Felicity did a great job recapping our horseback riding trip. I had never done it before and I LOVED every second of it. (Okay, maybe I was a little bit nervous going down hill. ) Anyway, I took a bunch of fun videos and thought I would share one with you here!
Also notice there is tapping on this video. That’s because I used the rear camera. No idea what is going on with my other videos. We have been troubleshooting and so far wifi turned off, case taken off, and haptics toggled off hasn’t helped. Hopefully this guy will figure it out soon! There’s no stopping this vlog train now!
After leaving the West Glacier campground, I took a trip down memory lane. We went horseback riding through the forest. On the lookout for bears and deer we saddled up. Behind our wrangler, Chad, Harry was the first in line on his horse named “Marley.” I was behind him on “Splash,” my mother behind me on “Datsun,” and my Dad as the caboose on “Facebook.”
Even though it was only Harry’s first time, we could all tell he was the most relaxed the entire ride. One hand in his pocket and the other on the reins, rolling his body with the horse’s footsteps. Harry was even promoted to “Junior Wrangler!”
My horse was definitely called splash for one main reason. No, not because its hair looked like splattered paint (even though it did). But because Splash did not like water! This may be ironic, but he would rather walk on a thin and muddy log in the middle of a puddle and slip every time with a splash than walk straight through. Let’s just say I got a little wet.
Datsun took a few too many dumps. On a half day tour, the horses usually code brown about twice and code yellow three times. My mother called code brown about five times and code yellow about four! My Dad grew up with family horses and I took lessons when I was younger. Since Harry is already a pro, I’m guessing Harry and I both inherited this gene from our Dad. My mother had the most trouble while riding Datsun, but Datsun wasn’t the problem. 😉
Anyway, we passed by a scenic overlook of Strawberry and Chocolate Drop Mountains. On our way back to the stables, we took the trail “Bear Claw.” It was named appropriately! All the trees had scratches on them and logs were scraped up on the ground. This trail was where they see 90% of their bears! We luckily didn’t see one, I was on edge the entire ride!
After the tour, I kept saying “herse” instead of horse. This may seem weird, but a lot of strange things happen in Glacier National Park!!
As most of you know, I was very skeptical about taking this trip. (And that hasn’t changed. Ha!) So to keep things fun, I’m trying my hand at vlogging my perspective of this whole thing. Here is the first one that will tell you a lot about our big travel day from NC to MT!
Hopefully the quality and orientation will improve on the next one! And no I have no idea what that tapping is. Sorry, Emily!
The photo at the top of this post is the one I mentioned in the video. No photo can ever capture how things look from the naked eye. Sigh… Trust me. It was magical. Or maybe it was just the fact that my family was sleeping and I was binging The Ballad of Billy Balls podcast. (Thanks for the rec, Dawn! I may or may not have bawled at the end!)
And lastly, I have to share this gem from Harry on the plane. As we began our descent into Montana and the Rocky Mountains came into view he said, “Mom, if I had emotion tears, I would cry right now because I can’t wait to get into the RV. ”
Me too, kid. I might cry, but I don’t think it’s because I’m excited. Not yet anyway…
No, you’ve come to the right place. This corner of Migratory Pebbles will chronicle the Lipchak/Sands 40 day road trip in a 25′ RV. Is it too many days, or too short an RV? Tune in here to find out which.
I’ll be joined by social media personalities Jessica, Felicity, and Harry of recent Greenland/Iceland blog fame.
Now study our intended route above to find out if the Shitshow Roadshow will be visiting a community near you!
Here we hiked up about 💯 flights of stairs to get to the top of the waterfall. Then we hiked back down and took a shower. 🤣🤣🤣🥶🙁🙂😀
The Diamond Beach
Ppsskkowwww!!¡¡¡!!!
Here we just smashed icebergs.
Reynisfjara, the Black Sand Beach
Now… how do I get down?
Here we went to eat, after we ate we got ice cream. Then I climbed the stone pillars, then… we left!
DC-3 Plane Wreck on Sólheimasandur
I wonder where this plane goes?
At this location we went on a giant bus with giant wheels to get to the wreck. Then we took some photos, and went inside… the… um wreck? Then… as always I left and we ran 2 mi.
Here we started by watching the geyser go up one meter. Then we hiked up the hill to get some photos. On our way up we saw something that looked like a witch’s cauldron. On the way down I ran down. Then the geyser went up 20 meters.
I bet it is a kinetic energy potion. #geyser. This to…This!!!!!!
Kerið Volcanic Crater
Here we hiked down & around the bottom of the crater. There were a lot of students.
Gullfoss Waterfall
Here we walked down to a little ledge at the bottom of the waterfall/foss. Then we went up to the top of the waterfall and went to the WC 🚽, which costed 200 ISK.
Traditional Dairy Farm and Free Ice Cream
Here we basically just got ice cream and scared sheep.
Thingvellir National Park
At this place we went down the path toward a geocache. We couldn’t get to it because of the construction. This was the first place that people met to make laws. This was also a place that had a gravel road that had a hole in it. People figured out that there was a 20 meter drop under the road. It is on the border of the North American & European tectonic plates. We were walking in between the 2 tectonic plates.
GoT location
We also went to a place where people make bread in the sand.
“Private” We got kicked out… of the private demonstration.
Here there were a lot of rocks, also some ducks and seals scattered around.
Búðakirkja, the Black Church of Búðir
Here there isn’t much, just a danish style church and a hotel.
Rauðfeldar Canyon
Here we hiked through the big dent in the cliff, wich was carved by the river. The water was cold and had a really strong current.
Arnarstapi
Here we hiked across the harbor to the restaurant, and on the way we saw a 20 meter deep hole. We also got some cool pics. Game of Thrones location. (See Game of Thrones locations below.)
Saxhóll volcanic crater
Here we walked up the side of the crater, and I went down into the crater. Before I went into the crater I asked the guide if it was a good idea and he said:
Since I learned to ride a bike, I had free range in my neighborhood. Before that, I was already spending a lot of time outside the house, poking around with my sister Maggie in the back yard swamp for hours on end. We walked ourselves to school from kindergarten through junior high.
Occasionally there would be our little neighbor, Mikey, running down the road to find grownups. “Ben has blood! BEN has BLOOD!” Mix wheels and steep roads and sand, or bare fingers and plate glass, or bike pedals and untied shoes, and accidents will happen. There will be blood.
By the age of 7 or 8 I was riding my bike along Rt. 16, past Memorial School to downtown South Natick: Olde Towne Market, church, the library, the waterfall. By the age of 10, now in Sterling, I was riding my bike everywhere. To the soccer fields, to my friend Wes’s house all the way across town, and eventually to work at Johnson’s Garage or the beach, hoping to run into friends there.
If there was any protocol to keep our parents informed, I’ve forgotten it. Eating at a friend’s house, or sleeping over, I’m sure demanded a phone call home. But at a young age, if I wasn’t spending an entire summer day in front of my computer at home, I was out on my own exploring my world, unaccounted for, until dinner.
This was a lot of set up for my main point: my kids do not have this. They don’t know what they’re missing, and we don’t know how this might handicap them later. The world is no more dangerous now. Seems it was already riddled with pedophiles needing help finding their lost dogs. We barely had seatbelts in the 70s. It feels like as parents we’re just holding on a lot tighter these days?
With this in mind, I’ve given Harry an extra measure of free range on this trip. Unintentionally at first!
On our first day in Reykjavik, we explored the city a bit, walked down to the waterfront, and then back up the hill and found a café. I was working away on my laptop after we finished our croissants and hot beverages. Harry said, “I’ll meet you back at our hotel.” I distractedly said okay, sure, thinking I’d catch up to him right outside in a minute.
10 minutes went by, and I realized I should probably get out there and join him. I thought he’d probably be looking in the windows of shops on the street outside. No sign of him. I went to the corner, looked up and down both streets. Gone baby gone. I circled the block, starting to worry that I lost my son in a foreign country. Finally I gave up and left proximity of the café and walked to our hotel on a parallel street 3 blocks away.
Harry was sitting in the sun on the front steps, just people watching. My heart rate normalized. I nonchalantly asked him, “How’d you know your way back?” He said, “I was paying attention and keeping track of where we were.” Duh. Same as we did before cell phones.
Harry returns from a solo mission with his fractional iceberg trophy.
So every time on this trip he asks, “Can I go climb on the rocks, or the icebergs, or the seals, or …?” the answer is, “Yes. Remember, we don’t know if there are hospitals in Greenland. Just make sure there’s at least a body I can bring home to your mother.” He respects that protocol. I think he’s right when he said, “I’ve grown up a lot over the last few days.”
Me too. I’m still watching nearly his every free range movement from an invisible distance, and still checking for signs of breathing every morning when I wake up before him. But that’s on me.
“I’m taking the long way over the mountain. I’ll meet you back at the hostel, okay?” Feels like an eternity, but eventually Harry emerges into view…
Having escorted pebbles from the Irish Sea to the North Sea on the Wainwright Walk, now Benj is eyeing the Appalachian Trail…
