500 Saturdays: Nomad Diary

My first time to Yellowstone.  We drove first to the north gate in Gardiner,  Montana on Tuesday this week. We stayed two nights in a nice airbnb.  On Wednesday we toured Lamar Valley and saw buffalo,  antelope,  marmots, and a wolf. The weather was cold, and even hailed at one point. Lol. Thursday we began touring the bubbling springs and geysers. We drove from the north gate to the west gate. The west gate is at West Yellowstone, Montana. We drove 20 miles to Island Park, Idaho and stayed one night. We purchased groceries for Friday dinner through Saturday dinner because we would be in remote Wyoming.  Friday we entered the West gate and exited the East gate going to our tiny house airbnb 30 miles into Wyoming.  On Friday we mostly toured geysers including Old Faithful.  We saw some beautiful waterfalls too. The drive on the southeast loop toward the east gate follows a giant blue watered lake with snowy mountains as the backdrop! Amazing scener...

Monday, May 17th:  Driving across South Dakota is a lot of miles with very few towns and people.  Highway 90 from Suoix Falls to Rapid City is in excellent condition and the speed limit is 80 mph!!  The time flies when you are driving that fast.  When leaving Suoix Falls, there is a river that seems to be the beginning of rolling hills that rise for miles from there and then the land levels off into wide open spaces that are flat looking with few trees and green pastures where cows and crops are raised now.  This highway follows the old railroad that was first laid in the push westward in the US.  From the old railroad history and westward movement of people are the stories of massive buffalo herds that no longer exist here.  Buffalo are now protected and are seen in small herds here and there, and even ranched for meat and other products now.   Mid way through the flatlands of South Dakota, the Missouri river cuts through with another sharp ...

 On the road again after our second week staying at my Dad's place.  He and his wife, Donna, live in a two bedroom, two bath home.  They celebrated their 12th wedding anniversary.  On Sundays they meet up with my two sisters, their husbands and sometimes some of their kids and grandkids too.  Breakfast is at a restaurant before church worship time, and lunch is often at Dad and Donna's.  On our first Sunday Donna made a chicken vegetable soup, a potpie (provided by my brother-in-law John), and sister, Annette brought the salad.  We have since been eating some left overs and cooking some too.  John keeps them in wild elk meat that we turned into some delicious tacos!   I used my sister's house as a day spa with an exercise room and a sauna.  That's been a nice treat!  Other things this week have been:  Darrell working remotely set up in the sunroom.  Me working a few hours by phone and computer.  Early morning wal...

This Blog Diary has brought up a couple of questions from my friends and readers.  One question was posed this way in a text:  "Quick question:  where did you find your crates?"   I responded:  "Lol. This is not a quick question!"  She then texts: "Oh pooh!"  I'm still smiling because of my friend Megan getting right to the source of detailed information that she wanted to use for herself.  Megan, being a lifelong teacher, is really great at getting to the significant nuggets she is looking for! Darrell and I agree that these crates are key to packing our items easily into our truck bed.  This was Darrell's vision for packing organization beginning in July 2020.   At that time, we still expected to downsize over the following 18 month time period that turned into less than 2 months as we let the speed of our process accelerate. So here are the nitty gritty details of Darrell's shopping for and purchasing crates, trunks, and utensil boxe...

     Living our Nomad life is a life of movement and living with fewer things.  It is Thursday, 2 days before we are driving to Indianapolis.  On this day, we are both working.  Darrell is set up at the desk area in our bedroom, and I have afternoon appointments scheduled at my place of employment in Huntsville.  Our refrigerator items are sparse and we have been eating down the pantry items and buying fewer items in our final two weeks here.        For breakfasts we have a loaf of sourdough bread, a dozen eggs, toasted coconut almondmilk, apricot jam, a little butter, extra virgin olive oil, Darrell's gluten-free pancake mix, my hot cocoa mix, "Good culture" cottage cheese, a couple of apples and bananas, and variety coffee and teas.  For lunch today we will likely finish off most of our fresh salad items of romaine, spinach, tomato, cucumber, celery, carrot, green onion, red onion, and apple.  Other items for lunch ...