Travel Diaries, Part 1

Here, belatedly, is the history of our trip to Yellowstone National Park...

At about five hours earlier than our usual wake-up time, we were roused from dreamless slumber by Purring Piggy (dreamless because we hadn’t slept that night; long vacations are almost non-existant in the Clan and therefore too exciting), and we were stuffed into an already packed van. The entire back seat and most of the aisle (we have a 15 passenger van) was full of our camping equipment and clothing, so that if we had chanced to flip over in our van, we would have moved only an inch or two to either side, so tightly squashed were we. Everyone’s excitement gave them alertness as well, so we started listening to the unabridged The Scarlet Pimpernel as we gazed out of the windows, visually farewelling the green and mountainous landscape of the Pacific Northwest.

Before leaving there had been great discussion of what book we should take on the trip. It couldn’t be too long, or too dull, or too girly, and it had to be suitable for all ages. Well, the Scarlet Pimpernel was the perfect choice. We had already seen the excellent adaptation with Anthony Andrews many, many times, so there was a slight anticipation that the book might be a little boring. But while Anthony Andrews and the other actors grasped their characters perfectly, the plot was a medley of two books in the SP series, so the book was sufficiently different enough to make it a wonderful choice. The reader of the book (Michael Page) had a great talent for voices, slipping out of accents and tones so easily to almost make one think that it was a full cast reading, and Baroness Orczy’s dramatic style of writing made it perfect for a read aloud. Her only fault as a writer was that she tended to repeat descriptive words or phrases, something that we all noticed.

It was a long day of driving, but our excitement had not dimmed by the time we got to our hotel in Missoula, where we unpacked what we needed, swam in the indoor swimming pool (something our family only does on vacations), and settled down once again to sleep.

The second day of driving was made enjoyable by listening to Michael Medved’s entrancing Revolutionary War history CDs. I knew our family loved history and especially discussing it, but when every three minutes or so we were stopping to add comments or have discussions of our own, it made me smile and wonder how we got through so many of the CDs as we did.


We arrived at Yellowstone Bible Encampment about 3:00pm on Saturday, after having a tire go flat, and finding no tire store in any nearby city to replace our spare. This would not have been so disastrous, had it not been for the very bumpy gravel road that stretches for 5 miles before you reach the camp. We were worried that if one of our tires had gone out, than one of the other ones might be ready to go, and the long stretch of washboards might be too much. And out near Pray, Montana, far away from any decent sized city, it would be a long while before we could get help. But, God was gracious, and we made it safely into the camp. YBC is a beautiful large campsite in a valley, completely surrounded by mountains, full of log cabins, and with a glacial stream creating most of its border. We had been there once before, but it was five years ago, and so the first thing I noticed when we entered camp was how much smaller it had grown.

We unpacked into our cabin, which had the lovely name of Rose Arbor, and prepared for a week’s worth of time to meet new people. The last time we had come, Aragorn and I had spent a little too much time with people we knew (whom we had not seen in a long time), and failed to meet new people, so this time we were firmly commanded by Purring Piggy to at least try to be extroverted and meet new people. But we found out, when we arrived, that there were going to be twelve families, and six of them lived near us. We knew that a lot of people we knew were going to be there, but didn’t know that the Pacific Northwest would comprise 50% of the camp! And as those other families arrived, I found that the only people near my age were the ones from the Pacific Northwest that I already knew. So though I was prepared to be outgoing, I ended up spending most of the week deepening friendships with the people I knew, and playing with the younger children of other families sometimes.