The first month of summer was a whirlwind.
You’ve already read about our trip to South Dakota. One week after returning home from that trip, I flew to Canada (with a couple stops en route) for my annual girls trip with my friends. I returned home for a week and a half and then was off again, this time to Idaho for my annual(ish) mother-daughter road trip.
I’m back home now – for the next few weeks, at least – which means it’s time to start sharing these adventures with you all. As I’ve done before, I’m going to begin with some photos from the air (and also a few from the ground) from these trips.
Colorado to Canada
From here, I had a layover in Seattle en route to Canada. It was predictably cloudy and rainy on the west coast, but I still managed to capture a few photos along the way.
Canada to Colorado
To begin, a couple of my favorite photos from my time in Canada. We had one beautiful day in the mountains (more on this in my next post) and one cloudy, rainy, and cold day in the mountains (as you can see in the photos below).
Any day in the mountains is a good day, though.
Days in the mountains with friends are even better.
I really only have one photo worth sharing from the flight back home because it was cloudy most of the way, and once it wasn’t cloudy, it was unpleasantly bumpy.
Have I mentioned how much I hate flying in and out of Colorado? So much turbulence. I enjoy flying… right up until the moment the plane starts bouncing up and down. Then I’m not a fan.
Colorado to Idaho
Trip #2 began with a flight to my mom’s house for the start of our roadtrip. It was partially cloudy for much of the flight, but I did manage to snap a couple landscape photos and there was a break in the clouds just as we flew directly over what I’m fairly certain is Norris Geyser Basin in Yellowstone. Whatever it is, I could actually see the hot spring pools from the air (and if you zoom in on the second photo below, you probably can too)!
Idaho to Colorado
And finally, we have my journey back to Colorado, once again largely defined by clouds. We were on day 3 of rain when I departed, and there was just a small gap in the middle of the flight between when the clouds dissipated and the smoke began. Multiple fast-growing wildfires broke out in Colorado while I was away, blanketing the state with layers of smoke and ash. I fear it’s going to be a devastating summer.
If you have any rain to spare, please send it our way. We so desperately need it.
With that in mind, I’m actually not sure how many Colorado adventures I’ll have to share with you all this summer. We have an overnight backpacking trip planned in a couple weeks that I really hope we can still pull off, and I have various other local hikes and 14ers I’d like to accomplish as well. I don’t hike when the air quality is poor, though, or in areas where I’d be hindering firefighting efforts or potential evacuations, so I’m uncertain how many of these plans will actually come to fruition.
But in the meantime, I have these adventures in Canada and Idaho to share, so that will be the focus for the next few weeks. Stay tuned!
Up next: Hiking to Grassi Lakes in Canmore, Alberta
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