A Few of My Favorite Things

With a five week long trip covering everything from mountains to beaches to cities to tiny villages, it's tough for me to make a "top ten" list like Jeff did.  I'm just going to talk about the things I liked the best.

The first thing that comes to mind are Lake Superior and Lake Michigan.  I think one of the reasons I liked them so much, aside from how beautiful they both are, is that it marked the spot in the trip where we started to relax a bit.  There's just something about a beach to make you stop and take it all in.  The sunsets on the lakes were spectacular, and I enjoyed every walk I took on the beaches in the area.  It was amazing to take in the scenery along Lake Superior - first on the way to Two Harbors and then at the campground in Munising.

Harbor Springs and Petoskey were beautiful towns on Lake Michigan and I look forward to going back there again sometime.  It's a nice mix of Rockwell-esque small town charm, cute shops, the lake, and the delicious meals we ate there.  We had never heard of these places before and were thrilled to have found them.

I also enjoyed our time in Grand Teton National Park.  It's a gorgeous area and a manageable size, and once you get past getting up at the crack of dawn, it's hard to top watching a moose graze along a winding river or getting stuck in a bison jam.  One of my favorite memories of the Tetons was watching the sunset behind the Tetons and how the golden last rays of the sun warmed the swaying fields in front of them.  Soon after, we watched the sky turn rose, then purple before the moon rose into the sky.

Call me crazy, but I love the drive across Kansas.  It's a beautiful drive (there's that word again...) with fields of grain, blue skies and patchworks of farmland.  It's important to see where so much of our food comes from, as the result of hard work of Kansas farmers. The only thing that would make the drive better was the flexibility (and time) to drive into some of the smaller towns off the interstate or the scenic landmarks to take some pictures or look in the quilt shops, antique and thrift stores to do some shopping.

I also loved Red Lodge, Montana.  I looked forward to going back there after having lunch there back in 2009, and it didn't disappoint.  It's a small town with western charm, a great main street to walk and shop along, and majestic mountains in the distance.  It's not the easiest place to get to, but it's totally worth it.  If I thought we could survive the winter there, I'd have convinced Jeff to buy the ice cream parlor that was for sale in town and made it our home.

There were so many good memories on this trip, and thanks to this blog, we'll be able to revisit them again and again.