Rather than boring you to death with ramblings about our final week in Dubois, Wyoming, I thought I would use this week to give you a few statistics as we approach 18 months on the road. Can you believe it? Eighteen months!! Many of you have been blog viewers during the entire time. Roger and I thank you for your continued interest in our life on the road. At the end of the statistics portion of the blog, I will show you some pics of the Bighorn sheep we were lucky enough to see on a drive through the Whiskey Basin Wildlife Habitat area.
The past eighteen months have flown by as we have travelled in the Mid-west, West, and Pacific Northwestern parts of this beautiful country in the Embark and then the Tour. We have met very interesting people and learned so much about this chosen lifestyle of ours called RVing.
The Winnebago Tour (class A motorhome)
Our home
The Embark (class C)
Our first motorhome
We are dependent on our GMC Terrain, our "towed" vehicle. It affords us the opportunity to travel in a fairly large area near the site where our Tour is parked. We now have 25,000 miles on the Terrain.
We have toured 12 national parks and multiple national forests, as well as many state parks. Roger and I agree that our top two favorites are Zion and Yellowstone. We look forward to spending more time in those parks in 2013.
We have parked in all sorts of RV sites from RV resorts to campgrounds (46 since we moved out of our house in Tucson). No, we have not parked at a Walmart or truck stop yet, but have met many people who have done just that. We have found that we prefer the RV resorts and the winner for us is Polsen RV Resort in Polsen, Montana. For a variety of reasons: wide sites (important for those slides), cement pads, beautiful landscaping with lots of amenities too numerous to mention, plus the owners taking an active role in the running of the resort, makes this place our favorite. The close runner-up is Buckhorn Lake Resort in Kerrville, Texas.
The people that we have met along the way have greatly added to our RVing experience. They drive everything from multimillion dollar motorhomes to fifth wheels, to camping trailers and pickup campers. We have been surprised at the number of older RVers. Apparently this lifestyle is something you can do for many years. We have met full time RVers and those that enjoy camping a few weeks a year. We have met many people from Europe and Australia who rent motorhomes in the states.
It is amazing how quickly the time has gone. It is always an adventure and almost always, FUN!
Thursday was our day to visit the Whiskey Basin Wildlife Habitat area. This is the winter home of the herd of 900 Rocky Mountain Bighorn Sheep. More than 7,500 acres are managed by state and federal agencies. The picture below shows why the bighorn sheep like the area. The winds in the area keep the snow from settling on Whiskey Mountain where the sheep can feed on sagebrush and other shrubs.
The majority of the herd are still in the upper mountains, but we managed to find some ewes, lambs and three year old males (we learned how to tell the difference at the museum in Dubois).
Torrey Creek runs through the habitat and provides water for beavers and moose.
Mountain Lions and Cougars are also in the area.
In the distance is Wyoming's tallest mountain, Gannett Peak at 13,804 feet.
Glaciers feed the lakes located in the area.
Perhaps you can see the painted rock in the mid ground with snowcapped mountains in the background.
As we were preparing to leave Dubois, a group of mule deer (seven) dropped by our site. In the pictures below you can see fawns, does and one young buck with his new set of antlers.
Saturday morning, we leave for Gillette, Wyoming. There we will participate in the Rocky Mountain Ramble. This is a mini rally for RVers. You may recall that we participated in a huge one in Phoenix. This one is sponsored by Family Motor Coach Association and we look forward to meeting more RVers. Thank you for taking the time to read our blog.
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