4 Radical Roadschoolers and a Fat Cat

The North Shore of Minnesota

Posted on October 16, 2016 by Heather Gebbia

After driveway surfing in Wisconsin we headed back into Minnesota up to the North Shore. We stayed at Burlington Bay Campground in Two Harbors right on Lake Superior. Do you see a Fat Cat on the fence?

She’s easier to see close up.

Lake Superior is amazing! I swear this seems so much more like the ocean to me than a lake. It’s enormous and on windy days the waves were just as big as ocean waves.

One evening we went to visit beautiful Gooseberry Falls State Park, and enjoyed riding the bike trails.

We heard that when you’re in Two Harbors you must stop and try Betty’s Pies. So after walking and biking around Gooseberry Falls we stopped there for dinner and dessert. Delicious!

Another evening we checked out Split Rock Lighthouse State Park. Wow, this was absolutely gorgeous!

We also enjoyed walking the trail across the street from our campground. I loved watching the waves crash against the rocks!

That’s our home back there, parked in between several other homes with a view.

We found a nice playground down the street for my little monkey.

On Saturday my boss and his wife and daughter came up to visit us for the day. We went back to Gooseberry Falls with them. It was a lot colder that day than when we went earlier in the week, but lots of fun to enjoy this with Mike and his family. They have been here many times before and were able to show us around to other areas of the park that we missed when we went the first time. It’s always nice to have locals to show us around!

We got to see an eagle on the trail!

I’m so glad we took this trip up to the North Shore. It was a little out of our way since we were on a tight timeline to get to North Carolina by mid-October, but it was worth it. Such a beautiful area and definitely a place I would like to go back to again when we have more time.

Categories: Minnesota | Tags: betty's pies, burlington bay campground, ditching suburbia, fulltime families, Fulltime RV'ing, gooseberry falls state park, great lakes, lake superior, Minnesota, north shore, split rock lighthouse state park, two harbors | 11 Comments

Driveway Surfing in Wisconsin

Posted on October 9, 2016 by Heather Gebbia

One of my co-workers lives on a beautiful farm in Amery, Wisconsin. She invited us to park on her property so we went there after Minneapolis. I recently learned that parking at someone’s house is called “Driveway Surfing” or as another friend put it “Mooch-docking”. 🙂

Whatever it’s called I like it! I need to find more friends that have room on their property for us to park. This was really fun, and just look at this beautiful spot!

Jenna and Scott were such gracious hosts and we really enjoyed spending a few days with them. We especially enjoyed evenings by the campfire! We surprised Jesse with a birthday cake after dinner one night even though it was now past his birthday.

Jenna took us kayaking one evening. That was so much fun and the lake was so peaceful and beautiful.

This was the first time Jake kayaked on his own and he did great!

The Amery Fall Festival was that weekend so we got to attend a small town parade and carnival.

As if the kids really needed more rides after Mall of America!

They tried to help Jenna win a goldfish with no success.

Jenna had a temporary roommate from Mexico living with her, a very sweet lady named Rebecca. She made us a real authentic Mexican dinner one night that was so delicious! What a treat that was!

We are so grateful to Jenna for inviting us to stay with her for a few days. We all really enjoyed our time there!

Categories: Wisconsin | Tags: amery, ditching suburbia, driveway surfing, fall festival, full time rv'ing, fulltime families, kayaking, moochdocking, Wisconsin | 2 Comments

Mall of America and Birthdays on the Road

Posted on October 9, 2016 by Heather Gebbia

Last October I went to Minneapolis for work for a few days. You can read about that post here: The Smokies with a side trip to Minnesota. While I was there I went to the Mall of America and later came home and showed my kids pictures of the Nickelodeon Universe amusement park that is inside the mall. Ever since then they have been wanting to go there.

After leaving South Dakota we headed to Minnesota. I was able to go into the office one day while I was there. It’s always nice to see people I work with face to face sometimes. I feel very blessed to work with some awesome people that I really like to spend time with.

Jesse’s 10th birthday was that week and guess where he wanted to go for his birthday? Mall of America of course! Sometimes people ask me how we do birthdays on the road. Actually we were never really into the birthday party thing when we lived in our sticks and bricks. We always preferred to celebrate birthdays by taking a vacation to Disney World because that’s just how we roll. So now on the road we just try to plan our travels through an area with something fun to do as a family.

We went to Mall of America twice that week. One day I took the kids to the Crayola Experience in the mall.

I found a Groupon for 50% off and I was able to get in free with my homeschool teacher ID. What could have cost $60 (it’s normally $20/person) ended up only being $20 for all 3 of us. Score! I wasn’t sure if my kids would like this place because they are getting older and I wondered if it may be a little too young for them. But they loved it and we all had a great time! We spent about 4 hours there because there was so much to do. I was really impressed by all the activity stations and how much creativity is involved.

At the first station you make your own personalized crayon.

Then you make a coloring page featuring your own picture!

At another station you make something out of clay.

In this section they could color with markers. Jesse’s sign shows his love for his family, Jake’s on the other hand shows he could use a little humility. 😉

After the Crayola Experience we went to the Lego Store where the kids could play with lots of Legos. Check out the amusement park in the background! That was for the next day.

So the next day my baby turned double-digits… 10 years old! How can that be possible? I can’t believe how quickly they are growing up on me. Chris took the afternoon off work and we spent the day at the Nickelodeon Universe inside the mall.

First of many roller coaster rides

The log flume ride was my favorite!

I think the kids liked the bumper cars the best.

This ride was pretty fun. With your controller you can make it spin or go upside down. I’m not a big fan of spinning, but it was still fun.

I love roller coasters and this one had upside down loops and corkscrews. It was really fun!

My cute birthday boy! He kept telling me several times throughout the day how thankful he was that we took him there for his birthday. He is so sweet and it melts this momma’s heart to hear him express such gratitude.

Ferris Wheel

We were all pretty amazed at how many rides they can fit inside a mall. We bought the unlimited rides wristband that my boss was able to get a great deal on. And we sure got our money’s worth! We stayed until they closed and only took a break for dinner. And since it was a weekday we practically had the place to ourselves and never had to wait in any lines. That’s a nice benefit of homeschooling and September birthdays.

Jesse said this was his best birthday ever. Now how am I going to top that next year? Hmm…

Categories: Minnesota | Tags: crayola experience, ditching suburbia, full time rv'ing, fulltime families, mall of america, minneapolis, Minnesota, mn, nickelodeon universe | 5 Comments

Badlands National Park

Posted on October 1, 2016 by Heather Gebbia

While in South Dakota we visited Badlands National Park. I have to admit I did not have very high expectations for this park. I mean after we just spent the past month or two visiting the Tetons, Yellowstone & Glacier, I wasn’t sure anything could measure up. I am happy to report I was wrong. The Badlands are amazing! It was so beautiful and so other-worldly. I mean it seriously looked like we had landed on another planet. Hey, that’s not such a bad idea! If space travel ever becomes a “thing”, we might have to change our names from RoadSchoolers to GalaxySchoolers! 🙂

Anyway back on earth, here we are at the Badlands.

Beautiful hills that remind me of the painted desert in Arizona with wildflowers everywhere.

Oops, a little traffic jam caused by some pronghorn sheep that decided to walk in the middle of the road instead of on the endless miles of prairies off to the side.

This was after they decided to get off the road and let us drive by, thank you very much!

We started our hike at the Door Trail. This is where it especially felt like or looked like walking on another planet.

Oh no, it seems we have left bear country, but we’re back in the land of rattlesnakes. Yuck! I’m not sure which is worse. At least bears are cuter.

Next was the Window Trail.

And then the Notch Trail which had a fun ladder to climb.

The Notch Trail was my favorite. Not only was the trail itself really fun with so many cool rocks to climb, but the end of the trail had a really amazing view.

Climbing back down the ladder was a little harder than climbing up, but Jesse makes it look so easy.

Afterward he wanted to sing a song on top of a rock. 😉

The last trail we hiked was the Saddle Pass trail which was a short but steep climb. You see that pointed peak in the background? Jesse and I climbed to the top of that!

When we reached the end of the Saddle Pass Trail, Jesse and I wanted to climb to the top of that peak, so there we are — those two little dots almost to the top.

We made it! Now we look like one little dot at the top.

Climbing back down Saddle Pass was a lot harder than going up. It’s like trying to walk down a dusty slide. You might as well just sit on your butt and slide down because that’s basically how you’ll end up going down anyway. 🙂

At the end of the day, we stopped at the Visitor Center so the boys could earn their Junior Ranger badges.

On our way out of the park we passed by one of many prairie dog towns. They are so cute!

We visited the Badlands in September, and it was a very nice day (about 80ish), but it felt really hot on some of those hikes. I have heard that in the summer it gets well over 100 there. So if you plan to visit, keep in mind that the middle of summer is probably not the best time to go. I think September was great, but even October is probably very nice.

If you have ever traveled down I-90 in South Dakota, you would see many billboards advertising a tourist trap called Wall Drug. Wall Drug is close to the Badlands so we went there after the park to check it out. It’s basically just a bunch of shops and some restaurants, and you can buy any kind of SD souvenirs that you can imagine. There are also lots of fun statues for the kids to play on.

That wraps up the highlights of our time in the Black Hills of South Dakota. Next up — Minnesota!

Categories: National Parks, South Dakota | Tags: badlands national park, black hills, ditching suburbia, door trail, full time rv'ing, fulltime families, junior ranger, notch trail, prairie dogs, saddle pass trail, sd, South Dakota, wall drug, window trail | 6 Comments

Custer State Park and Mt. Rushmore

Posted on September 25, 2016 by Heather Gebbia

After leaving Montana and Wyoming we headed east to South Dakota and stayed at Custer State Park. This park was amazing! We all agree it should be a national park. It’s a very big park with several different areas and campgrounds. It’s definitely one of the coolest state parks we have been to. I was very thankful to get a campsite there as they start taking reservations a year in advance, but I didn’t know we would be going there until about 3 months in advance.

We had lots of excitement at our campsite every day as bison came walking through. We’re always told to never approach or go near the wildlife, but we couldn’t really help the fact that these bison were always grazing right in our campsite. Sometimes we would be sitting outside and look up to find a bison just a few feet away!

Fat Cat was pretty scared of these things. She wanted to run back in the house anytime she saw one. I think she realized this animal was much too large for her to mess with. She liked to watch from the safety of indoors.

We visited 3 different areas of this park. First was a driving tour of the Wildlife Loop. We saw some pronghorn sheep and bison on this loop, but honestly we thought the wildlife sightings back at our campsite were a lot more interesting.

The next evening we drove the Needles Highway. This was an amazing drive with spectacular scenery of these tall rock formations. I had read about this highway beforehand that mentioned 3 tunnels we would have to drive through. The tunnels are very narrow and only one vehicle can fit through at a time. As you know, our vehicle is rather large and we weren’t sure if we should do this drive. The Needles Eye Tunnel is only 8’4″ wide and our truck is about 7’10” wide. But we did it! Chris is such a good driver. 🙂

Needles Eye Tunnel – I can’t believe we drove through this!

We hiked to the Cathedral Spires which was a beautiful hike.

Then we drove to Sylvan Lake and walked the 1 mile loop around the lake. This was a such a fun hike because there are so many rocks to climb on!

There were also a couple of narrow passageways to walk through.

I really loved how the rocks reflected in the water like a mirror.

The next evening we drove the scenic Iron Mountain Road to go visit Mt. Rushmore. This road also had some tunnels, but not nearly as narrow as the Needles Highway. As we drove through the last tunnel, we could see the president’s heads in the distance.

Mt. Rushmore is one of those iconic landmarks that is a “must see” on any American road trip.

All 50 state flags are on this walkway.

The boys earned their Mt. Rushmore Junior Ranger badges.

Before we started traveling like this, I had never really given the state of South Dakota much thought. I had no idea it is such a beautiful state with so many awesome things to do. We visited Badlands National Park next, but I will save that for my next post. Cheers!

Categories: National Parks, South Dakota | Tags: bison, cathedral spires, custer state park, ditching suburbia, full time rv'ing, fulltime families, iron mountain road, junior ranger, mt. rushmore, needles eye tunnel, needles highway, sd, South Dakota, sylvan lake, wildlife loop | 7 Comments

Lewis and Clark Caverns State Park

Posted on September 24, 2016 by Heather Gebbia

After leaving Glacier, we stopped for a couple of nights in Whitehall, Montana at Lewis & Clark Caverns State Park. This was so nice because we really missed staying at state parks. While we were visiting Grand Tetons, Yellowstone and Glacier our only options were crowded RV parks. Pulling into our site at this state park was a welcome change. Look at all that space!

Lots of room for Chris and the boys to play.

And Fat Cat loved it too!

We did the cavern tour while we were there which was really cool. This is the entrance to the cavern.

Inside the cavern is a small slide that everyone on the tour has to go down to get to the next section of the cave. It was a lot of fun and the highlight of the tour for the kids. Sorry the picture is blurry. It’s hard to get a good picture of kids in motion in the dark!

A few cave pictures.

I liked the room all lit up in purple!

This was a beautiful place to spend a couple of days after all the fun we had at Glacier.

After this we moved on to Cody, Wyoming and visited the east side of Yellowstone from there, but I already wrote about that as part of my posts about Yellowstone. You can read about that here: Yellowstone: Fishing Bridge and Cody, WY.

Categories: Montana | Tags: cave tour, ditching suburbia, full time rv'ing, fulltime families, lewis and clark caverns state park, Montana, mt, whitehall | 2 Comments

Waterton-Glacier International Peace Park

Posted on September 21, 2016 by Heather Gebbia

While we were in Glacier we decided to make a day trip up to the Canadian side of the park called Waterton Lakes. Waterton Lakes National Park in Alberta, Canada and Glacier National Park in Montana, USA joined together to become the first International Peace Park in 1932. The Peace Park commemorates the friendship between the two countries. I love this because my dad is from Nova Scotia and I have many friends and relatives from Canada.

Waterton Lakes was a 3 hour drive from where we were staying near West Glacier, so we left the RV at the park in Montana and stayed in a hotel up at Waterton for one night. This was so exciting because although I have been to Canada, I had never been to Alberta. And our kids thought it was really fun to go to another country for the day. Now Jake really wants to spend a summer exploring Canada, and so do I. What a beautiful country!

Our first stop at Waterton Lakes was Red Rock Canyon. This was a lot of fun for the kids to climb on the rocks and Jesse even found some rock slides.

I think it’s pretty obvious why they called this Red Rock Canyon!

Then we got settled at our hotel before venturing out to explore Waterton Village. The village is in the middle of the national park and it is so cute! There are several hotels to choose from. We stayed at Waterton Lakes Lodge because it had an indoor pool and hot tub which we enjoyed very much. You can walk to all the restaurants and shops in the area from any of the hotels. There were lots of deer everywhere!

Even Bambi!

Waterton Lake is gorgeous!

We ate dinner at a restaurant right next to the lake. While we waited for the food the kids enjoyed playing in their “yard” and on the chair swings.

I think I look a little tired in this picture. This family sure knows how to work hard and play hard!

The next day we hiked to Bertha Falls.

Some beautiful views of the lake and mountains from the hiking trail.

Then we toured the Prince of Wales Hotel which was stunning!

This is the lake view from the hotel.

I am so glad we made this little side trip from Glacier, but our time there was too short. Like I say about most places we go, that just means we have to go back again someday. Exploring more of Alberta is now on our ever-growing bucket list.

Categories: Montana, National Parks | Tags: alberta, bertha falls, canada, ditching suburbia, full time rv'ing, fulltime families, glacier national park, Montana, prince of wales hotel, red rock canyon, waterton lakes national park, waterton village, waterton-glacier international peace park | 5 Comments

More Random Pictures from Glacier

Posted on September 20, 2016 by Heather Gebbia

This post is basically just some more pictures of things we did at Glacier that don’t really seem to fit into a blog post all by themselves. There is so much to do at Glacier, we didn’t even get to it all so I hope to return there someday.

These first few pictures are from Avalanche Lake. The lake was beautiful, but the water level seemed really low.

Avalanche Lake

Avalanche Lake

Avalanche Lake

One evening we brought a picnic dinner to Lake McDonald. We even met another Fulltime Family there!

Lake McDonald

Lake McDonald

Then one day we went to Two Medicine Lake. This lake was good for skipping rocks.

Two Medicine Lake

Two Medicine Lake

Two Medicine Lake

Two Medicine Lake

While visiting Glacier we spent most of the time on the west side in Hungry Horse, MT at Mountain Meadow RV Park. This park is a very nice park, but unfortunately we didn’t have a great campsite. Our site was really small and un-level, and they didn’t have any other sites we could move to. What I liked about the park is it had more of a state park feel. The sites were spread out with some trees and privacy between each one rather than all lined up together like most RV parks. Many of the sites were large and very nice, so if we ever return there I hope to get a better site. And they had a really nice common area to hang out and play games or sit by the pond.

Mountain Meadow RV Park

Mountain Meadow RV Park

Finally, the boys earned their Junior Ranger badges.

Glacier National Park is definitely one of the most beautiful places we have ever been. I really hope we can go back there again someday. Coming up next I have one last post about Glacier, or I should say it’s about Glacier’s sister park up in Alberta, Canada: Waterton Lakes.

Categories: Montana, National Parks | Tags: avalanche lake, ditching suburbia, full time rv'ing, fulltime families, glacier national park, hungry horse, junior ranger, lake mcdonald, Montana, mountain meadow rv park, mt, two medicine lake, west glacier | 2 Comments

Grinnell Glacier

Posted on September 18, 2016 by Heather Gebbia

The hike to Grinnell Glacier was one of my most favorite hikes ever. It was also the longest at almost 12 miles. I may have gotten some complaints later from certain family members that would prefer I keep our hikes to 8 miles or less. 🙂

We started at the Many Glacier Hotel which was designed to look like a Swiss Chalet. It was absolutely gorgeous! Unfortunately we couldn’t see much of the inside because the power was out when we got there that morning. The hallways were very dark! And even later that afternoon when we returned from our hike several hours later the power was still out! I felt sorry for the people paying all that money to stay there with no power.

Many Glacier Hotel

Many Glacier Hotel is on Swiftcurrent Lake. We walked along this lake to begin our hike. There is a shuttle boat you can take from this point that will cut down on the miles of hiking to get to Grinnell Glacier if you don’t feel like hiking the entire 12 miles. But oh no, not us! We were going to hike the whole thing and not take the easy way. 🙂

Swiftcurrent Lake

Next the trail takes you along Lake Josephine. The shuttle boat would drop you off at the other end of this lake.

Lake Josephine

Once we passed Lake Josephine and were on the trail towards Grinnell Lake we noticed this sign. That’s always encouraging to see. We actually did see one bear, but from a safe distance.

From here you can take a shorter hike that takes you along the shoreline of Grinnell Lake (which is gorgeous by the way) or take the longer hike up to Grinnell Glacier. From the hike up to the Glacier you get a beautiful view of Grinnell Lake down below.

Grinnell Lake

Then it’s a steady climb the rest of the way up to the glacier.

We saw a bear playing down below. He looked so cute from our relatively safe spot up above.

Finally we made it to Grinnell Glacier, and it was incredible! There were even a few small icebergs floating around in the water.

Grinnell Glacier

It was pretty cold up there so we didn’t stick around very long. I would have liked to have stayed a lot longer and just enjoyed the view, especially after how long it took us to get there, but everyone was cold and hungry. We brought a picnic lunch but wanted to hike back down a little bit to where it was a little warmer before eating.

As we were hiking back down I was surprised to see all this lush vegetation and greenery way up where it was so cold even in August.

At this point we could see all 3 lakes that we passed on the way up: Grinnell Lake is the closest, then Lake Josephine and lastly Swiftcurrent Lake way off in the distance. Knowing we had to hike all the way back there was a little disheartening just then!

But eventually we made it back and I still think it was the best hike we’ve ever done.

The weekend we did this hike we stayed at the East Glacier/St. Mary KOA. They have a heated pool and hot tub and we really enjoyed that once we got back. We also worked up quite an appetite and enjoyed a delicious pizza at Rising Sun pizza that night. There is just something so satisfying about accomplishing such an amazing hike and then having a well earned yummy dinner that night.

Categories: Montana, National Parks | Tags: ditching suburbia, east glacier koa, full time rv'ing, fulltime families, glacier national park, grinnell glacier, grinnell lake, lake josephine, many glacier, many glacier hotel, Montana, rising sun pizza, st. mary koa, swiftcurrent lake | 11 Comments

Glacier: Going to the Sun and St. Mary Falls

Posted on September 17, 2016 by Heather Gebbia

In my first post about Glacier National Park I mentioned the long shuttle bus ride up to Logan Pass. Because that took so long we drove our truck the next day. What a difference! We were up to Logan Pass within an hour, and the drive was spectacular!

Going to the Sun Road

At one point beyond Logan Pass we went through a tunnel that literally looked like we were “Going to the Sun”!

Jackson Glacier

We stopped to hike to St. Mary Falls which was incredible! The trailhead parking lot was full so we ended up parking at the Sunrift Gorge trailhead just a little further down the road. That turned out to be such a blessing! I think the round-trip hike from the St. Mary Falls trailhead is only a mile or two, but from the Sunrift Gorge trailhead the round-trip hike was about 4 miles. Trust me, it’s worth it! The trail starts under this bridge. To the right you can walk up some stairs to see the Sunrift Gorge, then go to the left and walk the short trail to Baring Falls.

After Baring Falls, we hiked along the St. Mary Lake which was such a spectacular turquoise color. I was so glad we had to park farther away; otherwise, we would have missed this.

St. Mary Lake

We also got to see a moose along the trail. I’m not sure if you can see it, but there is a moose in between the trees in the middle of the picture below.