GRAND COULEE

I find myself walking this morning. We are tent camping at Sun Lakes State Park and I am up before everyone else, so The Dog and I walk amongst the scrub and grass and dry bushes as the sun rises over the cliffs of the coulee.

ROAD TRIP 2010: DAY FOUR

DAY FOUR: Friday 20 August 2010.

This was the day that stirred the ten-year-old boy trapped within my being. All was dinosaurs again—Dinosaur Park and then the terrain that prehistoric creatures trodded upon and slithered across, The Badlands.

I ran to Tyrannosaurus Rex when we arrived at Dinosaur Park. I clambered onto the bony plate of Triceratops to ride him like the caveman that never could perform that actual feat. I was somewhere I had been decades prior, reverting to the person that had been in the same place then.

Then, it was off to Wall Drug and its blatant consumerism and its disappointment.

Then, it was off to The Badlands. In the middle of Buffalo Gap National Grassland are huge scars of sedimentary rock, the remnants of ancient seafloor that have been weathered and sculpted over the subsequent millennia. I imagined the strange beasts that swam in the warm seas that once ebbed and flowed here as I stared at the colored soils.

We drove through this desolate land, stopping at overlooks and viewpoints to marvel at creation imagined and experienced.

ROAD TRIP 2010: DAY THREE

DAY THREE: Thursday 19 August 2010.

We drive from Billings, Montana to Rapid City, South Dakota. It is an all-day journey. We detour from I-90 to visit Devil's Tower National Monument, which is my favorite place we visit.

We are able to walk around the base of the basalt columns. We scramble over some of the lowest rocks of the boulder field. The trees are filled with prayer bundles and prayer cloths left behind by Native Americans as acts of worship and ritual. The day is hot, but not oppressively so.

It was hard not to reference scenes from Close Encounters of the Third Kind, although the magnitude and scale of Devil's Tower create a sense of awe that cannot be captured on film. It needs to be experienced.

The day ended as many of them will: with dinner and a swim in the hotel's pool. This is The Child's favorite part of the vacation. The Child could live in the chlorine-blue waters.

ROAD TRIP 2010: DAY TWO

DAY TWO: Wednesday 18 August 2010.

Today finds us in Billings, Montana and nearby places.

We visit Custer National Cemetery and the site of Custer's Last Stand at the Battle of Little Bighorn (the Battle of Greasy Grass to the Native Americans). Dan Old Elk, the great-grandson of Curly, an Indian scout of Lieutenant Colonel George Armstrong Custer, speaks to those of us gathered to listen to the tales he heard from his great-grandfather and his other relatives regarding the battle.

We visit the Pictograph Caves.

We visit The Uncle and The Aunt and The Cousins and their families.

Today is a day of Cowboys and Indians. Today is a day of Big Sky.

ROAD TRIP 2010 : DAY ONE

DAY ONE: Tuesday 17 August 2010.

The wife, the child, the brother, the sister, the niece, and I decide to take a road trip together. We are following a loose path that my siblings and I traversed with the parents 32 years prior. The brother vaguely remembers the previous trip; the sister has no recollection, being too young; I remember large pieces of it vividly.

The six of us leave at midnight, rather than 6:00 a.m., to fend off anticipation and excitement, as well as drive in the dark. Three states (Washington, Idaho, and Montana), many rest stops, and about fourteen hours later, we arrive in Billings, Montana.

We eat, we swim in the hotel pool, we retire early.

Road Trip 2010 has begun.