Wyoming

I am currently sitting in the most perfect cabin in Montana drinking coffee while looking over the past six days of vacation pictures. There is snow on the trees outside and Drew, the only other early riser this morning, is reading on the couch in front of me. My heart is happy.

I don't think I'm ever happier than when I am adventuring with my people. There is a lightness to life that happens when we all travel together that I just can't describe. The conversation, the time together, the giggles, the siblings holding hands.... I will always be so grateful that we have made family trips a priority and I know we are fortunate because not everyone is able to take these trips. Ben and I decided very early in our marriage that we would take at least one big adventure a year (even when we were broke newlyweds) and we have kept at it for the past twenty years. Our shared philosophy is that money spent on travel is money well spent.

When deciding what we wanted to do with the kids this summer, we kept coming back to the idea of going west to Colorado, Wyoming, and Montana. We'd throw around other ideas too, but just couldn't stop thinking about mountain time and the chance to see a new part of the country. Ben and I have spent time in Colorado, but Montana and Wyoming are new for all six of us. We finally pulled the trigger about two months ago and purchased tickets into Denver. The itinerary was 1.5 days in Denver and Boulder doing city activities, three days in Jackson Hole, Wyoming and the Grand Tetons, a day in Yellowstone, two days in Big Sky, Montana, and then 1.5 days back in Colorado visiting Estes Park.

To begin to document and share some of the hundreds of pictures I've taken during our time away, I'll start with Wyoming. Jackson Hole and Grand Teton National Park lived up to my expectations and then some.

We started our time with a visit to a buffalo ranch in Cheyenne. We were able to view buffalo roaming around the ranch from a train that took us around a very small part of the massive property. The guide told us it takes four days on the back of a horse to get from one side of the ranch to the other, though this felt impossibly big to us.  Since I knew just about nothing about buffalo before this tour, I found the guide's commentary pretty interesting. One of the buffalo was in the process of giving birth while we were viewing and this was by far the most memorable part of the visit for us.

These little sibling moments are WHY we travel.

Drew spent his souvenir money on a Colorado hat and he has worn it for about 80% of vacation. 

I am not sure why Gracie snapped this picture, but I am glad that she did.
Kate is my constant companion and her quiet chatter and questions is the background of my life at this moment in time. 

 We left the ranch and headed towards downtown Cheyenne. In the cute downtown area, we visited The Wrangler where Kate fell in love with all things Western wear. She gets it from her momma. ;)

These are the kinds of pictures texted to me when the boys and girls split up. 

Kate was in awe of all of the choices in cowgirl attire. We had a hard time resisting her adorable excitement and let her pick out a pair of heavily discounted boots, a plaid shirt, and a hat as her souvenir of the trip/Halloween costume for next year. She asked if she could wear them each day of the trip since we had a washer and dryer at our rental house. Love that girl so much.

A picture of the finished result taken the next day at the rodeo:

Next stop was a local brewery in Cheyenne where we enjoyed pizza, wings, and beer while discussing the activities for our time in Wyoming. Much of the rest of our day was spent driving towards Jackson Hole. It was a looonngg drive, but we had amazing views and an audiobook to pass the time and the kids were troopers. We arrived to our rental home late in the evening and made ourselves at home.

The next day was our Grand Teton National Park day and I think it might be the highlight day of the entire trip for me. It was only about a ten minute drive from our rental home to the entrance of the park, so we were able to get a really early start and beat much of the park traffic. It is fun to document/remember that Drew had an "Every 4th Grader in a National Park" summer pass that he used to gain us free admission to both Grand Teton and later Yellowstone. The park rangers at the entrance made a fun fuss over him at the many ranger stations.

We thoroughly enjoyed our full day of hiking together. The weather was crisp, the views were amazing, and we were all in great moods. A park favorite for us was Jenny Lake/Inspiration Point. We also really loved Schabacher's Landing.  One of my happy memories of the day (and one that I only have a mental picture of) was eating lunch out of a cooler at the back of the rental van. Not sure I can explain why, but this memory of the kids passing around paper plates of carrots, apples, sandwiches, and pretzels while contentedly resting from a full morning of hiking just makes me smile.

Late in the day we headed back to the house to clean up before heading to Bar J Ranch for dinner. This dinner experience is a Jackson tradition, we are told. We bought tickets for the one meal of the day and showed up at seven, not sure what exactly to expect. We were seated in a huge mess hall and invited to go through a chuckwagon line with our tin plates. We were served by the cowboys who later performed a Western music/comedy show for us. The kids really loved this experience and I would definitely recommend it.

Kate thought she should wear her boots and hat to a chuckwagon dinner just in case there were horses around.

We made it back to the rental home late that night and the kids crashed hard after such a full day of activity. Ben made a run to get us a bottle of wine and some local beer to enjoy and came back with a treat called a sloshie, evidently a Jackson thing. It was an alcoholic smoothie sold here in the summertime and it was d e l i c i o u s and surprisingly strong. I could see why locals would be excited when sloshie season arrives, as we saw written on many shirts in souvenir shops around town.

The next morning we headed into Jackson Hole to enjoy breakfast at the cutest little bakery, shop for souvenirs, and take our required picture in front of the Jackson Hole antlers. Downtown Jackson Hole was wonderful and we all really enjoyed our time there.

Prettiest latte around- a campfire latte complete with large homemade marshmallow.

Nutella and almond croissants were a big hit

We were a little disappointed to see that the famous Cowboy Bar was closed during our visit.
We had talked about leaving everyone at home and heading out for a vacation date to hear some live music.

That afternoon we were scheduled for a float trip along the Snake River. The experience was everything I hoped it would be. In fact, I left my first trip advisor review ever after our float just so I could recommend it to others. Our guide was the perfect mix of informative and quiet. He taught us so many things about everything around us, but also gave us plenty of time to just relax and quietly take in the mountains and river and wildlife. It was cold on the river, but he provided wool blankets and the kids were happy to just cuddle and take in the experience.

For our final night in Jackson, we opted for dinner at a local brewery followed by a night at the rodeo.

looking the part for a night at the rodeo

Best part of the night, hands down, was seeing the cowgirls barrel racing.
Kate loved them, especially the girl who looked not much older than eight.

We really enjoyed our time in Jackson. We weren't quite ready to leave it the next morning, but were excited enough to hit Montana that nobody protested too much.