Coddiwompling | FindPenguins

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Trip start
September 24, 2017
Coddiwompling Traveler
Black Hills
September 23, 2017 in the United States ⋅ ☁️ 5 °C
South Dakota, the better Dakota. Sorry North Dakota but South Dakota wins every time. If you live in Minnesota and you've never been to the Black Hills, get there. There's really no excuse to live so close to something so majestic and never visit. Rolling hills, meadows, forests, there's a landscape for every nature lover and plenty of wildlife vowing opportunities. Going off season has its perks, Deadwood was literally dead. Sidenote it costs $2 per person to enter the Mount Morah Cemetery where Calamity Jane and Wild Bill are buried. Don't forget to pay your respects to Potato Creek Johnny. While Mount Rushmore is obviously a must see (it would be much more impressive if they had finished it, Google what it's supposed to look like 🤔), Crazy Horse is where the real action is at. I highly recommend sitting through the half hour video that tells the story of the sculptor Korczak Ziolkowski. It will give you a whole new perspective on the work that has gone into bringing the sculpture where it is today. While leaving I turned to Mike and said, "If we ever win the lottery we're donating a large sum of money to this project". It would be such a shame to never see it finished.

Mood Music:
https://youtu.be/zC30BYR3CUkRead more
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Coddiwompling Traveler
Glendo, United States
September 26, 2017 in the United States ⋅ 🌫 13 °C
Wyoming, what can I say about my favorite state (so far). I can't even really describe what it is that I love so much about Wyoming. Wide open spaces, golden fields, blue skies, jagged mountain peaks. We stayed in Glendo State Park at the Sandy Beach Campground. We had two human neighbors about a half mile away and one Great Horned Owl neighbor about 100 feet away. This campground had a fire about 5 years ago and they're still working on cleaning it up but there are plenty of sites, some right on the beach.

Mood Music:
https://youtu.be/0sFvFVkeGVgRead more
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Coddiwompling Traveler
Yellowstone and beyond
October 1, 2017 in the United States ⋅ ☀️ 0 °C
Until thus far we'd been staying at campgrounds with electric hook ups but this is the point where we decided to try boondocking for the night. At 9500 ft elevation in the Shoshone National Forest, switchbacks galore. With a low temp of 30 degrees at night. On the banks of a river. To be fair we had picked out somewhere in the valley, but when we got there the road to the campsites was full of rocks and holes so we decided to press on. The views were amazing and the banks of the river were full of moose tracks, it's a beautiful area. Our used battery died in the middle of the night so we woke up to about 35 degrees inside the trailer. Needless to say we were up and out of there early, eager to get to Yellowstone. We should have just kept on going... Yellowstone was a hot ass mess. Unbeknownst to us, this late in the season all the campgrounds with electricity have closed down. We paid for 3 nights and only stayed two. With a shitty battery, no electricity, and a winter storm coming in we were very cold and anxious to get out of there. The scenery in Yellowstone was impressive as usual however and we were able to see and hear the elk ruttting for the first time from a distance. Also found a new hidden gem, the bathrooms in the Old Faithful Inn👍. Campers can pay $5 to use either a shower or a clawfoot tub for as long as you'd like. It was glorious.

Mood Music:
https://youtu.be/VbrfXDFuzu0Read more
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Coddiwompling Traveler
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Idaho
October 5, 2017 in the United States ⋅ 🌫 4 °C
Our first stop in Idaho was a small but very picturesque state park on the Snake River. We would have loved to stay longer but the winter storm followed us and pushed us further west. We made reservations at a campground in Wendell and prepaid for a week. Woof, probably needed to do a little more research into the area. We picked it because it seemed centrally located to some of the areas we wanted to visit but it turned out we were pretty isolated and it was at least an hour of driving through extremely dull landscape to anything scenic. Just lava fields and scorched land for miles and miles. We visited Craters of the Moon and had our first foray into spelunking. A little unnerving but super fun. We also drove through Ketcham and Sun Valley up to Stanley to see the Sawtooth Mountains. The mountains were snow capped and the lakes were turquoise, it is the absolute most perfect area for a cabin.

Mood Music:
https://youtu.be/dFM0pUn4dcARead more
Traveler I think I love Idaho
11/12/17Reply
Traveler Very nice photos
11/12/17Reply
Traveler Sweet!
11/12/17Reply
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Coddiwompling Traveler
Onward to Seattle
October 10, 2017 in the United States ⋅ 🌫 9 °C
After two overnight stops we made it to Washington, about an hour outside of Seattle. Again we made this reservation under the assumption it was centrally located but quickly realized everything was at least an hour drive. We had a lovely sunny day in Leavenworth, an authentic Bavarian village. Super charming and smelled delicious downtown from all the different vendors. The trip into Seattle was a little different. The traffic was ok but the whole area is laid out wonky, there is construction going on every other block, and the one way roads and hills just add to the pleasure. We managed to do Pike Place, REI, and the Fremont Troll in like 2 hours just so we could get the f#ck out of there. So Seattle is not really our thing but Washington state on the other hand might be.

Mood Music:
https://youtu.be/fregObNcHC8Read more
TravelerSweet! Now I can follow your travels ❤
10/23/17Reply
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Coddiwompling Traveler
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Olympic Peninsula
October 15, 2017 in the United States ⋅ ☀️ 6 °C
The pacific northwest is like an alien planet, something straight out of a movie. You can't even believe how tall and perfectly straight the trees are or how green and lush the forests are. The coastline looks like a Bob Ross painting from every angle. Much to my dismay the towns of Forks and La Push were not overrun with shirtless vampires and werewolves, just an unusually high number of bums for such small towns. We caught sight of one whale and a handful of seals but rainy windy weather made it hard to see much in the choppy waters. We hiked all over the peninsula in and out of Olympic National Park. The tidepools at Ruby beach, Hoh Rainforest and Sol Duc falls were highlights as well as hiking out to the most northwest point in the contiguous US, Cape Flattery. I got a text while there saying "Welcome to Canada!" 🤣 We would have stayed in this area for much longer but rainy weather forecasted for the next few weeks pushed us south.

Mood Music:
https://youtu.be/s5BJXwNeKsQRead more
Traveler Great shots guys ☺
10/29/17Reply
Traveler 😁
10/29/17Reply
Traveler Very nice trip pics
10/29/17Reply
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Coddiwompling Traveler
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Columbia River Gorge
October 24, 2017 in the United States ⋅ ☀️ 16 °C
We spent the last week wandering around and exploring both sides of the gorge area and nearby Portland. What an amazing area, the views from both sides of the river are stunning. The Oregon side was always a little hazier due to the wildfire that is still actively burning. We didn't see any fire but we did see smoke coming from several areas still. We explored the Guler Ice Caves (caves are the coolest), Mt. Adams and the Conboy national wildlife refuge in Washington. In Oregon we drove around Mt. Hood, hiked LakeTrillium and Mirror Lake and spent a day in Portland visiting Powell's books and Washington Park. Portland was.... interesting. Definitely some unique fashion choices. In this area I preferred the Washington side. Just a little slower and more laid back vibe. Although if you need to do any shopping, most of that is on the Oregon side and you have to travel over one of two toll bridges to get across the river. $1 or $2 depending on which bridge you choose. The Bridge of the Gods is part of the Pacific Crest Trail, very beautiful and convenient and probably the more poplar of the two however it was much more narrow. I think I made an eeek face all the way across.

Mood Music:
https://youtu.be/VXXD1QxpiswRead more
Traveler Love it!
10/29/17Reply
Traveler Yikes! Where does it go.
10/29/17Reply
Traveler Awesome picture 😊
10/29/17Reply
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Coddiwompling Traveler
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Oregon Coast
October 29, 2017 in the United States ⋅ ☁️ 13 °C
We've spent the last two weeks traveling south down the coast of Oregon. New favorite for sure. It's probably even more amazing in the summer with a little more sunshine and heat but we can't complain about the lack of people. We've combed mille long stretches of beach and tidepools without seeing another human. We found out we love exploring tidepools and we hit every low tide possible, even one during sunset. Highly recommended, you can see a lot of crazy shit with a flashlight in the tidepools when it's dark out! We especially loved the stretch of coast between Lincoln City and Newport. Beautiful sandy beaches, jagged rocky coves, marine wildlife and my favorite..."hidden" sea floats. Lincoln City hides beautiful hand blown glass floats randomly throughout the day on it's 7 miles of beach, everyday through winter. You bet your sweet ass I spent hours upon hours scouring the beach for 3 days straight. I'm still super salty I didn't find one and I bring it up almost everyday.😣 I'm really too lazy to tell you about everything we saw and did but if I could recommend one area it would be the central coast. Namely Devil's Churn, Spouting Horn and Cape Perpetua, we explored every square mile we could at those sites. We are getting ready to head into California tomorrow. We'll see how long it takes before all the people and traffic send us back to Oregon.

Mood Music:
https://youtu.be/_Mnw9uiYggURead more
Traveler Beautiful!
11/12/17Reply
Traveler Hang on Mike 😂
11/12/17Reply
Traveler Beautiful site.
11/12/17Reply
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Trip end
October 29, 2017