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Lisbon

7/7 - Day 4 - Anniversary Part I

Next morning pack, sandwiches lol, drive to airport, drop off car, no extra charges, woo!

Flight delayed 1 hour, fancy coffee out on airport deck overlooking the runway.

Arrive in Lisbon, Uber to hostel

Private room but shared bathroom kind of like college but most of the people here are older than us. Location is downtown right in the middle of everything!

Go out and phone isn't working great, Steven steps up his tour guide skills and finds all the places I have started for the afternoon.

We loved Pink street, got drinks there and had a great time.

Find the Steep steep trolleys. Wild

Found time out market, just like in Boston

Vertical escalator to overcome all the Steepness

Takes us to our best dinner yet at Tu es eu 2. Sit in a ally way with another escalator! Made friends with a German couple who looked pretty young but we're celebrating their 20th anniversary and us our first! Grill sardines, Pica pau pork, 0.5L wine. Perfect

Walk around a bit a get a good gelato to share.

Steven guides us around some more and we find an awesome bar overlooking the vertical escalator! Wine and beer so pretty

So tired go back

Street cleaning noises all night!

Portugal - Madeira

Day 1

Land and pick up car

Car Strugglesss. Learn the hard way we cant trust the gps for anything and we have to plan our routes and parking destination before we go anywhere (this took a few trips to learn).

Downtown funchal. Parking garage, big egg steak lunch, coffee, tosta michea.

Decompress by the pool, read, find Steven the Apollo Ono book.

Hotel owner runs it after his grandmother passed. He got us a bottle of champagne for our anniversary!

Go to cafe for beer and a nata. Nata had cinnamon, Soo good. 1.20 for tall beer. 1€ for nata

Across the street for dinner

Hanging meat skewer. Chicken super good. Salad, bolo coca garlic bread DELICIOUS, and rice. Bottle of red wine for 12€ 😂 all really good. And then chocolate mousse!

Day 2

Levada PR 25

Up early and to the cafe for a chocolate croissant and a tropical fruit croissant for Steven.

Getting better at driving and navigating together but the roads are just TERRIFYING. Took the highway around the outside of the island most of the way there but then the "main road" up the island was so so so steep and windy. Steven was okay but I hated it. I made one wrong call on turns but had Steven turn around right away so it didn't get too bad. Finally made it up to the ridge for the hike. The last bit of road was just cobble stone which we thought was weird but maybe for grip because its so steep?

The hike is down first then up the way back. Starts out on a paved road, down to the first stream where we stopped for a quick stretch. Continued on to the first set of stairs which took us to a cafe with camping, paid bathroom, ice cream and beer. Wasn't open yet. More stairs down to the main trail with the levada! A levada is an aqua-duct about 2 feet wide with varying depth, 0.5ft to 4ish feet, at least for the ones we saw. The builders capture the water coming down the side of the mountain and transport it to the farms and towns. All these trails were originally built for them but have since turned into a recreational attraction. This levada originates at a tall beautiful waterfall where the constructors built a weir to redirect most of the water from the river bed into the levada. We even saw fish in the levada! We got to the waterfall and ate the rest of our pasties and watched a few people jump in the cold water. Started back and found another main trail to a second waterfall, lots more people now, full tour groups of 20+ people. This levada wasn't flowing as fast or full. The must not have gotten the slope right 😋. At the waterfall there is a tunnel into the rock to carry the levada through the cliff, around the valley. So crazy. We put some water on the backs of our heads to cool us down. Starting the hike back up out of the valley. So many more people now, we realized we took the wrong way out, not supposed to come back the same way because the levada trails are only so wide. Made it back to the parking lot and there was a shuttle running from the lot down to the cafe which was now serving lots of people. The parking lot was now PACKED. Hundreds of cars, way further down the road then what seemed reasonable. So glad we got there early!

My original plan was to go from here to the far side of the island for the black sand beach, then to the Thatch roofs, then a cafe for dinner, then home. But with the driving being so stressful because of the combination of manual car plus steep, skinny, windy roads, we re-assesed based on roads that looked more reasonable...

Because the main roads stay up on the center ridge line more, we decided to go even further to the end of the island and drive to Porto Moniz. We got through the windy roads, found a parking lot and made our plan! There are natural volcanic rock pools that have been made into public swimming areas with the help if some concrete and pumps. First we had lunch at a cafe. The sit yourself method really through us off, we never know if we should tell them we're here, or order at the counter, or what! We finally ordered and got fruit juice and fish sandwich on our favorite local bread, the bolo coca. The swimming was 3€ each and was awesome! Not too cold, clean, and the waves were coming of the edge! We loved it and hung out there for a while. Afterwards we walked around a bit more and found a second pool area on the other side of town that was actually free! But we were already changed and had more to do so we continued on. Next we drove to Seixal to try the black sand beach. We were able to take the highway there and there were new highway tunnels that weren't on Google maps that made the trip way easier! The tunnels for the highway are these major builds for the two lanes of highway, one tunnel for each direction. I think the longest tunnel we took was 2.5 km, over a mile! This makes it wayyy easier to get around.

Between building the levadas, driving the crazy roads, and then building all the tunnels, I've decided the people of Madeira are next level tough. Makes sense Ronaldo is from here.

We arrived at Seixal but it was super crowded and not very warm out. We circled but couldn't find parking so we ended up skipping. Next was the traditional thatched roof house that all Madeira people used to live in, there are few left in the town of Santana. Again more new tunnels that made it easier for us to get there!! But the same thing happened, no parking so we saw the houses and kept driving to the surf town Porto da Cruz. There's a surf school here and I had picked out a cafe with good reviews. We found a parking lot and the town was not nearly as crowded as the others. Before the cafe, we found a nice rock walk along the water and saw some beautiful cliffs and fisherman. We got to the cafe and had beer and a sangria and ordered too much food again! We got prawns and our favorite bolo coca. Really good and also messy. After that we started the trip back to our hotel, we picked up some water on the way as well.

Drive UNDER the airport runway to get home! So cool

Sausage skewer, salad, bread, and beer too much again! The wait staff didn't seem to like us tonight haha took the long way home for some extra walking

Went to shower, no hot water!

Day 3

7/6

Skip PR1 too scary to drive and out of shape

Change it up and do the PR8 Vereda da Ponta de São Lourenço, point of the island hike.

Early, good parking, cool airport view

Down town funchal, park near lido

CR7 restaurant and then museum

Busy funchal streets, cute shops and cafes, nata and coffee for 1.5 €

Found a mall with "women's secret" instead of Victorias secret. Walk through park

Back to car. Drove to Santa Cruz, small beach town near our hotel town

Looped acouple times but found a parking spot

Tried "poncha" the local drink. Basically whiskey and fruit juice. Steven liked it but I didn't

Went to another cafe and I got the best mussels maybe ever, huge with really good garlic lemon butter and of course our favorite bread. Steven got a steak sandwich on the same bread and we ordered the fried polenta bc I wanted to try but it was too much food again 😂 I took my extra garlic bread and wrapped in a napkin for breakfast

Walked around a bit more, stuck feet in the water, super rocky, really hard to get in the water.

Went back to hotel, cold shower, but don't really mind it at all

Skipped the restaurant this time but still went for a nice walk.

Had our champagne on the little porch and relaxed a bit

Having such a great time. Tomorrow morning we take off to Lisbon! And no more driving!!

Yellowstone Day 10 - 8/4/17

We woke up to some hikers headed in for the day and snacked on cheese and fruit for breakfast. Today was pretty chill, Steven wasn’t feeling the hiking so we did a lot of gyeser visits, lodge/musuem sites and driving and to look out spots along Yellowstone Lake.

We went and saw the Yellowstone Lake Hotel built in 1889, it was way too swanky for us haha. We went to the Fishing Bridge Museum and Visitor Center where we bought a book about poo, learned about birds, and enjoyed a view of the water. We ate lunch on an overlook by the lake, wrote some parents post cards, blogged, napped, and listened to tunes. We checked out West Thumb Gyeser Basin, played cards in some traffic. I almost convinced Steven to get crab ravioli but we decided to save it for our day in Cody tomorrow haha

We relaxed in the hammock next to Avalanche Mountain and then made dinner on a beautiful stump on top of Butte (pronounced Butt ;) Mountain. We shared soup and beans

Tonight we actually planned to sleep in the car haha We wanted to be in Cody for an Air show at 8am which was an hour drive but the closest back country permit I could get was a 6.5 mile walk… We’d never hike out in time for that… Hindsight I should have looked for more campgrounds in between here and Cody but we we’re pro car sleepers by now anyways haha I found some rasbury bushes at our trail head parking lot. Steven took a ton of pictures of sunset and burned trees around us. This side of the park was super different because of the great fire of 1988. The effects of the big forest fire were super evident here. Hardly any green. All the burned trees still standing. Pretty crazy. After dark we snuggles up in our sleeping bags in the car, put on some pod casts and I was out.

Yellowstone Day 9 - 8/3/17

Last night at 1am we heard a bunch of clanking like someone was messing with the bear boxes that were throughout the camp…like maybe a bear messing with it… Steven jumped out the tent with headlamp and bear spray. Nope just a dumb person messing with a bear box at 1 am

We slept in, reheated some pepps and onions for breakfast and then packed up. First we stopped at a ranger station to get hiking recommendations for all the areas we we’re going to be in. She gave us a bunch of helpful maps for all the areas of the park.

To start off we went to the Grand Canyon of Yellowstone. We had been told by everyone to do the Uncle Tom’s staircase trail down into it but our ranger friend told us it was closed all season for repairs!! Noo

She gave us recommendations for other ways to see it. On our way over there we saw the National Park Ranger Museum. Stopped in a met a two rangers who met at Estes National Park and have been married 50 yrs. They were adorable haha We learned about how Yellowstone was the first nation park and the entire place was run by 1 man in the 1880s. Finally he convinced the government he needed more help protecting the land from poachers, they assigned the military cavlery to help him protect the park. In the early 1900s Congress finally started the the National Park Service and the Rangers we’re created.

We signed their guest book and we’re off to see the Yellowstone Grand Canyon. We walked a few overlooks, saw some cool birds, and then ended up talking about rafting the real green river in the Grand Canyon one day and how we need to get a group together for a few years from now haha

After that we drove over to Mount Washburn and ate a few snacks in the car. We suited up for a gravel road hike up 3.1 miles to a fire tower. This is one of two fire towers the park still has staffed and in use. The hike was gradual gain and easy switch backs. We kept getting annoyed because the back country office had us watch this safety and preservation movie where they repeat over and over, don’t take trail short-cuts, don’t cut the switch backs, and leave everything as or better than you found it. Well non-back country ppl don’t have to watch it and you could argue that there are more of them on a lot of the good hikes. We watched a father and son proudly find the switch back short cuts and a mother and son have a rock throwing competition down into the canyon below :/ We definitely like the Tetons better haha

The hike was really pretty though. We quickly left the forest and we’re in the flower meadows above the tree line the whole time. The fire tower at the top had two floors for visitors and education and the top floor was the apartment for the fire watch ranger. There was also an HVAC van that had driven up to fix the apartment ac 😂 We spent a while hanging out on the deck, blogging, posting, and relaxing

Next we went off to do our first back country in Yellowstone aka “Grizzly Country” It didn’t go so well lol We found a good spot to make dinner at alternate trail head for our back country site. We treated ourselves to cheese tonight!!! Steven had bought some instant potatoes and kept saying the cheese is what makes it and I had been craving cheese since our friend at lake solitude…I convinced him we should get it haha woo!! We snacked on cheese as an appetizer made the potatoes with lots of cheese chunks and also shared a chef boyardee or some equivalent. I was very happy with our cheese purchase haha. As we were cleaning up steven went to look on at trail head. Someone had written in pencil “Grizzly and 2 cubs, late July early August” Great.

We we’re already nervous because people say Yellowstone is where your bear run ins are gonna happen… We decide to stop at the alt trail head #2 and see what that trail head has to say. The same person came a wrote the same thing here but this one was dated 8/1. We run into a solo overnighter, he’s going in farther than us and doesn’t seem to be concerned about bears, looks like he might be trail running. We’re thinking well be okay so we drive over to our trail head. The trail from here is a hundred yards of open field before reaching the forest. There’s an older couple sitting in chairs with binoculars looking for a bear because they saw one two days ago right here. Awesome. They didn’t see a mother and cubs though. They saw a “Gigantic Male - didn’t even need binoculars he was so big.” Great a mother and cubs andd a giant male. We pack up our bags while continuously talking about if we’re gonna do this or not. The trail head sign isn’t till the other side of the field here so we start off. Same thing written on this sign… They took the time to go to all three trail heads to write this… We say screw it sleeping in the car - call us whimps if you want at least we will sleep through the night! We know the likelihood of something happening is so small but we both have so little experience with this we wouldnt sleep the whole night and it’d suck haha Instead we posted up with the older folk to watch for the bears haha We decided next trip like this needs to be in a group of ¾+ with someone who’s had lots of experience and confidence in the area/back country haha

Didn’t see anything but we had some beer, played some cards, ate some cookies, and watched the sunset. It was surprisingly easy to get to the car set up for sleeping, we put on some pod casts and fell right to sleep!

Yellowstone Day 8 - 8/2/17

I woke up once or twice last night and I remember Steven getting freaked and asking if I was okay?! All I remember thinking was I’m inside…what could be wrong?! Haha

We snoozed a few times and finally got up to head to Yellowstone and Old Faithful. We finally got full service for a while at Old Faithful so we caught up on contacting friends and started the more touristy part of the trip. Steven put on his tour guide hat and brought us around the ring of fire in the Old Faithful area. We check out the Old Faithful Inn, which is a the biggest Lodge Cabin in the world, originally built entirely with wooden pegs, no nails! It was so beautiful. There was a huge center lobby whose ceiling went 4 stories up with a crows nest at ceiling level where an orchestra used to play. It was so beautiful.

We watched Old Faithful go off (but it was 5 minutes early) and saw a bunch of other really cool geysers and springs. It awesome how clear the water is into the caverns below.

Next we did a quick little hike to beautiful Mystic Falls. We forgot the bear spray so we sang a lot haha From there over to the Grand Prismatic Spring. We made sandwiches and ate them at the overlook of the giant rainbow pool.

From there we checked into our campground but continued on the West Yellowstone in Montana to pick up our back country permits and explore the town a bit. One of the campground rangers was telling me how the park is getting so popular, 1 million visitors last yr, could be as many as 5 million this year… He said the 14 miles to West Yellowstone has taken a record 4.5 hours with traffic…. He said tonight would be fine but that’s insane… No bueno

West Yellowstone was a touristy little town. Mary Ann at the back country office was super helpful with our permits and such a nice lady. We walked around the shops and shared a delicious chimichanga at a school bus food truck. We gased up the car and went back into the park.

We we’re gonna go back to the campsite but it was still early and hot out we decided to go check out a swimming hole nearby. Firehole river, we floated with a Yellowstone beer and watched a bunch of people jump from the rocks into the warm river. It was our very own lazy river. So relaxing! We we’re on the fence about jumping, there was 8 footer, 20 footer, and ~35 footer. We we’re getting chilly and talking about leaving and if we would have time to come back here tomorrow and jump it… Finally I was like okay I’m jumping then out to warm up! Haha We both climbed up to the 20 footer and Steven was all Awesome I didn’t want to peer pressure you into doing it! Lolol

It was so fun and awesome, Steven jumped first like a pro and then we ran up to the car to warm up.

Back at camp we set up, enjoyed some beers, ate beans and beefaroni, blogged in the hammock and conked out ✌️

Midway Day 7 - 8/1/17

After an exciting night with Bob and Dave, we treked out of our campground by 9am and went searching for fritters and found danishes. We did some final gift shopping and went for one last swim in Jackson Lake while admiring the Tetons. We hung up the hammock, made some peanut butter apple sandwiches, and floated in the tubes.

Finally it was time to say goodbye to the Tetons and go to Flagg Ranch, in between the Tetons and Yellowstone. This is our half way point of the trip. As a reward for the half way, we reserved a CABIN instead of a regular tent site. No electricity or water but 4 walls and roof so no worrying about bears haha it was a relaxing night.

We hung out in the fancy lodge while steven charged his cameras. We played a long game of Rummicub, got free fresh baked cookies, a made friends with a group of people who were biking from Canada to Mexico. We made onions peppers and beans for dinner and lived it up in our snazzy cabin haha

Grand Tetons Day 6 - 7/31/17

Woke up this morning and heard someone yelling a bit, then a whistle, ....then a Hey Bear! We jumped up and got right out the tent. We knew car camping had a greater likelihood of seeing a bear and here it was. A mama and her two cubs walking through. The campground owner scared her off and we we're glad it was our last night there! We cleaned up camp and went shopping around the different lodges for a bit before deciding to go find a picnic beach spot on Jackson Lake to hang out at. Steven set up the hammock next to the water and I blogged in the sun for the morning. Super nice and relaxing. Nobody else around. At about 11:30 I went up to the car to get stuff to make lunch and all of a sudden there were two RVs and two other cars pulling up to hang for lunch haha We made a really good lunch of the classic sauted onions and peppers with Italian dressing but this time we made ramen too and put the cooked onions and pepps in there. It was delicious haha Cleaned up, made friends with some other road trippers, poured a beer into a Gatorade bottle, and went out to float into the lake :) At 4 we packed up to go do our 4.5 mile hike into our next back country campsite. It was an entirely flat hike along a set of lakes. We had the campsite that was the furthest back at the smallest lake. I tried to get the campsites closer but they were all booked in March! We made the best of it and tried to go swimming in our little lake but the water coming right off the mountain was sooo cold!!! We used it to cool our cider while we watched all the wildlife at sunset over the mountain. We made friends with a beaver named Bob and a deer named Dave. Steven went mountain man and cut up some more fire wood for a fire to keep mosquitos away. Played some cards and sang some songs to try and not be scared of bears haha We know camping like this is more safe because as long as you clean your food, there's no reason they'd come over but at car camping someone in the campground is bound to mess up. But being alone is scary haha Few scares through the night but we made it!!

Grand Tetons Day 5 - 7/30/17

Jackson

Grand Tetons Day 4 - 7/29/17

Wake up a Jenny Lake campground at 6:00 scarf down some peanut butter breakfast and suit up for our hike. We drove over to the boat launch parking lot and headed down just before 7. There was a small like but we made it on the first boat. Then we found out the special deal that the first boat is only $5 round trip instead of $15!!! Woo!! Saving $20! Hop off the boat and get our bags together. We met another pair of hikers who ask us if we know the way to Cascade Canyon haha I said I was hoping they would know the way! Haha they were two guys from Maine not too far away from where we rented our ski house a two years ago. We all start hiking together and find our way to the trail head. Talked to them for a bit and they gave us a good pace to start off with. Being the Maine guys, they speed up and we decide to fall behind. We played hop scotch with them all day, seeing them though the end of the trail haha The whole hike had amazing views of the mountains and a beautiful river along the train. About 1.5 hrs into the hike we see our Maine friends ahead of us signaling towards the river. It was a mamma moose and her baby! About 25 yards away! So cool!! We take some pics and continue on. Steven was walking about 10 feet in front of me and not 3 minutes from the last animals he turns around to me with big eyes and points up into the brush. There's a female moose 12 feet off the trail sticking her head out of the thick bushes. Woo little close for comfort haha looked like she was looking to cross the trail from the mountain side to the river side. I don't think our Maine friends in front of us has seen her at all haha went right by! This kind of hiking reminded us a little more of New England, in shade of the mountain it had the classic switch backs and rockiness we were used to haha But soon enough we got up into the canyon and we we're surrounded by wild flower meadows, ice melt streams from all over, and collosal mountain faces in all directions. It was beautiful. We crossed a ton of cool little bridges and countless culverts haha kept making me think of friends who had done trail construction out of school and how itd be so cool to be part of something like that. We passed by the campgrounds we had tried to reserve but couldn't, it was okay though since we didn't have the right snow gear for going past lake solitude anyway! We stopped for a few minutes to fuel up on cliff bars and water before the final push. The view was amazing. Soon enough we came up upon the snow surrounding the lake. It was the most beautiful thing I've ever seen. The canyon cliffs came to close in front us, creating the lake below them with wild flowers and snow patches all round it. We walked over to the lake to find tons of big fish swimming below the floating ice patches. All of the lakes and ponds here are so clear that you can see all the way to the bottom depending on how the sun hits it. We found a rock on the side of the lake and started on our lunch with the 12 or so other groups that we're up there. We made it up in 4 hours. After lunch we laid back on our rock and closed our eyes. One hour and some burnt legs later we woke up to see a whole lot more people there haha we packed up and started to take our final pictures of the beautiful place. We couldn't find Stevens bear spray! We both remembered having it when we stopped for Cliff bars so the only thing we could do was retrace our steps :/ We started out of there when a solo hiker struck up a conversation with us. Super nice guy from Salt Lake who was interning with the rangers here for the summer and then going to School in Britch Columbia! We chatted for a bit, got some recommendations from him and continued on. He had yummy looking cheese too and I've been craving some since haha We hiked down cruising a long when Steven asked if this is where we ate Cliff bars, I was like no I don't think so.... He turns around and there's the bear spray!!! Yay!! Hahaha Our cheese friend from the top cruised by us and turned down one of the camp trails. Part of his job is to check on the back country sites. We kept going on down and kept thinking we we're going the wrong way because the lighting was so dramatically different. Wayy hotter and sunnier now haha we were just trying to get down as fast as we could so we could go jump in the lakes. Bout a half hour from the trail head cheese friend caught up again and we had some great conversation about how he is studying environmental anthropology/environmental sustainability and how he wants to come work here after graduation and apply what he's learned to the parks mission. Before we knew it we we're back across the boat, we wished him good luck, and went to go find some swimming. We went up to Colter Bay, grabbed a Traut Slayer six pack, snacks from the car, and went down to the beach with our tubes. Unfortunately the wind picked up a ton so floating was a little cold but it was awesome on our muscles. Next we went over to beautiful Jackson Lodge and got a cheese burger with fries and an Oreo chocolate milkshake to share overlooking the amazing view of the flats and the mountains. We relaxed in the hammock a bit before crashing in the tent feeling accomplished

Grand Tetons Day 3 - 7/28/17

After the excitement of last night we treated ourselves to sleeping in till 8 woo! We started off the day by checking in with ranger station and to get advice for hiking solitude lake tomorrow. We had hoped to do the Cascade Canyon trail to the Lake and then Paint Brush Divide. The rangers said paint brush divide still had lots of snow and should only be hiked if you have cramp-ons and ice axes so round trip via Cascade for us! For today we decide to hike Hidden falls and Phelps lake. Hidden falls was about a 5 mile round trip around Jenny Lake up to the water falls at the base if the mountain. It was a nice mostly flat hike and a beautiful day out. We took a break when we found phone service to call Lina and wish her a Happy Birthday! Love her and miss her so much. We kept on hiking with happy smiles. We passed by an overlook of Moose Pond anddd we saw another mama Moose and her baby! As we got closer to the falls it got more crowded since theres a ferry shuttle to take from the lodge straight across to the falls, cheaters. We are going to take it tomorrow though haha it will we to cut our hike down from 18 miles to 14 RT haha The falls we pretty and steven got to practice more with his fancy camera. Next we wanted to do Phelps Lake which has a famous jumping rock. The ranger had told us it was a 3 mile RT but we should have looked ourselves because to get to the jumping rock it was a 6 mile RT... That's a lot of hiking for the day before a 14 mile RT... Instead we decide to float in the tubes out to some rocks with a Gatorade of wine and enjoy the sun. Best decision!!! We hung of a little over an hour. It was Soo relaxing! There was a funny family on the hike back to the car. For dinner we stopped at a look out spot, made peppers onions and something else, listened to a podcast about the pee dance and did some really good stretching in front of the beautiful mountains. Cookies for dessert. We got back to camp tired and happy, organized our bags for the trek tomorrow, set our alarms and went to bed!

Grand Tetons 7/27/17 - Day 2

This day was really hectic so this is just the bullets: Pack up from jackson lake at dawn Get to Jenny Lake campground at 6:15 and snag a first come first serve camp site from a nice girl Set up tent and head out, other ppl don't leave tents during that day which was weird haha Jenny Lake scenic road for breakfast and organize our tiny car. Over to Colter Bay for easy walking to the point and maybe swimming 9 miles later... So many buggs tons of talking for bears Swimming spot with tube!!! Horseback riding!! Funny guide Steven got gigantic Clydesdale mix named Baby Dino :) Amazingg dinner but we got eaten by bugs too Ride back, 5 min into ride we see a storm coming... The people and the horses start getting nervous hearing all the thunder... We were so close to the corral, 5 more minutes... A tree falls on last horse in the line at the same time lighting strikes! All the horse try to take off everyone seems okay and then we here a gallop coming, look back, no one on 2 horses! The mid guide, Heather jumps off her horse! Steven asks if she wants help, she wrangles the two horses and say yes - all I had been waiting for. I immediately jump off my house and go to help her. She gives me one of the spooked horses, Steven rides up to tell the rest of the group to tell the head guide that the Wrangler Bethany is flat on her back on the ground. It was her horse that got hit. The little boy who was riding in front of Bethany runs up the road to us. He was the 2nd who fell of his horse but he wasnt hurt. His dad was on the horse next to me and freaking out. I talked to the little kid and got him out of the trail and into trees. A Car comes for Bethany. We all start calmly walking the horse back as the storm continues to ramp up. Heather comes back to pony the two spooked horses. She got dragged earlier when her horse got scared of the falled tree! We all make it back. Bethany is okay and the little kid is okay. Back at the ranch there is a giant Rainbow! Haha Sooo much adrenaline. Walk around Colter Bay a bit. Drive and check out Jackson Lodge - Soo fancy. Will try and come for dinner one night. Leave the lodge. MOOSE!!! MOOSETACKULAR! Mamma moose and her baby so amazing. Get back to camp and there are Rangers talkijg to the people at site across from us. There was just a bear behind their campsite omggg. Listen to podcast and sleep

Grand Tetons and Yellowstone 2017 - 7/26/17 - Day 1

With a Rocky Mountain start to the trip our flight from Chicago to Jackson Hole got delayed about an hour which was made us nervous since we were getting in late and had to pick up our rental car by 11 and still go set up camp. We landed at 10 on the dot. Got in contact with the car rental who provides a shuttle from the airport to the office in Jackson Hole, picked up our red 2016 Ford Fiesta and we're off to grab Steven some much needed McyD's. We arrived at the KOA campsite about 11 and had to call the night guard for an escort to our site. Unfortunately it was a cloudy night so we missed seeing any mountains and stars! We couldn't wait to see everything in day light tomorrow. We set up camp right next to the river and admired the water for a bit. It was a great campground but we are cruising through so fast well hardly see it haha The next day we woke up early to and get ready for rafting! We packed up and drove up to the front desk to meet our rafting bus. The snake river runs from the Grand Tetons, down through Jackson Hole and some how makes its way up to Washington to the ocean! We went with a big group. We realized most of the group of 30ish seemed to know each other. They were part of a tour group called Contiki that does world wide tours for 18 to 35 yr olds. We met ppl from LA, NY, and a tonnnn from Australia. The Aussies were crazy as usual. We had the smallest boat with 8 people and the craziest Aussies of the group haha it was a good time. The guide on our boat was a born and raised in Jackson Hole. She said she is the only guide working for the company who is actually from here. The river was a class 2 and 3 so nothing too crazy but a lot of fun!! We jumped in the water for some swims, splashed the other boats, and went backwards through the easy rapid. And of course did awesome through the other rapids. After getting back to our car, we went into town to stock up for the trip. Once the errands we're all done we we're ready to head into the park! We had heard about a lunch place called Dorans. We finally had amazing view of the Tetons, posted up at a picnic table, ordered a bison burger, and Snake River Brewing Jenny Lake Lager. It was perfect :) We entered the park right on schedule and went and picked up our first back country permit for that evening. We chatted with the Rangers a bit and they awed at our site and said it was a great one haha it was an easy half mile hike and then camp next to the water. Before we headed down to camp we exploring and drove to the top of signal mountain and walked around a bit awed at the view. We drove down to the big Signal Mountain Lodge and found a picnic table to make a delicious sausage onions and peppers dinner. We drove to our parking lot and hiked down the real tough 0.35 mile hike to the lake haha It was a really beautiful place. Two other guys were down there at the neighbor site. They had boated in! So cool! We set up camp and went exploring a bit. Steven brought his brothers fancy Nikon DSLR camera so we got to start experimenting with it! We were tried from the busy day so we went into the tent, started listening to some podcasts and we're asleep before we knew it!

Leg 5 - Ireland

Woke up in Munich Packed up quick Left for train grabbed some pastries. Really need to look up almond croissant in other languages before coming to europe again Long clean train to airport Play paper football while we wait...till we flick too far lol Easy quick flight Customes they only stamp us and write that we have to leave the day after our flight haha Pick up car and the stick and other side is def a challenge. Off to Killarney! Ford Fiesta sweet Bluetooth Wrong turn cus were super hungry Stumble upon a cute town get water and chocolate and then pub for food Nommy burger and wings Drive the southern part of the Ring of Kerry SO BEAUTIFUL!!! Dramatic mountains. Rock tunnels. Colorful sheep. Beautiful lakes. Pavement markings def movie or something. Jungle almost. Feel like we've been on a movie set this whole trip. Arrive at funky hostel. Old estate house. Not as close to town as I hoped but cheap! Find my mom and aunt Suzy Straight up dorm lol do our own sheets and stuff. Tell them about Zadar. Get in their automatic car for dinner. Salmon and chicken pot pie. Tiny cast iron pot. Folky singer. Sang a bunch of songs from the squealing pig. Funny version of wild Rover. Steven crashing hardddd. Still have planning to do. Here about mom and Suzy in Belfast the Catholics and the protestants still fighting :/ last fighting was 10 years ago but they still have a wall that is locked every night at 7pm! My grandma's name on my mom's side was Lavery. My mom and Susy found a town with famous bar called Lavery's, they said hundreds of Lavery's visit every year haha Head back and plan for 10 minutes and then bedd (try not to touch the comforter too much lol) Up early and hugs goodbye! Wish Suzy a Happy Birthday! On the road to Doolin about 3 hours north along the west coast Next town we find a parking spot right in front of a place called the Coffee Pot. Tiny place with 2 locals. Oatmeal tea and scones. Yummy. Guy behind us talks to us for a good 45 min first about converting km to mi and then everything in the world of Ireland. Real estate, retirement traveling, Briexit, immigration, and a bunch of other stuff haha Steven says he's gonna be an old talky man like that one day so he needs to entertain them now hahaha On the road again. Arrive in Doolin superstar Hostel so so nice. Private room and bathroom. Right in town. Change to walk the Cliffs of Moher. Hostel is right at the trail head. Steven is amped on coffee hahaha wish I got one too to be on his level haha Walk is so beautiful. Through the cow and horse pastures. Lunch with the horses. Walk is not for the weak hearted hahaha right on the Cliffs and really fun really muddy!! Amazing waves could watch forever Steven hatched a plan for me to drive a van and him to ride a motorcycle across Europe together haha The hike there and back 16 km round trip great butts even with all the delicious fried fooood Rinse off at Hostel Coffee with Bailey's To dinner! Only 4 pubs in town haha Steven researched a bit to find the Best. 10 min walk no sidewalks so narrow as usual haha got there at 7 music doesn't start till 9:30 lol Drinksss yummy salad fun date night Spilt bangers and mash and side of onion rings yum yum Drinksss haha But then they opened the window!! 😭 Getting so tired and colddd Sitting right next to the band setting up. Banjo, crazy not bag pipes, our waitress is the "drummer" and also a singer. More window open 😭😭 Listen to 3 songs but got sooo tireddd. Walked home and slept so good haha were lame oops Up early for Breakfast more scones and oatmeal on the coffee kick Rainy :/ In the car for the Burren Rainy but pretty Drive up part of the walking trail haha are not prepared with boots and rain gear haha We stumbled upon a little Wishing stream with cups to drink the water and lucky money on a plate. I did some quick research later but never found what it was all about. We drank some of the water anyway. I wish we had more time for good hiking here, it is such an awesome environment like an Alien planet! Goatss Wish better weather Car to castle Not a war castle but has been well cared for. Woman bought in the 1960s and lived here till 1972 for hunting. Added a car garage haha still up kept and holds banquets for poetry festivals Goofy lunch - we've been eating a lot of burgers whoopss Almost left the card at the restaurant but the waitress chased after us! Omg haha Drove to the Doolin Cave!! Stevens having fun driving haha Largest Stalactite in the world!! 400,000 to 900,000 years old 11.2 tons wowowow Two boys 19 and 21 crawled down a 1.5' x 3' stream tunnel in 4 degree Celsius water for 2.5 hours to find it in 1952! One died 4 yrs later but the other came back in 2007. 4 yrs after they made the big tunnel to show his wife. Soo so cool love caves but never do spelunking haha Learn that the Burren and the cave were created from glaciers moving over limestone that used to be the ocean floor. Drive round for beautiful sunset and finally blue skies!! Go out later for dinner this time but pretty tired again tomorrow we will stay out in Dublin haha Biggest mussels ever!! Old guy "sings" to me about Boston and then back to Hostel. I finished Harry Potter and the cursed child - Not too impressed J.K. Rowling... Last full day!! Up early and scones, oatmeal and coffee again haha In the car to Dublin! Allll the traffic circles few tolls all brand new roads very nice. Arrive in Dublin and don't have to charge the last day for the rental car so it was only $111 for 3 and 1/2 days! So good! Call the airbnb lady from the Avis building. She didn't answer... finished checking out and tried again. She answered!! We will meet up in 2 hours. Steven directed us to the bus and then to a delicious pub for lunch. Some of the besstt Buffalo wings ever. The bar also had two parakeets. Stout cider and yummy salad. Leave and meet up with AirBnB girl. Shes about our age and is from Croatia!! We chatted with her about our trip for a bit and then off to explore! Did some good exploring, saw the Dublin Castle, and a cool neighborhood called Temple Bar. Made our way to Guinness Storehouse. Lots of horse carriages for tourist. Even say little boys with little horse carriages riding haha The Guinness factory is a whole museummmm. Steven is mostly worried about when he gets to pour his pint hahaha We you took our time reading everything and then got to the tasting room. First they do a tiny taster and talk about how youre supposed to taste it. I didn't know you were supposed to take big gulps...much better that way hahaha From there we went to the pint pouring Academy. I went first and didn't do tooo great hahaha and then my certificate didn't print out coincidentally... haha we brought our Perfect Pints up to the amazing view of the city. So pretty! We sat and enjoyed our Pints. Talked about stealing the glasses but decided against it haha From the tour we walked back to the Temple Bar area and sat for a drink there. Fun environment, we sat outside but it started to rain a bit. Went inside to finish our drinks and then off to find dinner. Wanted something better than bar food haha Steven put me in charge of finding dinner. I wondered into a place that looked a little more upscale and it had cornbeef and cabbage. I opened the door and it was packed! The host told a party of 4 an hour wait, and the 2 in front of us had a reservation.... I asked hopefully if he had room for 2, he was ify but so kindly asked a pair at the bar to scoot down one so that we could squeeze in. Snagged it! Woohoo!! All the food looked and smelled so good!! Nailed it!! So happy :D Steven ordered us a stout and cider - brands other than Guinness and Bulmbers or Orchards Thieves which are the only brands we've really found haha We got the cornbeef and cabbage and a Traditional Stew. It was all soooooo good we somehow finished it all and were soo stuffed. Again we were lame and wondered to bed so tired haha guess we'll have to come back to Ireland to party another timeee haha On the walk home last night we saw a place called Rolling Donuts so ran and got breakfast from there this morning haha off to the airport to come homeeeee Trip was amazinggg so ready to go to our new home and unpack the house and see friends and relax :D

Leg 4 - Munich and Oktoberfest

Oktoberfest Pastries yummys for Breakfast Rainy out. Texted with Michelle and Alex (the German friend who will show us Munich!) to set up a meet up point for Oktoberfest! Michelle says her and Bri are going to go look for lederhosen's. Steven and I stopped to look along the way but guys shorts were a min of 150€ and girls stuff was sooo expensive too. Steven and I Meet Alex at 11. Michelle and Bri are mia so the 3 of us head off to Find spot in tent! So crowded and So difficult but sit about 11:50. Keg opens at 12! In the middle of the two older groups. Alex last one to get beer. Prost. Song to cheers that plays every hour. Michelle texts Alex that they will be here in 10 minutes. But will be so hard to find us! I go to the bathroom. Stevens stays incase Michelle and Bri arrive. And they do!!! They found us in the madness! The older group next to us left so they could sit! Alex's friend comes and then more friends. So drunk. The older guys next to us are from Denmark. White sausage and 1/2 chickens. Potato dumplings. Leave at like 7. Left with a Stein... loose everyone. Pee soo so so bad. Pee at BK. Pizza. Wifi and finally text everyone. They are long gone haha Bed Meet Michelle and Bri for snazzy breakfast. Passionfruit juice. french toast. Huevos Ranchos. Michelle thought about raw ham but didn't do it haha go for wondering walk rainy find coffee place and hang with good convo. Meet Alex at Hofenbras beer house at 1:30. Found table and he found us! No phone life is a challenge. Chicken, fried sausage, and sourkrat nom nom. Fav German beer. Got a Ceramic stein. Cheersing song. Alex non alcoholic beer haha Walk to English gardens so so pretty. There is a river through the park and bridge too small so there was a big wave and they made it even bigger for ppl to surf on!! Beautiful park. Can't see buildings So nice. Stop at the airbnb for water. me Steven Alex back to Oktoberfest while Michelle and Bri do some planning. Check out international tent packed pack young seems so fun but will never find room. Find seats in the mayors tent. Cool round tablea. They sing so many American songs! Sweet Caroline. People next to us are from Italyand Columbia. Crazy guy kept coming up to our table and making sure we're all standing on the benches. We look up the history and confirm that Oktoberfest started as a wedding party hahaha Stevens decides this beer is his fav. Leave to meet Michelle and Bri for dinner and finally get KINDER Crepe. I was just gonna get a Nutella and then Steven was like reallyyy Annique.... So so so good. Steven bought some steins which isn't a German word. We say good bye and many thank yous to alex and promise to send him pics of his favorite burger in the world from Conor's. Meet Michelle and Bri for dinner at a cool old restaurant. So stuffed but so good. Great convo. Home pack Ireland tomorrow!!

Leg 3 - Zadar

Woke up and packed up to go meet Jon and Safa at the hotel Ran down to bakery for Breakfast Found the newly weds! Safa not feeling well :( Rental car Audi A3 hahaha in depth videos about the scratches hahaha Adventure time! Beautiful highway along the whindy coast line with the ocean view 5k through Bosnia - Bri and Michelle later told us that they did this same drive and messed up stopping for the passport check and almost got in trouble haha Ate lunch close to there. Ordered Frog legs off the menu cause why not. Sneakily pay for lunch then Jon got the bill just for ice cream mwahaha Me and safa napped and then we went to Krka it was late so no boat but we took a bus into the huge national park and then walked about 15 minutes down to the falls. Jon did good with the boot but we were worried. He tried to get in the water without and we all got really mad at him. Swim in the falls!! So green! I need Look up how they have so much vegetation. Soft lime stone made cool bottom of the pools. Old building from the mills that used to be here. I could have spent all day there reading about that stuff. Me and Jon needed ice cream, pit stop. Drice Another hour to Zadar. Found a parking spot 5 minutes from airbnb. Dinner with jon and safa. Safa weird gnocchi that was just a lump of dough. 2 app, 4 entre, 4 pieces of cake. 75€!!! They let us split the bill this time haha To bed and planning for me while Steven slept Omg day. I planned the next day but this day I found good ferries and figured once we got to the island we could wing it. Walked mile to the main town when we got there. Found tourist info. Gives walking times to different beaches. I thought if we pick on this side of the island, it would still be kinda built up and I kinda wanted a little hiking. So picked one on other side of island.... map says one just south is a 40 min walk... 3 hours later and we are on cliff faces 100 feet below the monastery that sits on the peak of the tallest mountain of the hilly island. Not enough water or food. I went in full Survival mode staying calm and careful lol we had no business being there. Steven really loves me. Get to the beach with big hopes and excitement of having this small ultra secluded beach to ourselves. We arrive to a small guy (I think he was a hobbit) sitting an reading next to his tent hahahaha we sit down just as a huge school of fish jump like cray and two hydro planes do a criss-cross touch and go. Where the heck are we!? Soon we see there is a second dude, naked, across chilling on a rock. Finally go Swim it feels sooo good. Hang and eat grapes for about 2 hours. Hike back FULL SURVIVAL MODE. But now we could yell to the naked guys in emergency. Map shows a potentially shorter route home. Make the first turn to see that it is wire cables on the cliff edge, Steven is dripping sweat, we have 3/4s of a nagleen left with 3 miles to go. Exec. decision - we leave the way we came. No cable haha pretty easy walk back. Go to the store to to Find juice. Swimmmmmmm. Coffee. Get drunk on sea wall and take the ferry back. We meet the guy for the boat ride tomorrow, pay him and get excited for tomorrow. For dinner we ate delicious leftovers on the plaza center steps. Walk around a bit and then crash in bed. Crazy day Boat trip day 7 am wake up Boat dock just across the road from the apartment. Wait for boat and eat kinder. Christmas ornament in the kinder egg. Boat of 60. Family business. Woman host was so cool 5 languages. Snooze and watch the islands. So relaxing. Ham sandwich. We see the monastery that we hiked just beloe yesterday. We are crazy. 89 islands make up the national park. There are restaurants but no one lives there. (Check that). On the way out, our boat stops to drop off food for lunch to be prepared for us. Alot of the islands have stone walls from one side all the way across until it meets water again. They were from the farms to separate the properties and the sheep from eating olive trees. Get to island that they might have in the family. See the tallest peak and gooo. We had some followers but we were far in the lead. Felt like star wars. Alien rock and bushes. Start seeing animal droppings. Get to the top and it's like a 300 foot cliff down to the water. There was a cool flag at the top and we could see the 3 or 4 sheep on the other peak of the island. Down the alien rocks to the other small peak with old old building ruins on it. Thought it was dry build with no cement but there was a gravely cement holding up the archways. So old and cool. Swimming but no cliff jumps because the water was too rough. Lunch with the quiet ppl we sat with on e boat, retired English couple, a honey moon Croatian couple. Good conversation. Lunch was so so good. Grill fish, pork, Cole slaw, and tomatoes. Steven is all in happy happy. Big jug of really good wine. Sunbath and skipper in the water. Boat back - no cliff jumping but nice relaxing day after the crazy day before. We got dressed up for dinner tonight and found some really good pasta with mussels. Went for a nice walk to the Sea organ and light show and then early bed. Travel day Pastries breakfast. Out of airbnb at 10 but no airport till 1 and can't store baggage anywhere. Sit and blog and read. Move and drink mixie. Classic lunch of lami, cheese, and chocolate. Awesome farmers market. Airport fun quick flights. easy clean train from airport to Munich. No wifi anywhere. Get all the way to the airbnb but no payphone or wifi. Borrow ice cream shop girls phone. Thilos status is "eating" haha. AirBnB real nice sooo hungry! Go towards exploring to find German food but BBQ place directly below the apt sooo haha good beer pork sandwiches more good beer happys. Bedd

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