that only 17 of the miles were traveled on a freeway. Our entire trip took us on one beautiful scenic highway after another.

Hope you enjoyed the pictures, sorry they didn't make it to you while we were there.

More of Day 6

We encountered some big horn sheep and they were so funny. This one and another both stopped on this rock peak to pose for pictures for the longest time. The pictures almost look fake.

Another critter jam was due to the biggest elk any of us had ever seen. Brad & Mike were drooling over the size of their racks.

We made our last day in Yellowstone a short one so we could do a few things in West Yellowstone. This was taken at the Grizzly& Wolf Discovery Center. It is kind of a refuge for the grizzly bears that can no longer be allowed to live in Yellowstone. Either because they were orphans or become dangerous to the park.

This picture is out of order... this was taken the first day we reached Yellowstone.

Day 6

We were told we could not miss the "Grand Canyon" What an amazing view. Caitlyn and I were bringing up the rear of the group hiking up the hill to the lookout.

Day 5 - continued

Before our trip Mike kept saying, "I want to ride with the buffalo". Well he got his wish. We were slowing down to take pitures of the buffalo along side the road with all of a sudden one decided he wanted to cross the road. I was on the bike with Mike and was able to take a few shots of just how close he was. He came to a full stop and just looked at Mike & I with a look of "hey I'm walking here" before he continued on to the other side of the road. This is what the call in Yellowstone a "Critter Jam".
We pulled off to the side of the road for some more pictures. Here you can see some other buffalo behind us. They were just off the side of the road.

Day 5 -A full day in Yellowstone

The first two pictures were at "Fountain Paint Pot". There were paths to walk around all the small geysers and mud pools.


Caitlyn was our tour guide at the "Midway Geyser Basin" pointing out an important spot of interest.
The whole group; (Caitlyn, Rebecca & Mike, Uncle Brad, Aunt Patty & Tara and Karen & Gary)