Thoughts on the US

Now we have been here in the US of A for the better part of a year we have been considering and discussing our thoughts on the country.

Language

Symi has been fascinated how in a country that speaks the same language as us there are so many words that we can't use. Just a few examples:

Australian                              US

toilet                                        restroom or bathroom

bin                                           trash can (they have no idea what a bin is)

car park                                   parking lot

ute                                           pickup

cool drink                                soda

petrol                                       gas

gas                                          propane

thongs                                     flip flops

we play with lego                    they play with legos

Lego or Legos?

On reflection it is much easier for an Australian to be aware of the American words than the other way around. We suspect this is an indication of how much American TV we watch and how little Australian TV those in the US are exposed to.

Accent wise we are constantly asked if we are New Zealanders or Australians. Evidently they worry we may be upset they get it wrong. We have heard so few Australian accents since we have been away that they now sound quite strange to our ears when we hear them. We are unable to hear each other's accent. The only exception to this was in Whistler where there are so many Australians that Fiona was asked if she was a local!

The other issue we have is pronouncing the letter R which no matter how we say it people don't understand - this is a slight problem when you are spelling Waller. The letter T is noticeably absent from many conversations.

Exchange in a supermarket

Fiona: Hi, can you please tell me where the butter is?

Assistant: the what?

Fiona: the butter (trying hard to pronounce the word well)

Assistant: sorry?

Fiona: the butter (sounding more and more English)

Assistant: I'm sorry...

Fiona: the yellow stuff you spread on bread

Assistant: oh you mean budderrrrr 

Food

As I am sure we have mentioned we are eating well. There is no shortage of fresh fruit and vegetables and we are finding cooking in the RV easy - especially with a BBQ. The thing that continues to surprise us is the sugar in everything. After 4 months we found our first loaf of multigrain, wholemeal and sugar free bread - yum. Even though people assure us you do, there is no way we will ever get used to the sugar levels in the bread. We have found that sourdough is our best bet for low sugar. We buy plain greek yogurt and is about 15% sugar!

The slightly worrying thing about the bread (and English muffins which are low in sugar) is that they last forever and still seem to taste reasonably fresh. We are not sure what preservatives we are eating and if this will shorten our lifespan - or preserve us for longer. Looking at ingredient lists on some items is positively frightening. We are working on the premise of eating non processed food where possible and not thinking about the rest. With wine we are blissfully ignorant as no alcohol content is given on the labels.

Meat has been a learning experience as many cuts have different names here. Our favourites for the BBQ have been flank steak and flat iron steak both of which are tasty and tender if you rest them. We tried a London Broil steak which I think is meant to be similar - it was tough. Not sure if we cooked it incorrectly or it was a poor piece of meat. We have also been experimenting with ribs. We have been cooking them in the slow cooker with both a BBQ sauce and an asian sauce - yum.

Coffee

Spending a lot of our first two months in Utah we found it strange that there did not seem to be much of a coffee culture.This highlights our lack of knowledge about the Mormon religion.We knew they did not drink alcohol but were unaware they did not drink caffeine either. On crossing the border into Colorado coffee appeared again.By that time we had

lashed out spending $15 on an electric drip filter coffee maker. Five minutes with the generator on and we can make coffee and microwave milk anywhere. Actually that is pretty much all we ever use the generator for, although it does have the added bonus of charging the batteries.

All in all I think you have a much better chance of finding a good cup of coffee in rural Australia than rural US. We have certainly found some good coffee but it is hit and miss. Starbucks coffee is easy to find but they tend to roast their beans too dark for our taste - it makes it bitter. Wow we sound like such coffee snobs.

Wildlife and scenery

Both the wildlife and scenery in this country have far exceeded our expectations. We have seen such a variety of wildlife it is amazing. Symi has taken multiple photos of every animal we have seen so we are in no danger of forgetting any. Lucky we have digital technology - Symi is still perplexed when we try to explain how it was in our day when we had to pay to get photos developed.

Other Strange Bits and Pieces

Light switches are upside down.

Cars and RVs here seem to need to idle for 10 to 20' before driving off!

Symi doesn't like hot chocolate here - it's too sweet

You can't pump your own gas in Oregon and New Jersey - not sure why

Manners

As far as we can tell everyone in the US has delightful manners. Meeting anyone who is anything but polite is a rarity. Crossing the road is an experience - people stop for you. At crossings without lights you mostly just have to step onto the road and the cars stop. Once again we do not have much experience in cities. When you are on a bike cars give you lots of space which is nice.

Assistants in shops and supermarkets go out of their way to help you. One piece of advice is do not ask for help if you are in a hurry. People are very helpful, but outside the cities in the US nobody seems to be in any sort of hurry. We have lots of time but sometimes feel like things are being done in slow motion.

We have stayed in all sorts of campgrounds and we have only had one episode of noisy neighbors and they were well quiet by midnight. There does not seem to be any of the drinking and inconsiderate behaviour that we have come across in Australia.

Hospitality

We have met so many lovely people here. We have been welcomed into peoples' homes, fed apple pies and generally looked after. We did not realise how exotic we would be here. Many people here think traveling for 12 months is positively astounding (we have been asked if we are independently wealthy!) As many people here only have two weeks leave a year they do not travel for long periods. That said we have met quite a few people who have retired very early and now travel a lot.

Meeting people - Tod and Barry on the left have the farm near Washington

Many people have given us contact details and said to contact them when we are in their area. One couple we spoke to for only 5' on a walk came and found us in our campground to invite us to stay with them near the Grand Tetons. Another couple we met on a walk invited us to stay on their farm (that was the Washington one) and yet another offered us the use of their ski chalet. On top of this we were lent a car for a week by Corey from Bozeman.  Others have been very generous with tips on where to visit and where to stay in different areas. Just yesterday Rob borrowed a couple of tools from someone to fix a problem with the black water pipe in the RV (not a pleasant job). They had to leave before he was finished and insisted we keep the tools.

The US is a fascinatingly diverse country in it's geology and it's people. We are truly lucky to spend this time here. Having said that Fiona had a dream that we had sold our house in Crabbe Place and was very relieved to wake up!

We will be heading home in January next year and we are really looking forward to seeing everyone.

Washington DC

The spring house and stunning autumn sunset colour

The escape from New York was quick and without any significant traffic. The destination was Frederick, Maryland (pronunciation: say it really quick blurring the syllables) where we had been invited to stay on a small farm. This was owned by Tod and his wife Barry who we walked with on the Iceberg Lake Trail in Glacier National Park. They had very kindly offered us a place to stay near Washington.

Reading the Gettysburg address

To break up the driving we stopped in Gettysburg to improve our knowledge of the civil war, not hard. Stopping in town first we visited the house where Lincoln stayed the night before he gave his famous Gettysburg address and we read his famous words. To understand what happened in the days proceeding this address we went for the short drive to the National Military Park. At this point the day could have deteriorated badly. Rob had left the camera on the roof of the car for the drive, it was still there somehow! However, compared to the massive casualties experienced by both sides in the three day battle in July 1863 that changed American history it would have been a modern first world

Battlefield talk with ranger

problem. In our very limited time we managed to fit in a ranger talk titled "the third day", luckily for us she quickly summarised day one and two. The politics around the war is very interesting, however the vast detail that can be found out about the battle is just plain gruesome. It goes likes this, men have weapons that fire maximum 70-100 metres, they walk in lines towards each other and shoot. When one falls, replace with one from behind. Add multiple cannons into the mix and at times the casualty rate hit one per second for hours at a time. Luckily they tended to stop for lunch for two hours. That men were willing to sacrifice their lives so readily for what they believed in is very sobering, however this battle did change the course of American history.

The farm house

Chilled by the talk and freezing wind, we drove the short distance to Frederick and had a quick tour of Barry and Tod's farm. We certainly picked the right people to walk beside on the trails. Their farm is small at 190 acres and is more of a hobby farm. Tod has just retired this year so is spending more time with the cows which he enjoys. The setting is stunning with a lovely old farm house and lots of other buildings. There is an old spring house (1750). These were evidently built over water supplies to protect them. The barn (an old milking shed) is huge with an amazing wood working area below (with an even more amazing amount of wood) and a huge area upstairs which Barry and Tod's 5 children and thier friends used for "outside play" when the weather was bad. There were cows and horses, chickens and cats. Symi was in heaven.

Bloody Lane, Antietam. There were thousands of
casualties here in hours.

The next day we decided to delay our visit to Washington and continue the Civil War theme visiting nearby Antietam. A battle occurred here on September 4, 1862 and is the bloodiest day in America’s history. There were a staggering 22,000 casualties in one day. Our knowledge was brought up to speed quickly by visiting the museum, watching a film and listening to another ranger talk. When the ranger was young he was inspired to learn about the war when he discovered that his great, great, grandfather fought in the battle. Again the history around the battle is very interesting, the gruesome details of the battle almost too much to think about. There were no real winners here, amazingly the two Generals here (Robert Lee and George McCellan) shook hands the next day to allow a cease fire to care for injured and deal with the dead. That afternoon with Barry and Tod we walked a short section of the Appalachian Trail that passes a short distance from the farm.

On Saturday we drove the hour to Washington and without too much effort managed to park for free just north of the White House. With a coffee in hand we stood outside the White House wondering if the two men on the roof ever moved - they eventually did. Symi and Fiona wondered if they should knock on the door and see if the daughter Sasha wanted to come for a play but decided this may be taking our "find a friend stalking" to new highs (or is this lows). We then wandered down to the

Washington Monument on the Mall. Our next aim was the Air and Space Museum but we were side tracked into the Natural History Museum when we noticed there was a wildlife and wilderness photography display. The photos were amazing. Symi remains totally intrigued by nature and proceeded to take  photo of almost all the photos. Luckily we are in the digital era. After some pursuation from Symi we then visited a live butterfly display. We now have an additional collection of photos taken by our budding David Attenborough.

How many animal shots do you want to see?
Butterfly unwinding it's proboscis.

Artwork by Syrian children in refugee camps.
Symi sending a message via drawing to them.

After a quick break for lunch, with views down the Mall to the Capitol Building, we crossed the Mall to the Air and Space Museum. Wow, the history and displays in there are simply stunning. Some of what we saw: the first spaceship to orbit the earth and land on the moon, the first plane to circumnavigate the world, the first plane that flew non-stop across the USA, Amelia Earhart's plane, the Wright Brother's original plane and so it went on. Eventually Fiona and Symi dragged Rob out and we wandered up to Chinatown to get some diner before heading back to the farm for bed.

Touching a rock from the moon.

Next day we headed back to Washington to visit the free zoo. We were keen to see the Giant Panda. It was a nice day and we had a lovely time wandering around in the autumn sunshine looking at all the animals. We headed back to the farm in the afternoon and Symi had a lovely time helping Barry do some brick paving, chatting with the horses, playing soccer on the tennis court and getting a ride in the tractor. Almost as good as Crabbe Place! What a great place this farm would have been to grow up.

Our favourite animal, burrowing owl at the zoo.

Next morning, after a huge thanks to Barry and Tod we were in the car for the 640km drive back to Connecticut. Good progress can be made at times as traffic on the interstate rarely sits at the speed limit, it is common to be sitting 10-20mph over and not attract attention of the mobile tax office, think of the fine you would get in Australia! We wondered what sort of  traffic we might hit driving up the busy east coast but apart from one busy merge point due to road works it was all plain sailing (strange term considering we were driving).

There's a huge smile inside that cabin.

New York, New York

Times Square

After a great deal of consideration we decided to drive to New York. Well actually drive to New Jersey and then bus the 30 minutes to New York. As we were planning to visit Washington DC as well it seemed it would work out better with the car. All went well, although we are not sure we would have gone without a GPS. We (or was it the GPS) only made one small mistake which luckily was easily rectified in a couple of minutes. It only took about 3 hours to get to our hotel and by 12:30 we were in New York. 

Hot Dog anyone?

The trip to New York was designed to be very Symi focused. Apart from Rob and Fiona's requests for the 9/11 Memorial and the Brooklyn Bridge the itinerary was all hers. We started at Times Square very near to where the bus dropped us off and headed up to Central Park for a pretzel and a hot dog. Verdict from Symi was that the hot dog was good and the pretzel not so much. We wandered around for a while taking in the sights before heading down fifth avenue. The next stop was to be FAO Schwartz (used to be the biggest toy store in the world) but we were side-tracked by the Apple Store. Wow - so many people looking at phones and computers. Rob is quite taken with the iPhone 6. Quite a step up from the $15 pay as you go Walmart flip-phone he is carrying this year.

FAO Schwartz proved a hit for Symi. She wandered around looking at everything. She was particularly taken with the Lego with large models of the Statue of Liberty and Batman.




















Fiona had done a little private research and informed Symi that the Lego store was nearby. This was instantly added to the itinerary. Before that could happen Symi was lured in by the candy land area.  After filling a bag of goodies for the road we were off to the lego shop. This also proved a hit - for both Symi and Rob. Rob was having difficulty working out whether he wanted a lego kombi, formula one car or mini. Symi decided to go for the large cup of lego pieces. You could choose your own from a pick and mix. That decided we left the lego store for a quick visit to Tiffany's. The lack of prices on any items was intimidating - although Fiona found lots of lovely things we decided not to get a pick and mix cup there.

Outside the Lego store was the Rockefeller Centre. We did not go up as it was beyond our budget (you have to have some limits when you don't work for a year!). We did spend a while watching the skaters in the ice rink they have set up in the plaza. We kept going down fifth avenue and had a look in the New York Public Library before finding some dinner. We walked passed Times Square for a look at the lights and then headed home on the bus for a well earned rest.

Walking down 5th Avenue

Next morning we were up early and encouraged by Kirstie, Symi added Toys'R"Us to her list - biggest toy store in the world. She was well impressed with the indoor Ferris wheel and the large Barbie house. In the interests of fairness she felt she should also try the candy (we are in the US) in this store. Overall FAO Schwartz was delcared the winner. 

We then visited the 9/11 memorial which was quite sobering. Last time Rob and Fiona were in New York in 1998 we went up the World Trade Centre. Then it was onto the subway and down to Lower Manhattan to take the Staten Island Ferry for a view of the Statue of Liberty. We did stop for a quick lunch on the way for anyone who is worried about how long it might be since Symi or Rob ate. We enjoyed the ferry and on our way back could see the Brooklyn Bridge which was our next objective. It took a while to find the way onto the bridge but once we did it was a great walk which we all enjoyed.

We followed this up with a walk through China Town to Little Italy. The rain started to come down so we decided to have dinner. The dinner was great - with a complimentary glass of wine. We took the subway and lots of underground tunnels along with half of New York and made it back to the Port Authority Bus Terminal to catch our bus home. The terminal is huge. We imagine there are people in there who have been lost for days. We ran to catch our bus which unfortunately did not arrive. Luckily for us we were near the front of the queue which snaked back for a very long way. Finally a bus arrived and we managed to get a seat for the ride back.

Much as we all enjoyed New York we were all looking forward to a bit of piece and quiet next. We were off to Maryland to stay on a farm much to Symi's delight.

 

Boston

We left Plainfield on a Tuesday morning for Boston leaving Symi with Rae and John for three days - a period of time Symi would later refer to as "The Spoiling". Rob's dad John had very kindly lent us his car and we had booked two nights at an Airbnb just outside the middle of Boston. We arrived late morning to be greeted by our hosts Sally and Bruce. 

We headed into Boston with a vague plan of completing a National Park ranger led walk - yes Boston is a national park. We got off the "T" Boston's tram service at Boston Common (luckily missing the stabbing that happened there later that afternoon!). We quickly found the freedom trail that leads you around Boston covering the events that happened there leading up to the beginning of the war of independence. After covering the southern section of the trail independently reading the plaques we arrived at the visitor's center and booked ourselves on the next tour. We had a short wait so fortified ourselves with a cup of coffee. 

Connecticut - Part One

After leaving Boise we headed south towards Salt Lake City. We stopped for a night at a State Park just north of the city to pack and clean up the RV before we left it and flew east for a month. We had not been out of the RV since Easter so we had a bit to do. Next day we left the RV in some long term parking and booked into a hotel near the airport for a night before flying through Chicago to Providence in Rhode Island. From there it was about an hour back to Rob’s Dad’s in Plainfield Connecticut.

Kid Time in Boise

We arrived in Boise on a Wednesday afternoon with Symi in a state of excitement due to the promise of playing with real live kids! Our destination was the home of Vicki, Nate, Alyssa and Cooper Witt who have moved to Boise from Perth. Symi and Alyssa played on the same t-ball team in Perth last year.

Craters of the Moon Idaho

Lava camping

After sliding out of Teton Canyon we made our way west towards Craters of the Moon (COTM) National Monument. The rain continued and it was also a cold day so we decided to plug in for the night at a town called Arco. The most we can say about Arco is on July 17, 1955 it was the first community in the world to be lit by electricity powered by atomic power. It also had a perfectly comfortable RV park for the night and good wifi.

Jackson Hole: More great riding and the ultimate fix for faulty Pike forks

Thanks Rockshox!

I had heard snippets about the riding in Jackson Hole (the area surrounding Jackson), however as usual it’s very difficult to find good reviews on the internet.

Grand Teton National Park

Coulter Bay

On a wet Thursday morning we headed south for the short drive to Grand Teton NP. There is a considerable drop in elevation on the drive and to our surprise all of a sudden autumn was in full swing. We pulled into the Colter Bay campground and found a spot, thankfully the campgrounds in Grand Teton rarely fill up, unlike it’s northern NP neighbor That afternoon the rain eased enough to allow a walk around the Lakeshore Trail. We enjoyed the stunning autumn colours and ever changing views of the Teton Range of mountains.

Yellowstone National Park

Our first day in Yellowstone was spent visiting the Old Faithful geyser area. We quickly realised that visiting YNP would involve considerable amounts of driving, particularly as two key roads were closed (a joke in Glacier NP is that there are two seasons, winter and

construction) and many campgrounds were shutting, due to shut or were full. The parking lot at Old Faithful is huge, the day we visited was busy enough, we wondered how busy it is in peak season.

West Yellowstone - Grizzly Bear and Wolf Discovery Centre

This post was originally going to be included in our Yellowstone post (soon to be posted) but as we were going through the photos we realised there was no way we could put the two together.

We booked an RV Park in West Yellowstone after spending one day in Yellowstone National Park, as we wanted to see the Grizzly Bear and Wolf Discovery Center which had been recommended to us by a number of people. The RV Park was located between an Imax theatre and the Discovery Centre (less than 100m to either) it only lacked a hot tub and cable TV to make it nirvana for Symi.

The Cubbyhouse Tree

Symi wrote this a long time ago - just found it in draft - not sure why but better post late than never!

This week my family and I went for a walk to Fern Canyon, through the redwoods in the Redwoods National Park. The coastal redwoods can grow up to 350ft or more. On the walk I found a cubbyhouse tree.

Mum and me climbing into the cubby house tree

Me inside the cubby house tree

Finally a food update

I think I have come to the conclusion I will not be a food blogger. I seem to be more interested in cooking and eating it than remembering to photograph and blog about it.  Take for instance this post. I started it weeks ago when we were still in Canada and have only just got around to completing it.

Since coming to Canada we have definitely been buying less steak to cook on the bbq – it along with everything else is expensive. We are definitely missing the cheap asparagus which had become a regular feature on the BBQ. Cheap summer corn is still in abundance so we are enjoying that instead. Yesterday we went to a farmers market in Rossland. I helped a lady wheel her baguettes across the road for the market and was given a free one which was nice. There was heaps of lovely produce and we spent a pleasant time wandering around tasting and shopping.

Symi at the Dog Show

In Bozeman while Dad was out mountain biking with Corey, Mum and I went to a dog show. We were invited by Jeannie who is the wife of Corey. 

Bozeman: Hidden Gem

Bozeman RV camping with shuttle vehicle. Thanks Corey!

We had never heard of Bozeman before I ran into Corey Biggers in Oakridge, Oregon. We exchanged a few photos we took on the Alpine Trail and he raved about some alpine riding in a place called Lionhead.

Glacier National Park: Part 2

Warning – get your coffee now – this is a long post. We loved Glacier NP. It was extremely hard to narrow down the photos to choose.

On a wet Thursday morning we left Whitefish and drove over the continental divide to the Two medicine area of Glacier National Park. We arrived and easily secured a campsite in the wet conditions. It was also cold, the temperature did not go above 10ᵒC for the next two days! The campsite was next to a beautiful lake and mountains, unfortunately the mountain were to stay behind the clouds. After the usual school work, we set off on a short walk to Appistoki Falls. It was nice to get out of the RV and stretch the legs.

Either get wet or cabin fever!

Next morning the weather had not really changed, but we set off again on a ranger led walk to Aster Falls then onto Aster Park. We shouldn’t have worried no one would turn up, we ended up having a group of over

Bear claw marks on the tree

ten. It’s not just the Wallers’ who walk in the rain!

Map

We are feeling quite pleased today as we have finally managed sort a basic map of our travels to put on the blog, We used a site called Blogabond. We were not able to find all the towns we visited when plotting the map so we have often just used places nearby. There are very few national parks on their list. You can zoom in and out on the map.

Just look right and there it is!

Update: this might not work so well on mobile devices - let us know!

Alpine Slide

Yesterday Mum and I went on an alpine slide at Big Mountain in Montana. We had been working hard doing school work while dad was zipping down the trails on his mountain bike. We decided to reward ourselves with some fun.

After we bought tickets we got in the queue for the slide, which has sleds and is like a luge track. We sat on the sleds and waited at the top with anticipation. I had that funny feeling where you are scared but exited at the same time.

Glacier National Park



Glacier National Park is large and crosses the border into Canada. The Continental Divide runs through the park, as does the Hudson Bay Divide. You could hike to Triple Divide Peak and throw water on the top and it would flow north, west and south. Those with small vehicles are able to drive over the Continental Divide in the park on the spectacular Going to the Sun Road (GTTSR). Those with 29ft RVs have to go around.

We decided to start on the West Glacier side of the park. As we were a little unsure about being able to get a campsite late in the day we spent the night at Whitefish where we were able to get provisions and charge up our electrical items. We left early in the morning and pulled into the Apgar campground before 8am the next morning to a choice of a few campsites. Our neighbours Pat and Alex, who are retired and have put what they own into storage and are travelling around seeing this great country with a tent, very nicely gave us the more level site out of the two they were considering.

Border Crossings and Rollercoasters

RV camping with Rollercoaster view! Aftershock in background.

Leaving Rossland we headed east then south towards the quiet border crossing near the Washington/Idaho borders. We were keen to be granted another 6 month visa so made sure we ate all our food so we did not have any prohibited items. We had no issues with stocking up once we hit the USA as the costs would be so much lower.