Expedition Bliss: Eclipse, running from the burning west, in Minnesoooota!

As it has been almost a month I will sum up. We did some more hikes in Wyoming awaiting the eclipse. Here are a couple shots from different hikes...

On the day of the eclipse we hiked Table Mountain on the ‘not recommended’ route because we thought it would be more fun. It was quite difficult, and fun. It was also shorter than the alternative route. We made it to the top and met up with an old friend of mine, Sean and his wife Alexa! It’s funny, we weren’t planning on doing anything special for the eclipse, just happened to be in the area. We would have just looked up from our campsite or something if it weren’t for Sean. We were so happy he was there and got us to hike up to see it. I didn’t think about the darkness and how it would look standing on the top of a mountain with the Grand Tetons in front of us. Oh man and it got cold!! Anyway, it was beautiful and a wonderful experience. We topped it off by hiking back down on the longer route with our friends then having a few beers at a nearby brewery.

On the hike up

One of the views from the top

Others waiting

Taken during the eclipse

The next day we headed to Sinks canyon near Lander, WY. It is a great climbing spot and they have the International Rock climbing festival there every year... sadly we missed it by a few weeks. We stayed there for about a week or so... and didn’t climb much! We didn’t feel all that well for the first few days. We did some climbs but... we just couldn’t get it together. Oh yea, I also hurt my shoulder. Nothing serious but bad enough I couldn’t climb for a day. I think we climbed a total of 3 times.. and on of those times we only did one climb. Eventually we decided we’d return some day but should get moving.

neighbors at camp

view from camp, cliffs in the distance we planned to climb but didn't get too

breaking after one of the few climbs we did

In an attempt to escape the fires of the west, in part due to Matthews asthma, we started heading east. Initially we were going to Utah but the smoke was very persistent and didn’t seem to be getting better.. and he wasn’t feeling so great. We decided to drive home for the holidays anyway so we are slowly making our way back. So, our next stop was the Black Hills national forest in South Dakota. On the first day we climbed all day, doing about 6 climbs... I think more than all the climbs we did in Sinks.

only photo I got that day

We were sore the next day so we went to Jewel cave, which is currently the third largest cave in the world. We only saw about a half mile of it, and it was impressive. Our photos don't do it justice so I'm not going to bother posting any, it was too dark, they are just sad phone photos.

The following day we woke to the smell of smoke, strong. We went for a drive, found a forest ranger station and found out there was new nearby fire that evening that was out but would smolder for 3-4 days before clearing. groan. We spent a few hours at a coffee shop and headed out! On our way out we decided to stop at Wounded knee. I had mixed feelings of sadness and shame.

We camped out near a beautiful lake on the way. The next day drove 9.5 hours to another beautiful lake to camp for the night on the way. The following day we made it to Duluth, MN. We spent some time wandering Duluth, then found a campsite about 30 min away.