school highlights

Short update from school...
For science, Aviv made a fermentation experiment. She melted sugar and yeast in warm water in a bottle and attached a balloon on top. The water is brown because of the brown sugar she used.
The balloon got filled up with CO2 and became pretty big.



For reading, we have a banana tree on the wall, where the kids add a banana each time they finish a book. They write on the banana the book title, author and how much they liked it between 1-10.
Hanging out in a book store

Teton National Park

First I want to share with you what conditions the last post was written under. We had no electricity hookup but we wanted to have internet really badly. After exploring the campground, we found out that there are outlets in the restrooms. So after the kids went to bed we dressed up well, took 2 picnic chairs and a beer for Dagan and we sat by the toilets with the laptop. We greeted goodnight all the toilet users who passed by. By the time we were done we felt like popsicles.

And now to Teton. This park is kind of an extension of the Yellowstone. It's known mainly for its mountain scenery.
It also has many interesting animals

The one we liked most was the moose. We sat for an hour to watch him eating by the river.

By Jenny Lake

Later in Jackson visitor center, the kids tried on some elk antlers. They are HEAVY!
We are still in Wyoming, in the very beginning of our long journey to Iowa...

Yellowstone National Park

We arrived to Yellowstone 4 days ago without really knowing exactly what and how much this park has to offer. We found ourselves in an active caldera full of dangerous animals. More than once we felt like red riding hood. Bad wolves, vicious coyotes and huge grizzlies in our vicinity. And once you're out of the woods you find yourself stepping on boiling or steaming ground where geysers suddenly erupt out of nowhere. Add to all that freezing nights (-1C) and cold windy days - we certainly deserve a week off. Cathy prepare the spa... (-:
Take for example this cute little(?) Grizzly. We saw him walking in the field close to a bunch of bison. It was pretty scary because they say that if you can see a bear without binoculars, it means you're too close. This guy can run 40mph.
The bison come to warm up in the hot springs area. The crowd doesn't seem to bother them.

Sometimes they go a bit too close

Coyote is out for dinner

Less threatening elk
The park major attractions are the thermal features - hot springs, mudpots and geysers. It's pretty scary to imagine what's going on under your feet, not very deep in the ground.
Some of the hot springs and geysers -
The hot spring pools can reach to 80C.We took a guided tour with ranger Jennifer who took the temperature of the different pools.


Only in Yellowstone - if your mammoth is not feeling well, where would you go?

short update

After 4 days in bear country we're still alive!
Hope tomorrow we'll have internet for longer time and we'll update from the Yellowstone and Teton National Parks.
Till soon!

Glacier national park USA

We've entered Montana through an Indian reservation of the Blackfoot tribe. Lots of tepees in every backyard and horses. As we continued we saw lots of agriculture - endless hey fields and farms. We arrived at Glacier National Park, which has the same name as the Canadian one. We spent 2 nights in the park at "Two Medicine" campground. We found this campground very unique for the people that camp there. It's people that go there every summer, year after year for over 10 years. They know all the rangers and participate in the activities they offer. The view from our campsite was beautiful. This is what it looks like in the morning.
We took a boat ride on the nearby lake (in the above picture) and then hiked to Twin Falls. On the way back we decided to hike 8Km instead of taking the boat. There are bear warnings everywhere and to be honest, it's quite frightening.

We couldn't stop eating huckleberries and thimble berries all the way and we also picked some for dinner's salad. As we got back to the rv, we saw a bear again, walking on the mountain, having, just like us, berries for dinner. The bear was less than 1Km away from our rv. Challenge - find the bear in the picture
Another nice hike we took was to St. Mary Falls, Where the kids were working on their booklets to become junior rangers.

Later on, they gave oath with a ranger and earned a badge.
Finally, to all of my skeptical friends, wherever they are, this is me in hiking boots
And look - NO SWEAT WHATSOEVER!

The Canadian Rockies

We’re on our way to Montana, back in the US. We spent the last 2 days in the Canadian Rockies – Yoho and Banff National Parks. We weren’t so lucky weather wise. It rained most of the time and the mountains and glaciers were concealed by fog. We managed to take few good pictures though. The amazing teal blue color of Lake Moraine seems unreal! Lake Louise has the same color and beautiful glaciers hanging right above it but it was too foggy to see. After that it started raining badly and we went back to the campsite.

Today we woke up to a better weather and guess what? WE SAW A BEAR!!! We saw traffic jam on the way and we thought it might be because there’s a bear around. We also saw the “bear police” car in the area. We looked in the woods and there he was, walking around slowly, nibbling leaves, didn’t seem like the crowd of people bothered him at all.
He was walking right next to a campground and it made us realize that the bear warnings in the parks are not rumors after all (-: That’s the best picture we could take.

From there we continued south to Banff city, which reminded us of Switzerland.

And to Calgary, where they’re working hard on getting ready for the winter Olympics in 2010.

We gradually descended from the Rockies to plateau, where we saw more and more deer.

This is where we stopped for dinner and then we found a campground for the night.