SALLY, DARRYL AND MATT GO TO WYOMING







JULY, 2008

Having failed to break the impasse over
whether to go to Egypt, Italy or Iceland in
the Summer of 2008, we settled on the
obvious compromise--

Jackson, Wyoming 

I counted them up, and this was my 22nd
visit to Jackson since 1990, but the first
for Sally and Darryl.  In real terms,
it meant that I got to do most of the
driving.
We saw pelicans on the Snake River (left) and flamingos on Town Creek (below).  OK, the flamingos were plastic, but they were very lifelike.
We saw elk, bison and moose.  Not seeing bears eventually became very distressing to Sally, especially since complete strangers would come up to her in the gift shop and tell her that they had seen a bear at some point during the day.

It didn't make her feel any better when I told her that Janice had once seen a bear and moose (with nametags yet!) at the same time.
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                                                                        Naturally, we went to Yellowstone National Park.
                                                          Since I was the one who remembered to bring the
                                                          camera, I got pictures of Sally and Darryl (clockwise
                                                          from left, the Continental Divide, Old Faithful,
                                                          the Falls in the Grand Canyon and Prismatic Springs.
                                                       
So now we come to our adventures in the water...
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After a float trip on Sunday, we were back for more fun on the river on Tuesday, when we went white water rafting.  This is a picture I took of
Darryl and Sally before we got into our boat.  Sadly, it was the last picture
I took with my old camera.  The water was high, and our guide was
determined to get us all (and our cameras) wet. 

If you'd like to know just how wet, click on the photo to go to the
pictures of the trip that we decided not to purchase since you couldn't
see us under the waves.  (I'm in the front right of the boat; Sally and
Darryl are in the third row under the hats. 
To add insult to my injury, we went kayaking and canoeing with Lisa and a friend later in the week.  Sally and Darryl rented a canoe.  Lisa had her own kayak, and I borrowed Paul's. 

It really was lots of fun, but about halfway into the cruise (?), I noticed that Lisa looked a lot more comfortable in her kayak than I was in Paul's--which was
built for someone who's much more agile than I.  Eventually, I decided that drowning was preferable to not being able to feel my legs, so I took this last picture of myself as a dry person before scuttling my craft.

I was heroically towed to shore by Lisa (thanks again!) who kindly offered to let me use her kayak for the rest of the afternoon. 

I could see that she was uncomfortable in Paul's boat, but I'm sorry to say I was selfish enough not to care!

We had a wonderful time seeing Paul and Lisa,
and it was great to see old and new things.
 
It was great to see Lisa and Paul again, and I enjoyed introducing Sally and Darry to them.  Paul told us about his new endeavor as Wyoming Coordinator for Republicans for Environmental Protection.  Lisa says that makes him the best of a bad lot, but the rest of us were very impressed. (If you're curious, go to www.rep.org and check it out.)