Archives - Show All 
  • 2010
    • September
      • Siuslaw National Forest
        09/07/10
        We went for a hike on Saturday. We biked down the hill to the first trail. The first time here, we biked all the way down to the end of the road and went on the hike there. This time we didn't go down as far because we remembered there was an earlier hike. We went on that one and it was a v

      • Rockaway Beach
        09/03/10
        It did stop raining, which was fortunate for the leaks and our power. We checked out the beach and the surf. The waves were really sloppy and there looked like an algae bloom. We basically just spent the day working instead since we had good internet. We went to the Mexican place that we liked s

    • August
      • Rain!
        08/31/10
        We woke up in the middle of the night to very loud rain on the RV... The trees we were under were apparently catching the rain, then saving it up in order to drop very large, and loud, drops onto the top of the RV. Also, the vent right above the bed may have a leak. Uggg We have a towel there no

      • Busy Day
        08/30/10
        Headed to Lake Quinault and took a quick Nature hike, and then another short hike to see the largest spruce in world. It was a biggin. 12' across?
        Continuing on we looped back out onto the coast and in Moclips, we drove out onto the Beach sand for a nice view with lunch. Found a nice YMC

      • Working down the coast
        08/29/10
        Woke up in our dank, dark, depressing location. The kitties were let out early for fun though, so we stuck around until 2ish, then headed down the coastal park of Olympic Park. Just stopped for views and a tiny hike at Ruby Beach.
        Then coasted over to a Gas station in Queets with $3 showers

      • Leaving Forks
        08/28/10
        We headed back into Forks early, Having lunch at pacific Pizza Along with a good block of work. (game update).
        Then headed south on 101 to see the Hoh Rain Forest. We did the three nice hikes at the visitor center then decided to head back out since the campground was busy. We saw 3 different

      • Northwest Olympic Peninsula
        08/28/10
        That spot turned out to be a bit busier than anticipated. At some point in the middle of the night, a truck came up and people were walking around talking and laughing. Unfortunately, neither Joe nor I actually heard the truck come (who knows why not, it was really loud) so I woke up to hearing pe

      • Olympic National Park
        08/23/10
        We did end up staying a couple nights at that spot. It was pretty foggy and drizzly, but we did go for a nice bike ride one day when the clouds had burned off. We left on Friday and headed into Sequim. We went to the Dungeness Spit, which is basically a long, skinny stretch of beach that eventually

      • Finally Back in National Forest
        08/18/10
        We left Seattle on Sunday and headed towards Tacoma. Michelle, a writer for the game, lives there and we were going to visit her and her roommates. We ended up staying there until Tuesday. We were able to get some work done, have some yummy food (Michelle made a vegetable lasagna) and relax while

      • Seattle!
        08/15/10
        We got into Seattle on Saturday and have been here for the past week. A friend of mine that moved here from Minneapolis to go to grad school is renting a house here and has a perfect RV parking spot. She and her roommate don't own cars, so they bike or take the bus everywhere. It's been

      • City Hopping
        08/08/10
        Sorry for the lack of updating. That's what happens when I wait until I upload photos and then never upload the photos.

        Anyway, our plan was to take a bigger hike than the Goat Mountain hike on Wed. but we missed the road because it was a turn off in the middle of the construction g

      • Goat Mountain
        08/03/10
        Yesterday, we woke up and headed for the trailhead, which was up a road that we had already driven up and knew about. The hope was that while we were hiking, we would get the battery charged back up, so we parked in a spot where we hoped the sun would stay out and not be blocked by the trees.

      • Crazy Cats!
        08/02/10
        Well, there definitely was a mouse problem.

        First off, the cats did not want to come in. It was a pain getting them in for the evening. We went to sleep relatively early, but at some point in the middle of the night, Joe heard growling. He swore it was a bear. We turned the light on

      • Mount Baker
        08/01/10
        We've been in the national forest near Mount Baker since we left Bellingham. We left the spot we were at yesterday in order to go for a hike. Joe had checked out Google Earth and it looked like there was a trailhead for parking, then a 3 mile or so hike up a large trail (Google Earth said it

    • July
      • Bellingham, WA
        07/28/10
        We spent a number of days in Bellingham parked outside Rod and Sarah's house. They were quite kind and we had a great time chatting with them quite a bit. We mostly focused on working the first day we were there. On Sunday, we went out to a very good sushi restaurant with Rod and Sarah. Aft

      • Northern Washington
        07/25/10
        We ended up heading to Mazama and stayed at Joe's friend's place there. He has two kids who were a lot of fun. Wiley (9 year old) baked brownies one morning and even gave us a baggy of some that were left before we headed out on Friday. Maya (12 year old) was giving a riding lesson to t

      • Forest Development Rd 37
        07/20/10
        We did end up leaving our spot across from Kettle Falls. We didn't feel comfortable letting the cats out with people coming and going on ATVs. We continued along Highway 20 up the mountain. Part way up, we stopped at a free, national forest campground where there were a couple trails. The c

      • Rec Area
        07/16/10
        The next morning we woke up and decided to head back into Kettle Falls. There's a very cute market basically like our Coop and they have a small Taco Restaurant in there that we wanted to try out. We bought a few things and used their wifi while waiting for lunch.

        The food was ve

      • Kettle Falls
        07/14/10
        We spent Monday running some errands in Coeur D'Alene. We mostly hung out in the grocery store parking lot, then a Target parking lot, working for a while. The plan was to just stay at a Walmart so we could get some work done.
        For dinner we decided on sushi. There was a restaurant prett

      • Coeur D'Alene
        07/12/10
        On Friday, we went for a long bike ride along the dirt roads. We ended up taking an old cat trail up the mountain thinking it would be a shortcut of the switchback we were on. Well, it took a while, but it did finally come out to a road. The problem was, we didn't know what road or which way

      • Fun in Idaho
        07/08/10
        After we left Sandpoint, we headed down US-95 and decided to check out a national forest near a lake. Google Earth said there was a campground, but we never know how accurate it is. Well, the dirt road we headed up to get there was pretty iffy, but got better so we kept going. Then there was a si

      • To The Coast!
        07/08/10
        Sorry for not updating sooner. The mountains make for wishy-washy internet.
        We aimed to leave Tuesday afternoon, but we didn't end up leaving until 7pm. We didn't get too far. There is a lot of national forest along highway 2, so we ended up finding a cute national forest campgroun

    • June
      • Kalispell
        06/23/10
        Well, we've been here for almost a week now. We're mostly just working. Joe started working on the RV yesterday. He's been pulling stuff out and will start building shelves tomorrow. We bought new carpet for it today, so we'll get that put in once we're done with everyth

      • Driving, Driving and More Driving
        06/17/10
        Well, we did end up staying at a rest area that night. It was a very small one, but worked out well. We left in the morning and decided to head for the National Grassland.

        There were oil derricks everywhere, but we finally found a road that didn't have one at the end. We found a

      • And, We're Off!
        06/14/10
        Yesterday we finished packing and left the house a bit before 12. We stopped in Duluth to pick up the surf boards, then worked our way out of town to Highway 2. Highway 2 actually goes right through Kalispell, so we decided to try that route (it's shorter in miles than the interstate) since w

      • Almost?
        06/10/10
        A few days ago, Joe decided to pull out the fridge and the oven. We now only have a stove top for an appliance. We figured we never, or rarely, used either, so might as well gain the space. Now we'll have a place to store the drinking water, which will be a huge help. The area under the sto

      • Getting Ready To Go
        06/06/10
        Well, we're about to head out again. We plan on leaving by the 13th and head out to Montana. There we'll work on outfitting the RV a little better while visiting with Pat and Nancy (especially since we left in a bit of a hurry in Feb). After that, we'll head to Washington, possibly

    • May
      • Finally Live!
        05/05/10
        After 2.5 years of work, Horse Isle 2 is finally live! We worked long and hard to finally get to this point. It seems to be doing all right so far. Only time will tell I guess. Once we put out any fires that pop up, we can hopefully start relaxing some and get out traveling again.
        -Miranda<

    • April
      • Apostle Islands Camping
        04/03/10
        Joe, Sarah (a friend of Joe's) and I all went camping on the mainland of the Apostle Islands from Thursday to Friday. The weather on Friday was pretty much perfect. A nice temperature to not get too hot, but not get too cold either. Parts of the trail were very muddy though. The campsite is

    • March
      • Back Home
        03/03/10
        We were talking about heading home to visit people and deal with some things, but weren't quite sure when or how. We were leaning towards taking the train and staying for only a week or two. That would have required that we leave the cats with Pat and Nancy.
        After much thought and debate

    • January
      • Mostly Boring
        01/26/10
        We've been in Montana for a while now. We pretty much just work. We did join a gym, so we head to the gym three days a week before lunch. It's definitely not always fun, but a great way to get exercise since we normally just sit around.
        A couple weeks ago, the weather was perfect,

  • 2009
    • December
      • The RV
        12/13/09
        Pat has a gigantic shop. He has his RV and boat in there and there is plenty of room for our RV. So, when Pat got home from work, we went to move it in there, however, it would barely move... It was slipping and sounding just awful. It was stinky too... Joe finally took a look at it today and i

      • Kalispell
        12/10/09
        Well, we spent Monday in San Francisco. We just drove around and ended up in downtown... We even drove through Chinatown on accident! The road was super narrow, very slow and up a steep hill. Very neat looking area, but not someplace I ever want to go in an RV again... We found a small Chinese

      • Highway 1
        12/06/09
        Sorry it's been so long since the last update. I kept meaning to get the photos uploaded before doing an update, and that kept taking longer to do than anticipated. So, this will be relatively long...

        On Thursday, Laura had the day off, so she drove out to us to spend the day. We

    • November
      • Visiting
        11/29/09
        We stayed another night at Laura's. We woke her up at 7:30 on Sat. morning to go jogging. That was fun. :) I'm impressed and happy she actually got up. It was actually her idea. We left and headed to Ventura to pick up Jenny who was down from San Fransisco to visit her sister. We had

      • Los Angeles
        11/27/09
        We drove into LA on Tuesday and haven't been doing too much since then. We have been enjoying our visit with Laura though. :) Laura has been working in the mornings, so Joe and I are able to work as well. We did have sushi the first night here. The place we found had 6 different veggie-type

      • San Diego
        11/24/09
        We spent the day working, basically. We drove to Trader Joe's and went to a nearby French cafe nearby for lunch. That night, we stayed at the nearby state park. Wow there were surfers everywhere! Joe asked the ranger if there was something surfer oriented going on and he said no, it's

      • San Diego
        11/22/09
        The state park was great, but we decided to keep pushing on to the coast. We stayed in a National Forest outside of San Diego up in the mountains before heading into the city. We didn't realize I-8 is crazy mountainous. We went up to 4000 feet. The mountains are really weird too. They are

      • Lots of Driving
        11/19/09
        EDIT: I added the Carlsbad Cavern photos.

        It's been a little bit since the last entry, so this is going to be a long one. .. Sorry. :)

        The next day we went back to the Whole Foods Market for lunch and ended up getting far too many sweets to bring with us. We debated on

      • Austin, TX
        11/15/09
        We drove into Austin this morning and headed straight for downtown. There is a huge Whole Foods Market downtown and we wanted to check it out. Let's just say it was really overwhelming. We spent at least 3 hours in there just looking around. They have a huge assortment of foods to get and e

      • Wow...
        11/14/09
        Before heading into Sabine National Forest, we stopped at the ranger station. On a large laminated map that pointed out some of the campgrounds and rec areas, some of them mentioned free camping by the water. Which surprised us, but we wanted to check one of those places out to see what was up. T

      • Sabine National Forest
        11/13/09
        We left the campground and headed for the next national forest, Kisatchie. I had looked online to see what campgrounds were in the forest in case we had issues finding a spot on our own. There was one that sounded neat on the Saline Bayou and it was supposedly free. So, we headed up there. There

      • Ida
        11/10/09
        We went to check out a St. Andrews State Park and found that the surf looked amazing. Joe really wanted to surf so we left the park and found a place that rents out boards. We each got a board and went surfing. Unfortunately, the gulf bottom was too irregular. It would dip down, then there would

      • The Gulf Coast
        11/07/09
        We left right after we woke up. We decided to try having breakfast at a little diner in the next town. It was a pretty busy place and the food was decent. Their "french fries" were hashbrowns. :) I did sort of wonder why they would server french fries in the morning.
        We stopped at

      • Cold!!
        11/06/09
        What the heck! It's been cold in the morning. The temperature swings down here are crazy! It's in the 70's or 80's during the day and down in the 30's at night. We just don't want to take the chance of the pipes freezing. Blah.

        Anyway, we ended up stayin

      • Little Talbot Island State Park
        11/02/09
        We did end up biking a little more the next day at Jekyll Island. We went to the driftwood beach, which was similar to what we saw on Hunter Island, but they were fallen weird directions. Some towards the water, some away, which made for some interesting passageways. We then biked down the beach

    • October
      • Jekyll Island
        10/31/09
        We left Hunter Island and headed farther south to Jekyll Island in Georgia. This island is definitely more touristy. You even have to pay a $5 entry fee (they call it a parking fee...) There are bike trails all around the island, so after getting a site we hopped on the bikes. We went around the

      • Hunter Island State Park
        10/28/09
        We decided to keep heading down south a little and check out Hunter Island State Park. It was a longer drive through town than we expected it to be and the park is pretty packed, but I think it was worth it. The mix of trees and the general landscape of the island are amazing. We walked down the

      • Muggy
        10/28/09
        The spot in Sumter National Forest was great. Unfortunately, we were not getting enough sun and it was raining yesterday, so our battery was running extremely low. Before we left we checked out one other road in the forest that looked promising. We didn't find any other spot where we would h

      • Sumter National Forest
        10/26/09
        Finally! We finally found a proper National Forest.
        We stayed in the Walmart parking lot for two nights so we could get a bunch of work done. We left yesterday, early afternoon and headed towards Union, SC in search of a YMCA. That one was apparently closed on Sundays. The whole town was

      • Electric Issues
        10/23/09
        We left the National Forest in the morning and kept on heading south. We made it to Johnson City, TN and found a Walmart to sleep at. We bought a little netbook type thing at the Best Buy in town also. Now we use that while driving and at night (watching stuff online before bed) to help conserve

      • Virginia
        10/20/09
        After leaving Daniel Boone National Forest, we just headed straight for Pikeville. We stayed in the Walmart parking lot that night. It was cold. It was down to the mid 30s. On Monday, we went to the YMCA to work out. The little one in Winchester was much better, I think. This one was larger, b

      • Daniel Boone National Forest
        10/18/09
        We left Winchester after running a couple errands and stopping for lunch again at that yummy sandwich shop and headed towards Daniel Boone National Forest. Our hope was to be able to park somewhere off the road and stay for a couple days. Unfortunately, it looked pretty controlled. You must buy a

      • Piece of Junk
        10/16/09
        We were between Lexington and Winchester when the RV started to sound like it was grinding and it gradually got louder. Then the temperature started to spike. Since Joe has had the engine seize from it getting too hot before he pulled over and shut it off. When he opened the hood there was oil, o

      • Lots of Driving
        10/15/09
        We drove basically all day yesterday. We stopped at a Walmart in southern Indianapolis and stayed there the night. We started out this morning and decided to stop for lunch in Louisville, KY if there was a good vegetarian place. We ended up finding a restaurant called the Zen Garden that was comp

      • Finally!
        10/14/09
        We finally left yesterday at around 4pm. Our plan was to leave right after we got the mail because we were waiting for a package. Of course that package didn't show up.... So, we decided it probably wasn't going to and just left anyway.
        It's a bit chilly, but we are working

      • Leaving Tomorrow
        10/12/09
        We finally have the patches and fixes done in the RV. Of course in the meantime it decided to not only get very cold for fall, but snow too. We are waiting on a package that should come today, then we'll be basically set to go. We're leaving in the morning tomorrow since we'll have

      • Uggg
        10/08/09
        So, our hope was to leave very soon. Last night we tested the water in the RV. Half filled the tank and ran water through the faucet. The main goal of this was to see if the lights worked (this RV has a gauge that lights up to show us how much water is in the tank) and to see if it was stinky or

    • September
      • Boring
        09/28/09
        Yep, we're pretty boring. We've mostly been sitting at home working on the game and Joe has been working hard on getting the Toyota RV fixed up and ready to get on the road. We'll even be taking it into town sometime this week to get new tires and the futon mattress for the bed.
    • August
      • Jenny Gone
        08/25/09
        We drove down to the Twin Cities on Sunday since Jenny's flight was leaving from there on Monday. We wanted to do something fun for her last day and a half. We ended up going to the Como Zoo. It was packed, but lots of fun. I took a lot of photos. I'll post some here.
        We then sta

      • Video of Work
        08/14/09
        I'm back home from Montana and have been for a bit yet, but I haven't updated because I have some video that I hadn't dealt with yet. Anyway, Pat (Joe's father) decided to bring the video camera up to the job to get some video of me working. I kept hoping that he would forget,

      • Montana
        08/02/09
        Last Sunday, I flew out to Montana to work for Pat for two weeks. The work has been going well. On Tuesday, the machine blew two hoses at two different times. Since then I haven't had anymore problems. The 12 hour days get a little old and tiring (leave at 4:30am get home between 4 and 5 pm

    • July
      • Curly Being a Cat
        07/08/09
        Yesterday I went outside to get the mail and noticed Curly in the flower garden. He had 2 baby Robins. One was clearly not doing well and going to die, the other one was sitting up with it's mouth open. So, I scooped that one up and tried to see if I could find its nest. Of course that was

    • June
      • Keeping Busy
        06/25/09
        Since we got home we have been not only working on the game, but working on getting the Toyota RV ready to go out on a trip. We had a lot of fun on our short adventure that we decided to go out this winter and head south, like some retired folks do. :) The old RV is set up so nicely for us that we

      • Home
        06/12/09
        Well, we made it home. I spent most of the day unpacking the RV. The RV is mostly done and a lot of stuff is put away. Mary took care of the house while we were gone and we came back to not only a clean and organized house, but the yard is very pretty now. She even put in pretty flowers out front

      • Almost There
        06/12/09
        We left the oil field and kept working our way home. We stopped at a person's house along the way. She's one of the players and quest writers for the game. She fed us some great pizza. After that, we kept going and made it all the way to Baxter and stayed in a Gander Mountain parking l

      • Heading Home
        06/10/09
        We ended up staying in the parking lot of the bar Sara works at since there was a large dirt area of the lot. This afternoon, we went out to lunch with Sara and her roommate. We then headed out of town and have basically been driving ever since. We are now sitting just south of Theodore Roosevelt

      • End of the Road
        06/09/09
        On Monday, it was pretty icky looking out, but we left our comfy spot anyway and drove to Signal Mountain where we planned on hiking. It wasn't raining, so that helped. The hike was about 6 miles round trip, with the middle being the summit of the mountain. People could drive up there, so th

      • Grand Teton Camping
        06/07/09
        We got to Grand Teton National Park with a forecast of isolated thunderstorms and showers for the next 2 weeks. It was pretty busy since it was Sat. so we decided to head to the nearby National Forest and find someplace to stay. We found a great place, not too far up the nearby mountain, but we ha

      • Leaving Salt Lake City
        06/06/09
        We dropped off Jenny on Thursday and stayed overnight. Jenny's mom, Pam, fed us a very nice breakfast and even bought us some donuts and other things. We headed out and stayed in a National Forest near Bear Lake. It thunderstormed and hailed right before we found our place, so the road was p

      • Utah
        06/05/09
        We decided not to go all the way to Dinosaur National Monument. We stopped at a small spot off the side of Hwy 40 right before Steamboat Springs. The view was amazing. There was a fire pit there also, so we had a fire for s'mores. Sadly, the only marshmallows we had were minis... It defini

      • Colorado
        06/02/09
        Wind Cave was very neat. Once we were done with the tour, we drove straight through Wyoming, stayed at a rest stop off I-25 and then got to Fa's on Sat. morning. We stayed there until Monday morning, working and hanging out. On Monday, we left and headed through Rocky Mountain National Park.

    • May
      • The Black Hills
        05/28/09
        We left our wonderful parking spot in the grasslands and headed for Mt. Rushmore. The internet was awesome there and that was the only thing we were doing that day (plus we had to pay $10 for parking) so we decided to hang out and work some before walking around the park. I got some great closeups

      • Badlands Day 2
        05/26/09
        We left the campground and drove the loop. There were lots of neat pull offs where there were gorgeous views. There was one short, but tough hike. It was only a quarter mile, but it was completely up the side of one of the buttes. There was another trail that kept going up to the very top of one

      • Badlands
        05/25/09
        We left the Grassland this morning and are in the Badlands now staying at the campground. The landscape is very neat. There was a nature trail that went through an area with gorgeous cedars. There are very noisy Meadowlarks all around the campground, which is neat, but might get old in the mornin

      • Pierre National Grassland
        05/24/09
        Yesterday we went to the Pipestone National Monument. Nothing too exciting, but the trees were neat, and lots of pink rock. :)
        We drove a long time yesterday to reach the Pierre National Grassland. This isn't too far from the Badlands. We are going to stay here for the day since it is a

      • First Full Day
        05/23/09
        We drove until about 10:45pm, until we reached the Rum River State Forest. We drove down a rode and found a parking area, so we stayed there last night. Unfortunately, the kitties were noisy, it rained and we were woken up by mosquitoes, so Joe and I didn't get much sleep. Jenny is apparentl

      • We're Off!
        05/22/09
        We spent the day cleaning and packing up the RV some more while we waited for UPS to show up with a package. It didn't arrive until about 5:45. I didn't get the house cleaned up (sorry Mary), but we were otherwise ready to go when the package arrived. We left at about 6:00, drove down 1

      • RV Trip!
        05/21/09
        Well, we have decided to drive Jenny back to Salt Lake City via the RV rather than buying her a plane ticket. We plan to stop in Rochester to visit Rebecca and Andrew and then we'll be heading through South Dakota to see the Badlands. Jenny has to be back by June 4th, so we'll have some

      • Driving Adventure
        05/05/09
        Yesterday, Joe, Jenny and I decided to go on a bit of a driving adventure. There is a national forest not far from our place, and we hadn't gone there yet, so we decided to check it out. Well, Joe printed out a little map and even drew some out. Unfortunately, it ended up not being as thorou

    • April
      • Jenny
        04/20/09
        Jenny's visiting again. She'll be here for about a month or two. She has already gotten a lot of work done. We should be having some fun too, not all work. :)
        Since it's sort of spring, the cats have been going outside again and Lucy gets really dirty. We decided to try a bat

    • March
      • Great Grandma's
        03/07/09
        Mom and Papa were heading to Great Grandma's with Hudson and Kaleigh, so I decided to come with. We took some nice pictures with G. Grandma. Kaleigh was being good until we tried to do pictures, of course.
        Also, G. Grandma's barn is collapsing, so I took a bunch of photos of that.

    • February
      • Sea/Ice Caves
        02/08/09
        Yesterday Joe's friend, Scott, and Scott's cousin, Adam came out and we all went to Meyer's Beach to walk to the Sea Caves. I've never been out there in winter. There was a lot of really neat things. I, being an idiot, forgot my camera. So no pictures. :( Sorry. We did walk

  • 2008
    • December
      • Snow!
        12/17/08
        Yep. So, we got a bunch of snow. So far no deer have traipsed across the backyard, so it's still completely free of footprints which looks really neat. The first outdoor pics are from before the latest snow. As you can see on the house picture, the back deck barely has any snow on it. Yeah

      • Baking!
        12/01/08
        I actually made my first pumpkin pies! So, it was almost a week ago now, but I was waiting until I uploaded the pictures. I made 2 pumpkin pies and a carrot cake from scratch (for Joe's birthday).
        I included some more fun pictures too since kitties are always fun to look at.

    • October
      • Videos
        10/17/08
        Sorry about the videos. I had problems getting them uploaded. The videos should work now.
        -Miranda

      • Kittie Videos!
        10/10/08
        I finally Got the pictures and videos off the HP camera, so here are a couple videos. Also, we have a red cat tube that the two of them were playing in tons yesterday. Super funny. They even figured out how to roll it. Unfortunately, the video we took was too dark to see much.

        -Mirand

      • Wash Renamed
        10/08/08
        Well, we weren't really set on Wash as the gray kitties name. We finally decided on Pickles. So, that is now her name. Mary came up with it.

        -Miranda

      • Zoe and Wash
        10/06/08
        We got new kittens on Sat. morning! Mom and Papa stopped at the place we had seen them being given away on Friday (we were heading into town so didn't get one then). Mom couldn't decide between two of them, so asked if we just wanted 2. We finally decided that would probably be fun for

    • September
      • Gorgeous Work Day
        09/17/08
        Yesterday we did a bunch of work outside. I finally finished painting the milk shed. Well, most of it. The trim still needs one coat, then it's completely done. Joe and Mary planted trees near the milk shed in a part of the field that we feel would be better forested. While we were working

      • Another Fun Filled Weeked
        09/15/08
        Joe's friend, Toan, drove up from the Cities on Friday and stayed overnight. Joe put him to work hauling some firewood and we watched a movie. Nothing too exciting but it was fun to have the company. On his way home on Sat. Toan took a crazy route through Wisconsin instead of heading back to

      • Fun Last Weekend
        09/09/08
        So, on Saturday, Mom, Papa and Laura came up to visit. Laura slept on the love sak for probably half the visit.. Go figure. ;) We took a walk around the property on the trail. Then we decided to go to Iron River for a pizza dinner and to get graham crackers and hershey's for s'mores.

    • August
      • New Place Photos
        08/17/08
        So, I walked around and took pictures of the place along with some photos of the land. I only included one photo of the land here. It's not very easy to get a good view of it... I did include a map of the 40 acres. You can see the yard and the house near the road to the west.
        Also, ther

      • We're moved!
        08/15/08
        Woohoo! All moved in! We got to the house between 8:30-9:30pm and then had to unload everything with Joe's brothers' and mom's help. So, that made for a long day. There is a lot of unpacking and organizing to do, but the kitchen is mostly done... :D
        I'll plan on takin

      • Packing!
        08/13/08
        We're moving tomorrow! How crazy! I'm trying to pack as Joe is heading to Menards to pick up some more things for the new house so that stuff can head out on the Uhaul with everything else. It's really weird trying to pack. We can leave some things here, but we're trying to g

    • July
      • House Photos!
        07/27/08
        Yay! We went out to the house/cabin today and Joe took some pictures. So, overlook the mess. The people that live there have a lot of work to do still. :)
        -Miranda


        This is the house. Unfortunately, there was a bee flying in front of the camera when the photo was taken...
      • Drastic Change of Plans
        07/22/08
        So, umm.. We are in the process of buying 40 acres with a cabin on it. We already have put down the earnest money and started to get the loan. Crazy!! So, apparently we aren't traveling too soon again here. But we'll have plenty of projects to keep us busy. :) We should be heading ou

      • The Circus!!
        07/08/08
        I got to spend a couple days up north with Sara, Luke and the kids. There was a circus across the street in a field. It was really fun. Rachel got to ride the elephant. Because we had to take the motorcycle back to Duluth, I couldn't bring my camera home. I brought too much stuff without t

    • June
      • Jenny's Here!
        06/04/08
        One of our artists from the game flew into town on Sat. and has been working here. It's been fun, but Joe's making her work all the time so she hasn't seen too much of Duluth. On the one nice day since she has been here we did go down to Park Point and walked along the nature trail

    • April
      • Joe's Home!!
        04/13/08
        Yay! Joe made it home this afternoon safe and sound. I really like the RV. It actually looks bigger than the other one. We have more walking room. So, I'm excited about it. :)

        -Miranda

      • Joe Update
        04/11/08
        So, Joe got the engine all fixed by Thursday. He then left and drove 30 miles and a tire blew. The tire also blew off a storage compartment that was carrying the tire iron and the specialized tools that are needed to take get the spare tire out. So, he spent the night at a gas station with a tire

      • Attempt at getting new RV
        04/06/08
        So, as many of you know, Joe drove down to Florida with his mom to get a new RV. We want one of the Toyota models because they get much better gas mileage. Well, they stopped being made back in the early 90's. So, there are not that many out there, most of which are in Florida or California.

    • January
      • Yep, We're Boring
        01/28/08
        So, we've just been hanging out at the house and working on the game basically. I thought I would put this up in case there are people still checking the site. :) We went for a walk yesterday since it was pretty nice. There's a broken water valve or something a few blocks away from our

  • 2007
    • December
      • Homa Again Home Again
        12/05/07
        Well, we're back in Duluth at the house now. Lots of unpacking still to do and we got to shovel the driveway before we even started.. . yay.
        -Miranda

      • Ishy Snow
        12/04/07
        We are almost home, but of course had to drive through the snow today... The roads actually aren't that bad... it's just a little nerve racking. Let's just say I'll be very happy when we pull into the driveway. Of course then the unpacking starts... :)

        -Miranda

      • On the Road Again
        12/03/07
        So, the guys fixing the RV this morning ended up breaking the fuel line while trying to get the fuel pump out, so the relatively easy, quick job turned into a few hours... Oh well, it's back up and running and we are back on the road heading towards home. The goal is to get to an RV park just

      • Truck trouble
        12/02/07
        update: we are spending the night in the gated auto-shop work area :) To have the fuel pump replaced in the morning. .. oh well.. . . At least they gave us an outlet!!!! wooohoooo! heat!!!

        -joe



        So, the fuel filter is in the Rusted big bolt, and the fuel l

    • November
      • Happy Birthday Joe!
        11/27/07
        :)

        We did a bunch more driving today. Had lunch at a neat cafe in Colorado Springs then drove through Denver toward Hygiene, CO. We are now staying at the house of one of our Horse Isle players/mods/quest writers. She has 3 beautiful horses, an ostrich, 2 dogs and I think 11 cats. A ve

      • Gallup, New Mexico
        11/26/07
        Well, we decided against the Grand Canyon. It would be too cold with probably no way to plug in, which means either no heat or using the furnace, which is incredibly inefficient. So, we decided on a return trip out west we'll go there. :)
        We are now on our way towards Denver, CO to go me

      • Windy Drive
        11/24/07
        So, we stayed in that RV park for another night to get some work done and left this morning towards Flagstaff. It was really windy though. The head wind was insane. We just felt like we were wasting gas. So, we found a nice RV park with wi-fi internet and stopped there for the night. Probably h

      • Thanksgiving
        11/23/07
        We are in Black Canyon City in an RV park. We went to the potluck here. Joe made a falafel salad thing and I think we were the only ones that ate any of it. I think it was a little too weird for a thanksgiving dinner I guess. Oh well. Now we know what we're having for dinner tonight. :) W

      • Phoenix
        11/21/07
        Hmm... yeah. Let's just say we didn't like Phoenix and will never go back. We did go to a Kelly Clarkson concert which I thoroughly enjoyed and Joe suffered through. :) We left the city after that.
        We'll just leave it at the "if you don't have anything good to say.

      • Sonoran Desert National Monument
        11/19/07
        We stayed in the Sonoran Desert for a couple nights. There wasn't much set up for it, but there was a road that went to a toilet, so we stayed there and went for some walks to check out the area. It was a neat area, but the first morning we were there a bunch of ATV's that went zooming d

      • Joshua Tree National Park - Lots of Pictures
        11/15/07
        The northern part, or Mojave Desert, of Joshua Tree National Park was really neat! There were huge rock formations everywhere. We stayed at the Jumbo Rocks campground the only night we were there, so I guess that would explain the rocks.. :) Apparently it's a popular place to climb and we we

      • Joshua Tree Campground
        11/13/07
        Well, we stayed at the Joshua Tree Campground for about 5 days and basically just worked. Pretty boring really. I guess the only reason I'm doing a separate entry for it is for the picture. :) So, here was our camping spot. barely anyone there except on the weekend. Then there were some te

      • Joshua Tree
        11/08/07
        Well, we're finally out of LA. Yesterday we drove out of town and headed towards Joshua Tree National Park. So, we're currently in the desert staying at a cheap RV park north of the national park. There are barely any people here, so it's a lot nicer. The days are crazy though. W

      • Universal Studios
        11/06/07
        So, Joe and I are nuts, and even after Mom and Laura left, we stayed in LA for a couple more days. We rode the metro for a couple hours and went to Universal Studios. It was fun. The theme park, not the metro. The first thing we went into was a haunted house, which was well put together. It had

      • Sunday-Relax Day
        11/05/07
        On Monday we had to bring Mom and Laura to the airport, so on Sunday we drove to Dockweiler State Beach near LAX and had a relaxing day. Laura, Mom and I went for walk into the nearest residential area which ended up being a few miles of walking, but it was fun. That evening we sat outside and pl

      • Saturday-Disneyland
        11/03/07
        The RV park we were staying at was within walking distance to Disneyland. So, we walked to Disneyland and hung out there for that day. For the most part the lines were really quick. There was a Finding Nemo ride that was new, but we never went on that because everytime we went by it was at least

      • Friday-Makeup Schools
        11/02/07
        So, Laura and Mom flew in on Thurs. On Friday we had to be at the bus stop by 7:20am in order to catch the bus to head into downtown LA and get to Laura's first appointment in Burbank. Laura is looking at going to a make-up school in LA and there are two that she wanted to check out. So she

    • October
      • Other Excitement
        10/30/07
        So, I just wrote about the burning pickup and didn't even mention what happened when we found a campground to stay at. :) The campground was right on the beach, literally, and it was only $15, which is $10 cheaper than most of the state park campgrounds in the area. Anyway, we got there afte

      • Truck on Fire
        10/30/07
        We were driving down highway 101 when I saw a pickup driving up the on ramp. The truck bed was completely on fire. There was also a fuel tank in the back, which wasn't on fire. The guy got on the highway right in front of us and Joe laid on the horn, assuming they had no idea they were on fi

      • Pismo Beach Surfing Safari
        10/26/07
        Exciting Surf this morning. Went out at 9am on a cloudy day. Miranda still stayed with kitty because of back pain last few days. On the beach, I noticed a Dead Seal body in a mess of Kelp.. hmmm.. Out in the water, The typical Seals were poping their heads out and staring all rudely about 2

      • Hmmm I hit a car today. I won.
        10/22/07
        We were riding bike back from a china buffet down by the harbor, I was going probably 15mph when a new shiny honda civic fully opened it's door in front of me, I veered, but it was too late, My right chest went fully into the top pointy edge of the door.. I was fully stopped by this, not

      • Morro Bay
        10/21/07
        So Joe and I are staying in Morro Bay, CA which is between San Fransisco and LA on the coast. Joe tried surfing yesterday and got a bit beat up. The forecast sounds like the waves should be good tomorrow so we're both going to try then and see how it goes. :)
        -Miranda

      • Leaving the Sequoias
        10/18/07
        We stayed at a campground that didn't have any bathrooms.. . You had to walk to the visitor center to use their cold bathroom because they closed the one in the campground for the winter.. . Quite annoying. We then drove to see General Sherman. That is the largest living thing on earth.

      • Sequoia National Park
        10/17/07
        We drove to Sequoia National Park and went to see the second largest tree in the world, General Grant. We then decided to head to the Redwood Mountain Grove which has many large trees. Unfortunately, there were 2 hiking loops that were both 6 miles long. We chose one that looked interesting and t

      • Fresno, CA
        10/16/07
        We worked our way back off the mountain for a whopping round trip of 12 miles for Toan and 20 miles for Joe and me. Lucy did great in the RV by herself overnight. We then drove down into Yosemite Valley which had some really neat views. It would be great to hike around down there some, but obviou

      • Yosemite Hike
        10/15/07
        We decided to go for a hike and camp in the wilderness today. We got a wilderness permit (free) and packed up our packs to hike up to El Capitan. The guy at the place that gave us the permit said it was about 8 miles (one way) with an elevation change of about 3000 feet. We hiked for about 4 mile

      • Sacrament Airport
        10/13/07
        So we went to Sacramento to pick up Joe's friend, Toan, at the airport. We ended up staying at an expensive KOA the night before though. Anyway, turned out Toan had a layover in Las Vegas where his flight ended up being cancelled. He had to fly to Pheonix that night then to Sacramento. We w

      • Lots of Photos
        10/12/07
        Here are a number of photos starting in the Oregon caves to our drive to Sacramento. While going down highway 101, there was a road you could take that went basically parallel to the highway called the "Avenue of Giants". We took that. It was a very pretty drive. Lots of big trees.
      • Ooops Lava Beds Photos
        10/11/07
        Okay, so I didn't realize how long it had been since I took the photos off of my camera. These four are from the Lava Beds National Monument. I still haven't gotten the photos off of Joe's camera so I'm not doing the Oregon Caves photos or Redwood's photos until I get the

      • The Redwoods
        10/11/07
        There are some huge trees out here! The forests are very neat. We stayed in Jedediah State Park campground for the first night, but no internet (go figure) so we did a little hiking the next morning then took off. We found a junky RV park in Crescent City that we stayed at the next night. That d

      • Oregon Caves
        10/10/07
        The Oregon Caves were really neat. The drive up there was a bit steep and windy, but it was worth it. We got there right as they were starting a tour, so no waiting even. The cave that we went through is marble, which is pretty rare. It was originally at the bottom of the ocean and was pushed up

      • Medford
        10/07/07
        We left the lava beds today. The last two days there we spent some time hiking around and checked out a few more caves. On one of our hikes we went to Big Painted Cave and the Symbol Bridge. Both of which contain pictographs drawn a long time ago. Of course I don't remember how old the sign

      • Holy Shmolly Catacombs Conquered
        10/03/07
        I can't believe Miranda Followed me through that Dungeon!!! Imagine the scariest possible Formations, And Layout, and thats what the catacombs were. We were completely underground, Hiking, Crawling, and stomach wriggling through over a mile of Twisty turney incredibly Crazy Cave, Over 3 hou

      • Spelunking and Random Pics
        10/02/07
        We had so much fun today! We explored a number of caves. We bought a small book that talks about each cave and has a map of each. That definitely came in handy on one of the caves. We both got pretty worn out faster than expected what with the crouching and sometimes even crawling. The visitor

      • Camping at Lavabeds!
        10/01/07
        Wow. Well, after a slow start this morning, We entered The Lava Beds National Monument through the Tule Lake Wildlife Refuge. So Miranda got a chance to see a ton of birdies.. A PrarieHawk flew along side our driver window at about 25 feet away for a bit, that was intense ;)
        From the

    • September
      • Photos of Lucy!
        09/30/07
        She apparently likes to sleep under the covers.. . So we didn't sleep great last night because when she did dive under the covers she either tried to curl up next to your stomach (then proceed to knead it with her little poky claws) or she went straight to your feet which tickles. So, we dec

      • 3 ENTITIES in this little RV?!
        09/29/07
        Omg. .. Miranda has gone ahead and gotten us a New Family member.
        Lucy is a white 1 year old Cat. Already Marking most of the RV as her own.
        Within the first hour she explored most of the RV, Used the Littebox, and Ate some food. We hope she will be mellow enough to just "hang

      • Excitement about Lavabeds
        09/28/07
        I was looking at a Brochure for the lavabeds (Hundreds of Caves!) And read this one:
        Catacombs Cave (6,903 ft/2,104 m)
        This very long cave is easily entered but gradually
        increases in difficulty. It is possible to walk upright for
        approximately 800 ft (244 m) to the stairway, a

      • Crater Lake
        09/27/07
        We drove up to Crater Lake yesterday. It was gorgeous. A beautiful day also. We went for a short hike up to the tallest point on the rim and drove around half the rim. We started from the north and were leaving to the south, so instead of driving around one and a half times, we just picked a way

      • Diamond Lake
        09/26/07
        Well, we drove quite a bit yesterday and made it to Diamond Lake, which is just north of Crater Lake. We stayed at an RV park because they have internet. Our plan is to head into the park today and see what it's like and whether we have internet there. Then decide if we're just going to

      • Florence in the Morning
        09/25/07
        Well, Joe decided it would be best to get the oil change and check out our issue when we go uphill (sounds like it's going to die, so he has to put it into second and go about 25mph). So, while Joe found an auto guy that looked at the engine I worked on fixing some problems in the game.
        T

      • Me Surfing
        09/25/07
        Last Friday (yes these entries are a little out of order) we went surfing before leaving the campground. Since the sun wasn't directly behind us, Joe decided to try and get some video of me surfing. Nothing too exciting.. I was under a bit of pressure. :)
        CLICK FOR VIDEO:Miranda Surfing

      • Horse Back Riding
        09/24/07
        We went for a 2 hour horse back riding adventure today. It was tons of fun (don't know if Joe felt the same way... :) ) We walked along trails out to the beach, then we got to trot along the beach. There was a Russian family with us. We are staying in Florence at Pacific Pines again so we h

      • Joe Surfing
        09/21/07
        A couple days ago Joe went out surfing and I just walked out to the beach and watched. I was pretty pooped from surfing a few days in a row, so I wanted a break. Unfortunately, high tide is/was around 5ish so the sun was right behind him. Hard to get video when he's that far out and the sun

      • Dune Bunny Videos
        09/13/07
        Okay, so we went surfing today. Super long walk, but the waves were gorgeous and it was tons of fun. I stood up almost every time I caught a wave. :)

        Anyway, here are two dune buggy videos. One of Joe driving it on the beach and another I took from the passenger seat while on the dunes

      • Surfing
        09/11/07
        Went out surfing again. The waves were relatively calm and very nice for catching and practicing. Tons of fun, but after three previous days of surfing I'm am worn out. Our seal buddy was hanging out by us for a bit. At one point Joe was to the left and ahead of me and the seal was basicall

      • Back to South Beach
        09/10/07
        Well, surfing at Beachside was awful. It was pretty rough and the currents were really strong. So, we decided to move back up to South Beach, where we stayed before Labor Day Weekend. It's a longer walk to the beach, but the surfing is a lot nicer. I stood up bunches and even rode in the w

      • Beachside State Camground
        09/08/07
        Woohoo.. We're at Beachside State Park Campground, Near Waldport OR now.. Without Super Internet, But it fulfills all of our other requirements for perfection:
        Near the Beach (2 city block walk to the water)
        Surfable (Nice sandy beach)
        Hot Showers (Really really nice after gett

      • We're Naughty...
        09/07/07
        So, Joe decided, looking at Google Earth, that there really wasn't going to be much for beaches anymore. At least not for a looong time. So, we went back north. Yes, we back-tracked about 100 miles. So we're now south of Waldport by maybe 5-10 miles. We're at a national forest ca

      • Dune Buggers!
        09/06/07
        Miranda and I rented a 2 seat Dune Buggy to go play in the Oregon Dunes Area. It was a good time :) The dunes go up to 100+ feet above the sands, and you can cruise all around. Also had trails to go to the ocean shore and cruise along. it was a good time. Definately worth the money to do on

      • RV Parking Lot
        09/05/07
        Well, we're staying in our first parking lot RV park. It has fast internet though which we need in order to get more work done. So, we stayed here one night to top up on power and water and get work stuff done, then we're heading out back into a National Forest Recreation Area. There ar

      • Creepy Beach Creatures
        09/02/07
        I figured I'd post about our Creepy Beach Creature incident 4 days ago.
        I was walking to shore from surfing (luckily had boots on for the first time) And suddenly (in a foot of water) was surrounded by thousands of Small Creatures swooshing by my legs!!! They were all 1 - 3 inches acros

      • Back to National Forest
        09/01/07
        Because of Labor Day Weekend, we sort of needed to find a place to hide out.. We found a road out into the National Forest again. There was a bit of a ditch in the road, so we took the bikes up and ended up find a very neat spot. We got the RV past the drain ditch in the road easily enough. So,

    • August
      • Surfin Girl
        08/29/07
        WooHooo! Our dirty little secret has been that Miranda hasn't stood up yet on the surfing ;). Well, We finally had some good clean surf, and she gotup twice for some nice real rides :) Way To Go Girl :) We were being overrun with giant pelicans surrounding us, apparently, we were s

      • Yay Surf!
        08/28/07
        We went surfing today. Super nice waves! They were perfect! What a blast. At one point we were out a little ways waiting for waves and a gull flew up to us and basically hovered just two or three feet away. Super weird. Then later I saw something dark up a head in a wave and realized it was a

      • Bike Ride
        08/26/07
        We biked south down 101 to see if we could find any place to park. We explored some, but nothing looked very promising. There is one possibility, but it's right off the highway and it would be maybe just for over labor day weekend... We ended up biking 20 miles yesterday.
        Today we took

      • Newport
        08/24/07
        We have now moved to a new campground. We are now in South Beach State Park. It's a quite large campground, so people everywhere, but there are little trees between campsites... Every site is a hookup site though, so we can finally fully charge our batteries. We're even using the wate

      • Lincoln City
        08/23/07
        Well, we've been staying in Lincoln City in a State Park for a few days. Went on a nice bike ride yesterday and went out to eat at a Thai place. Very good food there. We went to Mexican place the day before that. It was named Mazatlan, which was the same as the place we went in Rockaway Bea

      • More Photos!
        08/20/07
        Here are some photos of the woods and a stump here. There are these huge, old stumps all over. I think I have a few decent pics on my camera, so the next time I can use my computer (very rainy = no sun = no solar power :( ) I'll try to get those up too.

        -Miranda

        P.S. I

      • Infestation
        08/19/07
        Eeeewww. Last night while watching a DVD, a spider came down right in front of the tv. We killed that one then kept watching. Within half an hour, one was walking on the down comforter across me. We killed that one then, after we had gotten up, I just about ran into another one hanging from the

      • Photos
        08/14/07
        Okay, so these are maybe a week old... but I was bad about getting them onto the computer. I'll post more probable right here as I look through them instead of adding them to their respective post. That way people won't have to go back and find them. :)
        -Miranda


        Re

      • Ouch
        08/14/07
        So yesterday we decided to bike down the road and see where it goes. Well, it was all downhill (not a good sign for coming back) but other than that it is a very pretty road. There was a trail head that goes into a preserve that's about a mile long. We kept going to the end of the road thoug

      • BoonDocking in a National Forest. Finally :)
        08/12/07
        Took us a long time to find a suitable national forest road to explore.
        We went down one right before Lincoln city and it's great :) We have internet(slow), Sun for solar, and HOPEFULLY only 1-2 cars per day might drive by... . So hopefully we can hide out here for several days :)
      • Tour of the Rich and Famous Lifestyles
        08/10/07
        In searching for a place near Pacific City to stay a while, we came upon a Thousand Trails park. Upon stopping in, we were told it was a "Members Only" park and told to turn around and leave. . . . So we did. . . But then looked them up online. .. NO INFORMATION. Kinda worriedly,

      • Heading Out Again
        08/08/07
        Well, we're leaving Rockaway Beach tomorrow. We went surfing today and had a lot of fun. Then went out for pizza afterwards, so we have pizza leftovers for tomorrow. :) Mostly we've just been working. Nothing too exciting.
        -Miranda

      • Boring....
        08/04/07
        Yep, we basically worked all day again. We did go surfing for about an hour then went out to eat at the Mexican restaurant across the highway. We both tried something different and it was very good. Then we chatted with the woman that's letting us park in her 'driveway' for a bit.

      • Mmmm... Candy Store
        08/03/07
        So we're boring and basically worked all day... We did make some headway with the game though. We've mostly just been keeping caught up but haven't been able to add anything, so we're trying to get a lot of content done this weekend. This town is pretty small, but there were t

      • Rockaway Beach
        08/02/07
        Well, the possible place in Manzanita basically fell through. The guy's wife is a lawyer and was all worried about renter's insurance or something. Their neighbor has a little area we could have parked in, but he hadn't called the guy back yet and he would be in town on Saturday. S

      • Leaving the Park
        08/02/07
        So we were thinking of staying at the State Park maybe through the weekend (campgrounds fill up quick this time of year). We really wanted a beach access spot so we could go surfing though. We got a spot that would have been super pretty and really nice, but we didn't have internet :( Stupid

    • July
      • Formorally Fort Canby State Park
        07/31/07
        We wanted to stay in Long Beach for a bit and try surfing there, but we couldn't find anyplace to stay. There was a sort of RV park that was completely empty. Joe talked to the owners and said they were really weird and creepy and said it would cost $33 for us to stay there... They even have

      • Surfing
        07/31/07
        The coast finally! We went surfing for five minutes.... Well, okay, it was longer than 5 minutes, but not much. The waves were pretty messy, but Joe stood up a few times and I caught some waves. The last wave I caught I rode almost all the way in to shore. :)
        We're both hurting a bit f

      • Grayland Beach State Park
        07/30/07
        We drove through Seattle today and stopped at a surf shop where we bough a board for me and a bag for the board as well as a sock for Joe's board (they didn't have another 9' bag). So that will help protect the boards when they're on the RV's roof.
        We are parked at a

      • Another Day of Biking
        07/28/07
        So today, we got some horse isle work done, then went for a bike ride downtown. Bellingham has an awesome interurban trail system, so we were sort of following that and roads and went way past downtown, then tried to work our way back. Rod and Sara (we're staying in front of their house) were

      • Fun Riding
        07/27/07
        Today we went to an outdoor, classical concert which was quite nice. The weather has been beautiful. We decided we wanted to go for swim, so we biked to Lake Padden (steep uphill a good chunk of the way) then biked around the lake (2 miles) and went swimming. Joe decided we needed more exercise,

      • Walking All Over
        07/26/07
        Yesterday we walked to Downtown Bellingham, which is about a mile there. We walked all over, were all excited to have lunch at a bagelry, when it turned out they didn't take credit cards and we had brought my wallet, not Joe's, which only had $7 in it. Ooops. So we ended up going to a f

      • Biking Around
        07/24/07
        Bellingham has an awesome trail system for biking/hiking/jogging and such. We rode about 20 miles today and went to a state park out of town. The trail was gorgeous. There were some huge trees just off the trail. Most of it was a really nice trail. There was a section that was a bit hairy... s

      • Bellingham
        07/23/07
        Well, we left Leader Lake and headed for a friend of Joe's place in Mazama. That is a neat area. There are mile high mountains on wither side and the tiny town is in a valley between them. Unfortunately, Rob, Joe's friend, was gone until Tuesday. We probably would have stayed, but ther

      • Leader Lake Campground
        07/20/07
        Cool. we found a free campground about 60 miles (3 hours of us traveling) down the road. Normal people camp by the lake, we're parked at the top of the campsite-loop-road on a mountain so we have cell signal ;) Keeps us away from people also :) Nice.

        On our way here we noticed

      • Our first day of travel.
        07/19/07
        Last night we basically stayed right off the freeway. We were really tired and the RV got upset going up a hill...
        Something prolly with the transmission not working quite right to get this big lug up a mountain. Joe figured out
        that if he works it manually (puts it into 2nd) it does

      • We've Left!
        07/19/07
        Well, we didn't pick the best time to leave.... right at the start of a thunderstorm. It was just starting to rain when we pulled out of the driveway. It hit Kalispell pretty hard.. There was lightening striking everywhere and lots of wind. We saw one big lightening strike and then the powe

      • Rain!
        07/17/07
        So it has been in the 90's for at least a couple weeks... Very hot and dry. It's raining now :) Woohoo! I also finished work today so Joe and I are going to be packing up the RV tomorrow in order to leave very soon. His plan is tomorrow night.. (driving will be less busy). Plus we

      • Back to Work...
        07/06/07
        So started back running the delimber for Pat for a Week and a half while Dave (the not-so-retired delimber operator) is on a trip.
        It went fine, but I couldn't fall asleep last night and we left at 4am... so I now have a bad headache and Joe thinks I'm loopy...

        -Miranda

      • Fishing...
        07/01/07
        Joe and I went with Pat and Nancy this morning as they went fishing. No, we don't fish, but they were heading up to Glacier National Park to McDonald Lake. This did mean we had to get up really early.... about 6 am. However, the scenery was beautiful. It was a gorgeous morning and the lake

    • June
      • Canoe Trip
        06/24/07
        We went for a 4.7 mile canoe paddle in Ashley Lake today. The lake was gorgeous and the day was perfect. There were lots of birds all over. We saw a number of baby ducks and we got out at one spot and walked around a little. There were songbirds all over, but it was just slightly too dark to get

      • Horse Isle!
        06/24/07
        So, as most know by now, Horse Isle has been live for almost 2 months now. Woohoo. We just added a second server to accommodate the players. I don't remember if I put this pic up or not before it we lost our entries. Some of the beta testers did this in one of the drawing rooms on the game

      • Biking
        06/24/07
        Well, we've been doing some biking around town. We basically never take the car and we bike everywhere. We bike to the grocery store for groceries (yes, bringing a gallon of milk home can be interesting), to the car store (joe's been working on the RV) and bunches of other places. We�

      • Kalispell
        06/08/07
        Well, we make it to Kalispell after some fun events on the road... Sara had just had her oil changed in her car but her car has been burning through oil for some reason. So, we were driving and after about 50 miles the oil light comes on. This is at about 4:30am in the pouring rain.. of course.

      • On the Road Again
        06/06/07
        So, we left 8am Tuesday morning for the Twin Cities and had an 8 hour lay over down there. Then, we got on the bus to Billings, MT. We arrived here at 11:30am Wed. We are now in Billings at Joe's sister's (Sara) place where we will nap and such until we leave to go to Kalispell at 2am t

    • May
      • Missing Entries
        05/29/07
        There were some problems with rangenet the last couple days and our website was basically deleted. The last backup that there was, was from Feb. Hence, the newest entry being from Feb. But, we're heading back to Montana in a week to get in the RV and maybe do some more traveling. We'll

    • February
      • More Problems at Work
        02/16/07
        So we got the engine put back in the yarder. I worked up the last trees they brought up from that set and as I was backing up to clean more of the road off, I looked behind me and my machine was smoking. Turns out my fan belt was busted. There was something wrong with my heating hose too, so I ha

      • Problems at Work
        02/14/07
        Well, we had some mechanical problems on Friday. At about 3 the carraige stopped working. Pat couldn't figure out what was wrong with it so we had to load it up in the pickup and take it home. He fixed that on Saterday though, so we were back up and running on Monday. He actually does have

      • Birthday
        02/10/07
        So this is a bit late, but I kept forgetting to get the pictures from my camera onto the computer.
        I got the day off for my birthday so I got to sleep in. Also, the neighbors horses were down by the fence so I went to see them. I brought some carrots too. It was raining so I didn't sta

      • Warm Day
        02/05/07
        It was 50 degrees up at the job today! I was getting the rest of the mud off the tracks now that it was warm enough (long story) and I easily should have been working in my t-shirt. Crazy. Our temps have been basically the same as Minnesota.. up until now I guess.
        -Miranda

      • Game Night
        02/03/07
        We had loads of fun tonight. After dinner we played a game that Becky F. got us for christmas, Chaturanga. It's like chess except four people can play and there's a dice associated with it. It would be too long to try to explain the whole game. :) Nancy won. Then we played three games

    • January
      • Out for a Drive
        01/27/07
        Today Pat and Nancy took us for a drive around northwest Montana. We went up to Libby and through Troy. We also went by Turner Mountain (a ski hill) and went for a short hike to a swinging bridge and the Kootenai Falls off of highway 2. There is a map below that shows our general route (I believe

      • Fun Day.. . .
        01/23/07
        So this morning I had hydralic oil leaking out of the machine's head. So I shut her down and found a hose that was leaking. Pat got some stuff from the shop truck and made a hose. I think he's getting a replacement tomorrow. Regardless it works, it's just longer than needed so the

      • A Short Walk
        01/21/07
        Joe and I went for a short walk in the back pasture today. One of neighbor's horses was down near the fence so he came over and I got to pet him. Not long after two others showed up. So, I sat around and petted them for awhile. :) Unfortunately, I wasn't expecting them to be there so I

      • And Another New Guy.. . . .
        01/17/07
        Yes, this is getting ridiculus. The guy we had last week didn't show up on Monday or Tuesday and never called. So Pat basically said he was done. He's fed up with dealing with these people that don't want to work, or just can't show up for work. However, last night a guy call

      • Too Cold
        01/12/07
        YAY I didn't have to go to work today! It was too cold. We don't go to work when it's below -10. Pat went up and called at 5:30 saying it was -19. When he called again a few minutes later it was -22. Brrr. It's colder there than in town here too, but when I got up around 9i

      • And Another New Guy... .
        01/09/07
        Well... the guy worked for two days and he is probably very trainable, but he is even greener than I was coming into it and he's not in shape at all. So, Pat just interviewed someone else tonight. He has a bunch of experience and hopefully will work out.

        -Miranda

      • And Another New Guy...
        01/08/07
        Well, the guy from last Thurs. called and quit that night... We have a new guy that started today. He has absolutely no experience and is from North Carolina so we'll see how he does. There's another guy coming from Illinois that Pat told he would try out. So we'll see how he does

      • New People
        01/04/07
        Well, as of the day after New Years we've been short a crew member. Joe convinced Pat to let him post an ad online for him and now he's got people calling and asking about the job, so hopefully we'll get someone decent. We tried out a guy on Tuesday and he wasn't going to work,

  • 2006
    • December
      • More Machine Problems
        12/27/06
        So the delimber broke down again... A hydralic hose that is in the head and goes to the saw in the head was leaking this afternoon. We had to pull that out and call to see if they had a part in. They skidded more trees up while I chipped away at the mud that was thawing on my tracks (another long

      • Christmas Eve/Day
        12/27/06
        Well, we had a very nice Christmas. On Christmas Eve we had dinner together and played some cards. Sara and I went shopping for food (they always have shrimp and oysters) and we got some stocking stuffers too. On our way home we saw a Husky running around on highway so we caught it (it was quite

      • Our First Anniversary
        12/23/06
        Well, we're not doing much for our anniversary, but we are hanging out with Pat, Nancy and Sara (half sister). We played many games of pitch, which was a lot of fun. Joe and I went for a walk in the snow in the field with Brad the cat. Mom and Papa had sent the top of our wedding cake to the

      • Day Off Work
        12/15/06
        I got the day off today. Pat went up to the site early (like usual) to load the trucks and he called Nancy to have her call everyone because it was crazy windy up there. It's been really gusty in town too. Up there though, it gets pretty bad and since we've opened up the hillside the re

      • End of the Week
        12/08/06
        So Trevor (the truck driver) brought the two cables today as well as a heater for the yarder. So not only has my machine been having issues but the yarder's heater went out last week and there was beeping and smoking smell and everything in there. Apparently they blew a fuse and there was som

      • Fun Work Week....
        12/07/06
        So a lot of stuff went wrong with the delimber this week. I posted the best pictures of the delmiber I could find in order to give some reference to what I'm saying. On Monday afternoon I had hydralic oil leaking out from the under side of my boom. I quick shut it off so I didn't loose

      • Poor Cows
        12/02/06
        So now that we have snow, the cows are getting crabby. They have to work for at least some of their food now. They're water is harder to get to them now too being the faucets for the hoses are frozen. So, today Joe and Pat got some wood as well as filled a 35 gallon water jug with water to b

    • November
      • Around the House
        11/26/06
        Thanksgiving went well here. Pat cooked dinner and Joe and I found something for our main meal instead of turkey. Nancy's mom had made us two pumpkin pies, so we had a wonderful dessert. Tom also came over for dinner.
        I didn't take any pictures then, so these below are actually a

      • Moving Day
        11/21/06
        Well, we started moving to a new jobsite today. It's further down the highway, but the gate we drive in through is very close to the highway. So, less driving time on dirt road. :)
        We finished up the job we were on within a couple hours this morning and then started to get stuff taken c

      • Work Last Thursday
        11/19/06
        Last Thursday we had a nice mess in the cable that goes down the mountain. Pat got to try to straighten it out, which didn't go so well. They ended up having to unroll the entire drum of cable.
        We have gotten some snow up at the job, but it hasn't been staying very long.

      • The Cats
        11/16/06
        The house has two cats. They stay outside most of the year, but now they're inside since it's getting chilly out. The cats were named after the couple that gave Pat and Nancy them. They can be really annoying. They like attention.

        -Miranda


        The is Cleo and Jo

      • The House
        11/07/06
        I thought I would take some pictures of the house and where the RV is. Notice the storm clouds.... yeah,, we've been very rainy here the last couple days. We haven't even had the logging trucks come up to the new site yet because the road is very slick and muddy from all the rain.
      • New Job Site
        11/03/06
        Today we spent the day moving the last three machines (the yarder, delimber, and loader) to the next job site. It is part of the same job, but it's about 2 miles from where we were. Yesterday, one of the guys spent the day walking the clipper throught the 'goat trail' we drive throu

    • October
      • Pitch
        10/28/06
        Today Joe and I went for a short bike ride. Afterwards Pat and Nancy taught us how to play Pitch. It was a fun card game once we figured out what we were doing. It's a team game. I was on Nancy's team. We won two of the three games. :)

        -Miranda

      • Scenery Pictures
        10/26/06
        The site we're working on right now is called Bitterroot View. It has a beautiful view of Bitterroot Lake. Many mornings there is fog covering the lake that eventually burns away (when it's a nice day). Yesterday morning there was about an inch of snow on the ground, but that melted by

      • This Week
        10/19/06
        Well, I've basically been keeping up. I stayed late one day last week, but Pat has to load trucks early in the morning so he has time to work on my piles of logs before we (the crew) get there. This week has been going fairly well. I keep learning new things and how best to deal with other t

      • The Cows
        10/16/06
        The Hanley's have two cows. It was really nice out on Saturday so I went out with my camera to find them and get some pictures. Once they saw me out there they came right up to me then started following me when I was leaving. Before I started the logging I fed the cows in the evening for Pat

      • First Day Alone
        10/09/06
        I had my first day working alone without the retired delimber operator there to help me with problems or to catch up when there's a big pile of logs. It went really well. I stayed caught up and I didn't have too many problems. The hardest thing to tell sometimes is if a log is rotten an

      • Logging Videos
        10/01/06
        And here is the videographic proof that Miranda is a Big Machinery Operator :)
        CLICK FOR VIDEO:MIRANDA RUNNING DELIMBER

        And another video showing the process of hooking logs and Yarding them up, and delivering to the delimber. I'm out in the brush hooking the logs. This Area wa

      • Long Weekend Off
        10/01/06
        Well, we finished the job we were at for the last month. On Thursday and on Friday we moved most of the equipment and all of camp (the trailers) out. We had to walk the heavy machinery out to a gate which took about 1.5 hours where it is picked up and driven to our next job. So, we get Monday off

    • September
      • Near Death Experiences
        09/24/06
        Well, we're off to bed at 8pm to try to sleep prior to 4am wakeup. Another week of incommunicado out in the boonies. After this week, we may be done "camping" so we'd be back every night, OR we may go even further down the same road and camp for another 4 weeks!! (I hope not

      • Another week of work done
        09/22/06
        Miranda has been doing great on the delimber, it's real complicated, but she's awefully smart... Myself on the otherhand... after 4 days of working in the coulds at 6000 feet in 40 degree sleet-snow-hail, soggy boots, rotting feet, weak legs on the sloping mountains... I broke...

      • 3 out of 7 logging crew quit today!
        09/13/06
        3 out of 7 of the logging crew quit today.. they got drunk last night and made some real bad decisions.

        So I'm going to bring Miranda up to camp for Thursday and Friday,
        She can have a look at the operation so we can decide whether to stay here the winter working or not!.. Go

      • Week of "real" Work!
        09/09/06
        Well, I went to work for my Biological Fathers Line logging company last week. it was interesting! The site was about 2 hours from his house, so they have campers setup near the site. So I didn't get to see miranda all week... sounds like she enjoyed some quiet though... Work day is as f

      • Wild Horse Island
        09/03/06
        Today we went on a boat ride in Flathead Lake with Pat and his wife Nancy. We stopped at Wild Horse Island. It is a state park and there are actually wild horses on it, though we didn't see any. We did see Mule Deer and Big Horn Sheep though. We hiked to, probably, the highest point on the

      • In Kalispell
        09/01/06
        We are in Kalispell now, and will likely be here for a while.. (until the weather forces us out!) Don't know if we'll have internet or not. So the updates may slow down.
        -Joe

    • August
      • Dickey Lake Campground
        08/31/06
        We spent August 30th & 31st at the Dickey Lake National forest campground. At only $7/night we decided to stay 2 days since it was cold and rainy. Sat and read and played Erin's Rainy-day gift of Battleship and Chess in addition to starting to watch KungFu Series on DVD... Very lazy days :

      • Logging Road Boondock
        08/29/06
        We spent our last remaining Canada "Clearance" boondocked down a logging road. (N 49°19'24" W 115°12'28") We took a bike ride down an unmarked road towards a nearby lake. Ran into a Grampa and a couple grandkids. He invitied us to swim off of his dock, Had a good

      • Radium Hot Springs
        08/27/06
        Nice Lazy, Lazy day!
        We drove a bunch, from Golden,BC down to Cranbrook,BC. We stopped and
        lazed in the "Hot Springs" at Radium,BC it was busy, but HUGE, so there was plenty of room, it was just 2 giant outdoor swimming pools, one fed by hot springs below the building. a

      • Another Long Hike
        08/26/06
        Today we continued our drive down highway 1. We stopped at a 'lake' (it looked more like a pond or even pool). We then went on a 13km hike up to the upper lookout of Mount Hunter. It was an elevation gain of over a kilometer!. Ouch. We are going to hurt tomorrow.
        We are now out

      • Lake Louise
        08/26/06
        Joe captured the mouse! We let him go into the woods as we were leaving the campground. We continued our journey down highway 1A stopping at info spots along the way. We pulled off at a picnic area and there was an old road blocked off from vehicle traffic that we biked down. Once in Lake Louise

      • Long Hike
        08/24/06
        Last night we dealt with the mouse some more. Joe made a psuedo mouse trap out of an old yogurt container. Later we heard it chewing on some wrappers on the table and found that it was eating one of our granola bars we'd left out. We set that on the counter hoping to actually catch it with t

      • Banff
        08/23/06
        We slept terribly last night because there was some creature making noise INSIDE our RV. It sounded like chewing. We took turns getting up with a flashlight to try to catch it, but never could. Joe apparently thought it was a cockroach or some big bug. I thought it sounded more like a mouse. Af

      • Last Day in Dino Park
        08/22/06
        Today we stayed inside a lot again. Very hot. I did a lab tour and learned some about how they prepare the fossils for transport and what they do to display them in museums. Pretty neat. Joe found a dinosaur bone and reported it.
        We left with the intent to head to Calgary and stay at a Wa

      • First Full Day in Dino Park
        08/21/06
        This morning I woke up at 6am and went bird watching down one of the trails that goes by the river. There were a lot of different birds and some really neat trees. The hike is supposed to take less than an hour and I was gone for two. :) Afterwards we went to the visitor center to see about tours

      • Dinosaur Provincial Park
        08/20/06
        We stopped at an awesome City Water park in medicine hat. It was only $6 admission!
        Hot showers, rope swing, water slide, etc.. good fun. Afterwords we ventured off to the Dinosoar Park.
        Jaw dropping terrain.. You drive through endless farmland, and then suddenly hit this!
        we did

      • Medicine Hat
        08/19/06
        Arrived in Medicine Hat, Went for a bike ride along the city's trails, Good size bluffs all over the place, desert ontop, green grass below. I took a "short cut" to get to Miranda and noticed that i had just run over cactus!!!!
        OMG dummy. (they have cactus in Canada!!??)

      • Swift Current
        08/18/06
        Fixed our Black smoke/Sticky Choke problem with a tristytie wire....
        RV starts up Great now.. Not sure if I'm opening it too far now?? Or if it can even be open too far.. Oh well.. seems good. Stopped at Swift current's Walmart for the night. It's hard to drive the RV more t

      • One More Day in Regina
        08/17/06
        Moved our Camper to the Next Walmart in town :) then went for a bike ride to
        center of downtown Regina. On the way back we stopped at a great museum,
        highest quality displays i've ever seen!
        -Joe


        One of the displays. Included many stuffed specimans.

      • Long drive to Regina
        08/16/06
        After 7 hours of driving we are now at Regina,SK. We would not normally drive so far, but it's all farmland, so nowhere to Boondock!.. Regina appears to be a nice city. We parked at a walmart and rode bikes alongside a town creek. Found internet at the first park bench we tried! how nice. W

      • Lake Audy
        08/15/06
        Miranda wanted to see bison, So we headed towards Lake Audy. the 12 mile drive took over 2 hours!!! SO washboarded.. afraid we were ripping the camper apart.
        Once there though, we saw some bison, Maybe about 20 across a field.
        found a nice capsite by lake audey. Water was really weedy

      • Riding Mountain National Park
        08/14/06
        After taking a morning ride around Brandon,MB
        we decided to drive up to Riding Mountians National Park. Miranda was really excited for a real shower, So we stayed at the main campground in wasagaming. Went for a LONG bike ride down hiking trails (23miles) in search of "Whirlpool Lake"

      • Heading West of Winnipeg
        08/13/06
        We slept in a Walmart parking lot tonight.. Spent the morning biking around
        winnipeg, rode along the red river in town... They actually have river taxis!! and very good bike system, people biking everywhere :)
        We are running low on our "utility" water and now have to decide

      • In Winnepeg
        08/12/06
        We drove a long way today... too long! Gas is like $4.20 or so a gallon up here!!! omg.. Going to try to find a parking lot to spend the night in tonight whilst we figure out if there's anything to do here :)
        finally found internet though.. took 30 or so trys at different spots.
      • Inflatable Canoe Trial
        08/11/06
        We tested the Inflatable canoe, Very Good Boat!
        Stayed dry and not that slow!, very comfortable. It's a Sevylor Colorado.
        Paddled around the entire little lake. not much other than a pair of loons and some birds.
        Lots of Waterbugs.
        -Joe

      • New Lake Spot
        08/10/06
        Miranda found road access to the private swimming hole we found last night.
        So we moved the rv to 5' from the water!. perfect private lake. we may need to stay here a while :)
        Windy night... Scary Low Frequency Sounds while we were sleeping, finally figured it was the webbing on the

      • Into Canada We Go
        08/09/06
        Spent 3 hours in Canadian Customs!!!
        After 4 agents searched our Entire Camper for half an hour, They head agent told us to turn around!!!
        I Tried to find ways around, and "lightly" argued (didnt want a cavity search) and gave a fat lip for 20 minutes.
        She eventually chan

      • Heading Out For Good
        08/08/06
        We are actually leaving for our trip! We plan to head up to International Falls and cross the border into Canada, then take the TransContinental Highway through Canada to Kalispell, MT. It's doubtfall we'll get internet often during our trip so the diary will not get updated everyday, bu

      • Up in Tower,MN
        08/05/06
        Visiting my family, waiting for Sara to have her child yet...

        Today we swam at lake ore-be-gone and did the fitness trail at Laurentian.. (ouch)
        -Joe


        Miranda on the raft at Joe's mom's house with Odie with Laura jet skiing for the first time in the backgrou

      • Packed up and heading out...
        08/03/06
        I have completely finished work, and we finished packing up the RV and house, now it's time to Go!!! We're going to waste a few days bumming around the Iron Range while we wait for Miranda's sister Sara to have her new child. (By Aug 8th) Then We'll head out and not look

    • July
      • Home!
        07/28/06
        We decided to head home. We discovered most of what gear we were missing,
        and how everything works. Now we'll take a few days back at home to finish getting setup for our big trip. On the way home in Bessemer we climbed the City Bluff in Bluff View Park. Nice view, but we ascended on

      • On Our Way Home
        07/27/06
        I noticed interesting terrain on Google Earth so we drove over to it. Found out it was a huge burn-down over a strange sandy-bog..
        We stopped for a swim at a public park on Lake Superior past Ontonagon. It looked just like Park Point. Afterwards we stopped right next to the Big Iron River an

      • Another night next to a sand pit
        07/26/06
        Went window shopping in Copper Harbor. Started running out of gas, so headed back down hwy 41. Another recently paved, yet tiny road, very curvey.
        A lot of old logging roads or sand pits scattered around. We picked one
        to take a break on [47 25'36"N 88 00'56"W]. We had

      • Upper peninsula of the Upper Peninsula
        07/25/06
        Woke up in our nice hidden unused sandpit.. Miranda wanted to spend the day here...
        I'm pushing for a little better "view" :) [46 39'34" N,89 35'53" W]
        On the road, we went through a construction site where they're working on the highway.

      • Traveling...
        07/24/06
        We went snorkeling at a rocky beach on lake superior [46 36'44" N,90 19'59" W]
        had a nice dinner in the parking lot (conveniant!) and then Slowly drove down by the spooky-dark
        yet traversable forest floor. Very nice roads so far, small, but good condition.
        Stopp

      • Leaving Bayfield
        07/24/06
        We spent the morning in Bayfield. Rode our bikes around a bit,
        Thought about scuba diving here, they have some cool wrecks,
        but all the coordinates are in LORAN!!?!? something ancient and not
        equivalent to lat/longitude, so we had no idea where the wrecks were..
        TIme to move

      • We've Left!!
        07/23/06
        We left! We finished loading up the RV. Jerry helped us finish up a couple of last-minute fixes. I slipped on my nice green socks from Miranda's Grandmother and we left the house at around 11pm! We decided on heading towards the Upper Peninsula, so we parked at the Meyers Beach parking lot.

      • Packing Up!
        07/23/06
        We spent all day yesterday, and probably all day again today packing up the RV and last minute fixes. Hoping to leave for a short test-trip tonight!? I'm still on "emergency" call for another week, so i can't wonder off too far. But I am done with my daily work duties. It i

      • First Sleep Test In RV
        07/20/06
        After several toturous days of server reloads and other problems,
        Spent the day cleaning out Rangenet's Shop today. Helped John get his stuff in the morning, and then Jim and his crew grabbed everything else. Most of it junk, but oh well... Finally got a chance to bring Jims Kids out to

      • Big Rangenet Final Move
        07/15/06
        Long Day. Woke up at 5:45am, was on the road by 6am. Drove 60 miles to Virginia,MN. Shutdown and loaded up 4 servers destined for the cities and took off South. Tried to help Matt setup temporary servers while driving down to cities. Arrived at Onvoy at 10:30am Got mailserver up by 11am, Rangenet w

      • Surfing in Lake Superior on Park Point
        07/11/06
        Laura, Miranda and I had the rare treat of 2ft waves in the middle of July on Lake Superior.. normally it has to be early spring or late fall for the waves to be surfable. Although they were small, the girls were stoked and had a good time!! Here is a video of Miranda and Laura showing their s

      • Ore-Be-Gone Scuba Diving Encore
        07/10/06
        Joe needed to go up north for work and Matt was in town, so the three of us went scuba diving at Ore-Be-Gone. There's a lot of neat stuff down there to look at, plus we saw fish all over.
        -Miranda

        Miranda got frightened by a railway cart underwater!! Giant man-eating-pit-shark

      • Pattison State Park
        07/08/06
        My Mum, Miranda, Odie and I found 3 GeoCaches south of Superior, and then visited Pattison State Park quick. Nice looking area, but swimming lake was hugely busy.
        -Joe


        The path we took at the State Park ended in this small river.

        Nice head shot of Odie while he was

      • Moose Hunting
        07/06/06
        After our drive on Hwy 1 a few days ago, we've been excited to try again. I bought a 12v Spotlight that lights up better than headlights! Miranda and I left Duluth at 7pm to go Moose Hunting! We drove 60 miles to the start of Hwy 1 up the North Shore. It wasn't quite dark yet so we hiked

      • Strawberry Pie
        07/05/06
        Today I went to my parents' to make a strawberry pie. Sara really wanted me to post a picture of my pie after I made it, so here you go. :)
        -Miranda

      • Ore-Be-Gone Scuba Diving
        07/04/06
        Today we went Scuba Diving up at Lake Ore-Be-Gone in Gilbert. Miranda's Dad came with and helped Miranda learn how to get down deep.. Since I am unable to clear my ears properly yet. Miranda did great, going down to around 30 feet with her dad. I only got down to around 20 and my ears are s

      • North Arms Hike
        07/03/06
        Since Joe and I had driven up to his mom's after our Eagle Mountain hike, we all went for a hike north of Ely. The trails seemed to be mostly for cross-country skiing, but they were great hike. There were many different loops to choose from. In the end, Joe, his mom, Odie, and I hiked about

      • Hike Up Eagle Mountain
        07/02/06
        Joe and I drove up to the Boundary Waters to hike up Eagle Mountain, the highest point in Minnesota. It was a nice 3.5 mile hike. Busy weekend though, we passed quite a number of groups along the way. After the hike we decided that we would drive to his mother's house instead of going home.

      • Cave Exploring
        07/01/06
        Friends of Joe's, Toan and Thang, came up from the Cities for the day, so we all went up to Soudan to check out some bat caves and go for a little hike. We didn't see any bats, but the three caves we checked out were neat. We were toasty after the hike so we went to an old mine pit nearb

    • June
      • Kimballs Bay Canoe Paddle
        06/30/06
        Miranda and I paddled an unpopulated stretch of Lake Superior Harbor today. We put in @ 46°41'24"N 92°8'49"W. Nice 3-4mile paddle that started in a swamp and went out into the bay. Found a hidden unmarked campsite @ 46°42'4"N 92°9'46"W. Our general path is

      • Miranda's New Fancy Camera
        06/29/06
        Miranda Just got her Graduation/etc.. Present. A Low-end Digital SLR Camera. Talk about complicated and expensive!! She's been enjoying taking pictures though, and this should improve the quality of critter shots imensely. Hope to get out tomorrow and test it out!

        Olympus E-500

      • Fell in River, and Broke Camera + UPDATED
        06/28/06
        UPDATED: July 3rd-
        I just updated this entry with the pictures off the broken camera as
        we just got the replacement, and now we can both take pictures. Check out the merganser pictures below!

        PREVIOUS:
        Bad day. We went for a paddle just south of Island Lake in wetland and

      • Pokegama River Paddle
        06/26/06
        Miranda and I went for an evening paddle up and down Pokegama River Starting at: 46°39'57"N 92°07'36". We just missed a thunderstorm, winds were up high so we didn't go all the way to the Lake Superior Bay. We did see many animals along this thick, still, brown river tho

      • Wetland Canoeing
        06/25/06
        After camping at Island Lake, Joe and I decided to go canoeing in a nearby wetland. He paddled around the edges while I took pictures. Afterwards, on our way home, we came upon a fox eating roadkill. We were afraid he might get hit by a car being that close to the road so I moved it into the gras

      • Island Lake Canoe Camping
        06/24/06
        My Mother, Miranda, and I went for a quick camping trip to a fun little campsite up a river across Island Lake. Odie behaved well on our travel across the lake. Real nice Pine needle floored campsite. There was a rope swing nearby also. Highly recommend unmarked campsite @ GPS 47°1'36"

      • River Hike and Windsurfing
        06/21/06
        Went for a hike up Lincoln Park's River this morning with brother mike,
        we rock jumped about 1/2 mile up it. through a tunnel, and then monkey-bar'd it across the river under a bridge. Later went Windsurfing in the Bay. Far too much wind for my first time out this year, wasn't

      • Submerged Concrete Building Jumping
        06/18/06
        Went out to an old concrete building sitting out in Lake Superior off of Canal Park in Duluth. My brother Tim and Miranda came. It's a fun place to swim around, climb, and jump off. Water was COLD today though!! Our tiny little 1mm wetsuits didn't do much to help, the others were all h

      • Sailing Fun Race
        06/16/06
        Miranda and I went out sailing with Scott Tonight. Friday night fun race. Very light wind, but we were winning! Got real far up ahead... But the only problem with winning is that you have to follow the proper course to continue your lead... Captain Scott decided we should go around a bouy a 1/4

      • Jay Cooke State Park with Erin & Jon
        06/16/06
        Erin and Jon took us for a quick hike up at Jay Cooke State Park. We walked along the sharp rocks of the St Louis River. There was speculation that it may be possible to cross the river along a stretch of large rocks in the river. I took it upon myself to try, and learned a good lesson :). There

      • Little Hike with Laura
        06/15/06
        We took a short hike in the woods behind our house. About a mile away there are cool boulders to climb on in the middle of a good sized urban forest. They also found a GeoCache that my mother had hidden back there.
        -Joe

        Miranda and Laura lost in the ferns!

        Miranda and La

      • Scuba Diving Practice at Buhl's Stubler Pit
        06/14/06
        Miranda, my mother, and I practiced scuba diving at Stubler Pit in Buhl, MN. We mostly just stayed in the beach, eventually going into about 12' of water. We practiced clearing ears and bouyancy. Good time. Miranda and Mom did great. Forgot to take pictures, so I scribbled red on an aerial

      • Travel Diary Setup
        06/12/06
        Well, we have just setup this travel diary to keep record our travels.
        I have gone back and added some recent adventures we've had so there is something in here. We have not actually left yet. Still working on finishing up work. Hoping to be on the road by the end of June.
        -Joe

      • Rock Climbing with Nyhus'
        06/11/06
        Miranda and I took Jim Nyhus (Work Friend) his wife Monica, and their 3 kids rock climbing up at Ely's Peak in Duluth. Had a good time, rappelling off the 50' Top knotted up my stomach! It's been too long since we last climbed!
        -Joe

        Carl and Kara getting ready to cl

      • Sailing with Scott
        06/10/06
        Went out sailing with my buddy Scott. It was a big race, huge winds 20-30mph. Miranda managed to get out of it.
        We did a terrible show :) . We only managed to get the main sail up before the race, and reefed it because of high winds. One minute before the start, we busted the main sail'

      • Hiking in the Apostle Islands National Park
        06/08/06
        June 7th-8th:
        My mother, Miranda, and I had planned a canoe crossing to Sand Island from Meyers Beach but my mother's large puppy wouldn't sit nice, so we decided to go hiking instead. The only mainland campsite was 4.6 miles from Meyers beach. Didn't sound like much, but ther

      • The Wedding Ceremony!
        06/03/06
        We had a great time! Thanks to everyone that came. Here are a couple pictures for those that couldn't make it. We built a driftwood platform by moving several tons of sand and ailes by poking sticks in the ground. It was fun.
        -Joe

        Miranda's Sisters, and My Brothers, a