Shop till ya drop... A tourist trap to end all tourist traps.

Terry showing off his new fishing hat.

 

July 30
July 27 it was a relaxing afternoon in Yellowstone along the Madison river. Terry fly fished. A nice Birthday for me and then a campfire. It was 82° out and just gorgeous. 

Last night we got rain and had to spend the evening inside. Got caught up on Longmire TV show. Like all shows they tend to go off weird after awhile. But it's summer and tht's about all there is.

Now today Terry is outside sawing  and chopping up some more wood we found. 
OK some more wood pictures.

I have burned most of this so more was needed.

We carry a small electric chain saw and since we have our Honda 3000ie generator in the truck bed, when we are on a forest service road and see a nice down tree we can cut it up and off we go. Then later chop it up back in camp. 
There is a FS road (the next road to the left north from this FS campground) that goes way back in on a very nice road to a area that has had fires and has millions of trees downed. So there is all the firewood you could ask for. It's on the FS road to Madison Arm Resort and Marina.

Update on me... 
 Took one pain pill when we go back to the trailer, pain went away and never came back. Blood stopped the next day. I passed a couple of small kidney stones about three days later. Collected them in a specimen jar to take to the urologist later on. So I got off lucky me thinks except the for the scary blood.

Signed up for another week right here in Bakers Hole FSA campground just north of West Yellowstone. It's relaxing and we are in no rush to go to our next planned stop at Ennis, MT. for more fishing again on the Madison river.
We are conserving our gray and black water as there is no dump station here. There is a nice private resort on the way to Ennis so we can dump when we go that-a-way.

We watch the campers come back late from rushing around Yellowstone all day long and being tired. 
West Yellowstone downtown stores and restaurants stay open late as most people come out of the park late after a long day driving forever. 
As I said earlier we came up from the Jackson Tetons and went right on through to West Yellowstone without stopping. Wanted to secure a campsite here in this FS cmpground. As if there would be any place to stop with a big rig. It's peak tourist season and the roads are crowded and the hosts in the park say to visit early morning or late afternoon if you want to find a parking place in one of the many viewing areas. 
As for us we have toured the park many times and it is now more of a drive through for us. We perfer to relaxing in our campground and then Terry can go fishing in late afternoon. After all we are not on vacation but living this lifestyle for months on end. 

Terry got out his dutch oven and did another loaf of bread the other day. 

July 23
A scary day was had by us... 
The picture below is a arm band for me in the ER in the Bozeman Montana hospital. My day started of with back pain and then I noticed deep red blood instead of urine. Yikes that's not good me thinks. Off we go to the West Yellowstone clinic. Got there at 2 PM and they had me give them a urine sample and they freaked. Said head to Bozeman ASAP. Off we went thinking the worst as this can't be good at all. I have had some elevated kidney levels in the past so thought the worst. 
If you ever need to go to the ER do it in Bozeman, new, big and friendly. They took blood and did a cat scan. All came back that I had a couple of kidney stones. And since I am on Xarelto (blood thinner for stroke protection for A-Fib that made the bleeding much worse. Got some meds to help pass the stones (they are small ones) and pain meds. and headed back to our campground 90 miles south. Got back about 11 PM. Overall we were thrilled it was only kidney stones and not something much worse. So today no pain but have to pee (still with blood) through a funnel with very fine mesh to catch the stones when they pass so a urologist can look at them later on. Doesn't that sound like fun.

July 21
Moved up from Teton Park through Yellowstone Park.
It was just a fast drive through as we wanted to go right to the Bakers Hole FS campground just north ot West Yellowstone, MT and boy did we luck out. We got the best site in the place right next to one we had last year. Open for sun and satellite and right on the Madison river. The campground is just past the airport road north of West Yellowstone about 3 miles to town. 

The view from my RV desk window. 

It started raining (as in a cow pissing on a rock) with pea sized hail right after we got here. Went into town for a long awaited Arby's and to take back my Wilson cell phone booster which didn't work for crap. Radio Shack took it back no questions asked. I had tried it again at this campground and it didn't increase my 3G 2 bar sig at all. When I had first tried it a few days ago at Moran Jct. campground it got real hot and did allow data to come in but did nothing for voice. So back it went. 
Terry went and got his Montana fishing lic. and we signed up for 7 nights for right here. Oh to be sure we loaded a bunch of wood that had been chopped and now awaits to be turned into more campfires right here. 

Doesn't look that tall but is double row deep. Got to make room to get the 5er hitch over it to hook up.
Sun has come out and Terry is getting the grill out for a couple of small steaks for supper.
Will have to store it when done as we are in Grizzly country and they have a $5K fine and jail if food is left out.

July 20
Yikes a fridge problem.
Yesterday our RV Norcold fridge started to get warm inside. That's a huge NO NO to be sure. I searched to troubleshooting guides on line. Sure glad we have internet everywhere we go. Found to try to disconnect the thermoster inside the fridge that attached to the cooling fins.  That made it to start cooling again but only on AC with power from our generator. Still had gas problems with it cooling. So more troubleshooting and then I had Terry take the fridge burner and orifice out and clean it. Soaked it in gas and blow out the stack and that seemed to fix it. With Amazon Prime we will be having a new thermoster and burner with orifice waiting for us in West Yellowstone, MT next week. We were ready to pick up stakes and head to Idaho Falls, ID to a Norcold service center. We lucked out big time fixing it ourselves.
On our day trip today we stopped at Colter Bay National Park campground and we were told we could dump our RV tanks there for free when we travel north up through Yellowstone. 

Now for some good news.... Terry's mother got a biopsy report back on her lung and it came back negative. She still has a lump there but they don't know what it is so she is having another cat scan this next Wednesday. Her Dr. was sure it was cancer, so now more tests are on the way. All we can do is hope for the best, so far so good.

July 14
Yep we moved to just east of Teton National Park

We are north of Jackson WY off on US 26 east orf Moran Jct. on a side road called 
Buffalo Valley Rd. 10 miles on it gets you to Turpin Meadow Campground. A 20 some site (only hard sided campers allowed due to bear country). We had checked this place out before we pulled the big 5er in to make sure we could get here ok. It's all blacktop to the campground and there was water at that time. But a couple of days later when we did move up form the Pinedale area we found no water. The host said they blew a fuse so the site was free till the fixed it. From here we have been exploring Teton Park and going back to Jackson for supplies and lunch.   The national park campground are full and very tight and a zoo, so we are glad to be off the beaten path in the site. We are about the only ones here and it is only 15 miles form Moran Jct. the main intersection in the northern part of the park. So great location and peacefull. 

Yes and I needed more wood.    Notice the new axe. 
We are heading to Jackson Hole, Wy on Friday. I want to find a Wilson Sleek G 4 signal booster for my Galaxy S5. I saw a ad in the local paper that a local Radio Shack Verizon dealer sells them. At where we are at right now I get 1 bar and with Terry's moms heath issues we need to be in better contact. AND there is a great BBQ place for lunch. It would came in handy later in Montana which has poor cell service. Oh and Terry wants to stroll the downtown to window shop. Did I say he loves tourist traps. I will put up with this as I love him. A new high tech wood cutting axe might also be in our future. Our old axe is a little worn as as you know I need lots of wood. This should fill the bill and it has it own cutting case.

Jackson Hole is a very tight place for big rigs and you wont find a place to park a big rig in either of the two grocery store parking lots, that's for sure. So we stocked up in Pinedale so didn't need to stop. Their loss. I called both stores and told them they should support a shuttle service for people coming through in big rigs.
Also found propane at a litle C-store and campground  (Hilltop) on US 191 for $2.69 in Jackson it's $4.45 at the main gas dealership.

Teton Park

Also please scroll down to the bottom of this July post  for a 
SPECIAL Report on the Pinedale Rendezvous parade....  On Sat the 12 of July 2014.

July 11
Been hanging out at Green river Lakes since June 20. 
My how times flies.  On Tuesday after the Fourth we moved down river to a spot right on it.
It doesn't get much better than this. See the UPDATE below....

Later we made good use of the fire ring to be sure. 
 

One thing to know is you should NOT run out of Yard Guard out here. What for you ask...  Mosquitos. They are selling the cans at $10 in Pinedale, if you can even find one.  We just bought two, left the last one on the shelf for another desperate customer.  You know it's time to move when you wake up and find mosquitos in your bedroom. Try to sleep with a couple of these buzzing around your head. You Yell KILL... and pull up the sheets.

Oh and you know who much I love wood, as in firewood.

Terry has had a couple of days of fair fishing but the river is way up do to warmer temps and snow melt. The Mayfly Hatch  is out in full form now but with the river so high the fish are not active. 

Here he sits contemplating the fishing situation. 

To fish or not to fish that is the question.

As you can see the river is running bank full. 

 
 

UPDATE
July 11 (Friday) we came out of the outback and landed back at Warren Bridge campground where we had spent much time in late June waiting for the weather to clear. We had planned to stay on the upper Green River over the weekend but we got a email last night from Terry's nephew who said we should drive out to a phone and call him  ASAP. We have Satellite Internet but no cell service so I got on Skype and called him. Skype doesn't work well with Satellite Internet. Much delay as we are going through a satellite 22K miles up and and back down again.  It had been raining so to drive out 25 miles for cell service was not possible. We could get the gist of the urgent call... That Terry's mother had gone in for some tests as she was feeling tired. They did a cat scan and found a spot on her lung. She was to go a specialist for a consultation today. 
So we decided we would move back within cell service and wait to hear the outcome. That is why we are back at Warren Bridge BLM campground. 
Terry just talked to his mother. She is a strong woman at 88 years young and knows this is serious stuff. She has a bit of pneumonia, but the scans show a lump. They are going to do a biopsy early next Tuesday. That should take a couple of days for results. As you can imagine that call was stressfull for Terry to have with his mother. 

Now watching the weather tonight as it has storm warnings for heavy rains and flash flooding. This was not in the forcast when we were still up river in high country the last few days. We are so glad we made it out of many miles of dirt road down from Green River Lakes before that hits tonight. The road is rutty and bumpy in good times let alone with heavy rain on it. We are secure in a nice BLM campground with 4 G LTE cell service on high ground right  along the highway.  Our Satallite is up for HD DirecTV and our Honda 3000ie gen is ready for use. 

We are both deep in thought tonight about what lies ahead for Terry's mother. His nephew thinks we should rush back to Iowa right away. We tried to explain to him, how would that look to her. At this stage (we don't even know if it is cancer, or if it is, how bad it is). BTW the nephew (now 28) was raised by this grandmother, Terry's mother, so you can see the nephews deep concern. As she is like a mother to him. Terry's brother (nephews father) lives on the farm with their parents, so is there for them. A sister is a couple of hours away.
So our summer plans are in limbo, as they should be, waiting to hear more next week. 
Please take care out there as you never know what is around the curve in the road ahead. 

SPECIAL Report on the Pinedale Rwndezvous parade.... 
On Sat the 12 of July 2014.
We decieded we would get up and make it to the parade.
These are the pictures of it. A good time was had by all and a huge crowed. Guess it has been a long winter in the north country.

This town turns into party central as shown by these two carrying beer down the street. 
The line of the day was the parade isn't over till we say so!!!
Bloody Marys were selling for $4 a pop on the street. 

 
 

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