Magnus Goes North With Summer, Day 12

 Saturday June 7

I set the alarm for 5:50, thinking that with the time change, it would be an hour earlier than the time I’d gotten up the previous day. But I woke up at four and it was already light outside. I should have gotten up then, but I was freezing cold so I got into bed and went back to sleep for about 45 minutes. When I got up Ed did too. The sun was already up by then. 

So yes, we did get a really early start for our wildlife drive. But the sun beat us.

Off we went to the North Unit Scenic Drive. It was windy and alternately chilly when the sun went behind the clouds, and warm when the clouds moved away. Very nice scenery; not eye-dropping like Utah, but quite lovely. Lots of buffalo and turkey. One deer. On the drive home we saw a small herd of  pronghorn by the side of the highway, ten miles away from the park.

 

 I found a tick on my hand in the morning, bitten in but not engorged yet. Made me wonder if I had them all over my body, but that’s the only one I could find.

After getting up so early, it was hard making ourselves sit around at the motorhome and wait until afternoon to go back to the park. But after discussion, we realized that we’d need to go to the grocery sometime in the next few days.  And it was a good day for that, because the wind was blowing hard and making conditions for a walk in the park miserable. So that’s what we did—go to Walmart.

Horrible, as usual. Can you believe that they only had two brands of tortillas, Mission and Guerro?  No Ole brand, or even some other brand that isn’t full of all sorts of hydrogenated oil and weird “binding” additives.  So I decided to just get a loaf of bread instead, and they didn’t have Dave’s Good Seed Bread! 

Barbarism.

But we got the other stuff we wanted, and went on to the South Unit of the park.

  There we saw the visitor center, buffalo all over the place

  

some prairie dogs

 and a casual vistor who walked through the prairie dog town

We saw a few of the scenic views and overlooks and hoodoos and stuff (although nothing as cool as the hoodoos at Palo Duro Canyon).  But eventually we realized that we were running low on gas. Driving west on I-94 directly into a 40-mph wind had dropped our over-a-half-full tank of gas to under a quarter full.  So we went home, stopping on the way for gas.

Molly got her afternoon and evening walks at the RV Park. We walked in the grass along the street for about five minutes, then back, then around the back of the park for about five minutes, then back, then along the street….

You get the idea.  I do so very much dislike RV parks, even one so nice as this one.

  

 

 REVIEW: Oleo Acres RV Park $40 site 5?

Very nice itty bitty park by the highway

Right off US-85 with a constant noise from traffic, but such a nice little place!  If they ever get all their half-done improvements finished, it will be a 4-1/2 star facility. (You can’t get away from that highway noise).

At present they have about six pull-thru sites and about five back-in ones, all very nicely graveled and decently separated from each other.  Utilities are easy to use and spaced correctly. There is a part of a dog park built and what looks like they’re planning to make into a common area.  And a nice big building that they could make into an office. Sorry, I didn’t ask what their plans were. But at present, none of this is finished.

The managers or hosts or owners (also didn’t ask) are very nice.  We paid by filling out a small paper form and dropping it and a personal check into the office door.  They take cash, too.  The lady said she didn’t care which I used; it was all the same to her.

It’s perfectly convenient to both the north and south units of TRNP.  About a 30 minute drive to the south unit; about 25 minutes to the north.