Sigh. Sometimes between navigating, driving, shopping, setting up (or breaking down) camp, seeing awesome sights/animals/landscapes, etc., I just don’t have the mental energy to compose my blog. Russ makes a point of doing it every night, and for that, he has my admiration.

So if you want the up-to-the-minute pics and accounting of our trip, go to russloomis.com and enjoy his excellent photography. (I’m usually driving, so most traveling pictures are his. I’m too busy reassuring him—repeatedly— we’re on the right road and trying to keep the car from straying within a foot of the white line so he doesn’t panic and think we’re about to plunge off a cliff to actually look around.)

Where was I? I think my last post might have been all the way back in New Mexico. (Actually, I checked and I did post from our first campground in Colorado.) Meanwhile, we’re at Badlands National Park in South Dakota, where I’m currently sitting in the shade of a maintenance shed, watching several adolescent meadowlarks, two cliff swallows, the occasional mountain bluebird, and one very cheeky magpie forage about our campground (even the birds stay out of the sun by staying in the shade of the picnic shelters).

Ubiquitous western park picnic shelters.

After Aspen Glade, where we decided to skip a national park just to enjoy two more nights of cooler temperatures, we made the trek to Eleven Mile State Park in Colorado. Although we were back in hot, treeless territory again, it did cool down at night. Hot daytime temps meant that we needed the pop-up tent for shade. High winds meant that we needed multiple extra tie-downs (same with Russ’s tent). It’s a wonder I didn’t break a leg negotiating all the pegs and ropes. Moe, who can’t see, kept walking into them.

To my mind, this campsite redeemed itself with its two walking trail loops which took you up through stands of aspen and juniper and around some impressive rock formations.

Also a positive, I saw my first Western Grebes on the lake!

Then it was off to Rocky Mountain National Park.