August 3, 2015 Hike to the Craters, Indian Tunnel and 3 Caves

Monday, August 3, 2015 Hike to the Craters, Indian Tunnel and 3 Caves

We were at the Craters of the Moon at 7 am.  We wanted to beat the heat of the day.  We first started with a 2 mile hike to see the Craters.  I was okay with one but we actually saw 3.  These craters were very deep and different colors.  It was very enlightening.

 

Next hike was to the Indian Tunnel.  You had to climb down over the lava rocks to get to the bottom and then continue to the end and climb up some more rocks and climb through the hole.  This was pretty cool.  Didn’t find any bats!

We continued on to the caves.  Our first cave, Dewdrop Cave, was pretty easy.  We still had to do some rock climbing but it wasn’t too bad.  Next, was Boy Scout Cave, Mike decided to go down this one on his own.  It was pretty cold down there and there were some small tight places.  Mike did find something strange down there that he brought to the attention of the Rangers.  It looked like a banana covered in frost.  Our last cave, Beauty Cave, this was the biggest one yet.  I did crawl down into it but once I got to the bottom there was a huge room.  We were only able to go down so far as the other half was unsafe.  After all of this visiting to the tunnels and caves we ended up walking 4 more miles giving us a total of 6 miles this morning.

We then went an hour down the road to the Indian Ice Cave.  This was very unusual cave.  They told us that it was a ¾ mile hike one way and 160 steps.  Oh my!!!! As we descended into the cave it just kept getting colder and colder to the tune of 28 degrees and it was 80 degrees at the top.  There was definitely ice in this cave and it stays frozen year round.

This has definitely been an interesting and informative day.  Tomorrow we are headed to Grand Tetons.  Wonder what we will see!!!!

Total miles that we walked today was 7.5 miles.  Before we know it we are going to hit 10 miles.

THE THREE CRATERS

Looks like a pair of eyes right?

Spatter Cone

Lava Cascades

Lava Tube

Indian Fire Ring

Entrance to Indian Tunnel

Our way out of tunnel

Mike going up to exit

Black Tar Road

Entrance to Dewdrop Cave

Entrance to Boy Scout Cave

Ice Stalactites

Mysterious frost

Entrance to Beauty Cave

Inside of cave

Entrance looking from the inside of Beauty Cave

What we saw driving into the Ice Caves Entrance--Hilarious

temperature inside ice cave

bones of a bear in cave

Ice pond inside cave

Some more ice

Ice Wishing Well

Our campsite

Teepees that people were sleeping in

Nice dog park with nice grass

Nice KOA in Arco, Idaho

August 2, 2015 Travel day and a trip to Craters of the Moon, Idaho

Sunday, August 2, 2015 Travel day and a trip to Craters of the Moon, Idaho

Today we have a 6 hour trip ahead of us to a campground close to Craters of the Moon.  Mike had seen something on this and thought that it would be kind of interesting.  As I was looking at the map I noticed that there was a Shoshone Ice Cave that I thought was interesting so we are going to try to do both.

We found a KOA that was within 20 miles of the Craters of the Moon.  That works for us.  So we decided that we would go into the park to the visitors center and get some information.  Well information we got and we then went on a 7 mile loop to see what we would like to do tomorrow.  We settled on a hike to actually see a crater and another hike to a lava tunnel and some caves.  We are going to start early before the temperature gets up there.  After that we will go to the cave where the temperature will be in the 30's.

The trip around wasn't anything of what we had imagined.  We saw lots of lava in all shapes, sizes and formation.  Different shapes of trees and some flowers that grow in this environment.  This lava field was active as early as 2000 years ago. There is a connection to Yellowstone being that the same hot spots that give Yellowstone it's geysers and hot springs also gave this area the lava.

The road before us

Looks like a castle made out of hay

A pair of hawk's

Swainson's Hawk we think

and the road just keeps on going

Limber pines

VARIOUS PICTURES OF THE LAVA ROCKS

Dwarf Buckwheat

A field of dwarf buckwheat

We are staying in Arco, Idaho and this was just an interesting fact

Nice tradition

August 1, 2015 A drive to Our Lady of the Rockies

Saturday, August 1, 2015 A drive to Our Lady of the Rockies

All that was on our agenda today was to take a bus ride to Our Lady of the Rockies Statue.  This is a 90 foot statue done in the likeness of Mary, Mother of Jesus.  She sits at 8510 feet above sea level overlooking Butte, Montana.  She is also on top of the Continental Divide.  The bus ride had a lot to be desired but all 35 of us made it in one piece.  They are working on getting a tram to go up to the statue in the near future which in my opinion is a plus. The history of the building of her and putting her on top of this mountain were very interesting.  It also took them 6 years to build but they did a wonderful job.  She is almost as tall as the Statue of Liberty which stands at 111 feet.

Happy Birthday, Pat B!!

Our first look at the statue from Butte

The working mine taken from top of mountain

Butte from the top

Our Lady of the Rockies

Back of her with the  the bus as comparison

Well Known Women on the Chapel Wall

The Chapel

Final look at Our Lady 

July 31, 2015 Mining for sapphires, brothel house and memorial to miners

Friday, July 31, 2015 Mining for sapphires, brothel house and memorial to miners

Our first stop today was to go to Gem Mountain in Philipsburg to try and find some raw sapphires.  We had done something similar to this in North Carolina.  I was hoping to find a big enough one for them to fire and then cut.  We did find a lot of small ones and only 1 that I could do something with which I elected not too.  We had fun and that is all that matters.  As we were looking for these jewels in the dirt one of the workers had mentioned that he sees moose almost every time he goes down this one road so guess what? Off we go to go find this moose.  Mike is still trying to get a look at a real moose.  No luck.  We had lunch at Doe Brothers Restaurant.  It has a soda fountain that dates back to 1920 and all of the tables were full so we sat at the counter.  We ordered a shake that was big enough for the both of us to share and a bison hamburger that we should of shared.  Both were delicious.  I even had home made potato chips that I took home because I was stuffed.

We left Philipsburg and headed to Butte, MT.  I read about this brothel and of course Mike was all for it.  Dumas Brothel was built in the Victorian style in 1890 and ran until 1982.Rumor has it that it was still in business in the early 90's.   I thought that is was very interesting of all of the stories that were put up on the walls.  Still a lot of work needs to be done but you get the idea as to what it was like back in the days of old.  There was an underground tunnels that went from the brothal to the hotels in the area and there are ghosts.  We didn't see any though.

We left and continued up the hill to the Granite Mountain Monument Overlook. This is a memorial to the 168 men that died in 1917 in a mine fire.  It had recordings of letters that were written by some miners that were trapped.  It is on top the mountain were you can get a panoramic view of the surrounding area,  You can also see mine heads around.  It was a very moving and peaceful setting all at the same time.

Nice ending to our day of sightseeing.

Happy Birthday, Glenda!

Here is what sapphires look like in the rough

This is one way to decorate your trees for Halloween

A Bald Eagle waiting for breakfast

Alicia here is another horse for you

This is downstairs were the miners would go

The Madam's bedroom

and her living room

Upstairs room were the wealthy would go

The Dumas Brothel 

The Memorial

View from the Memorial looking over the mines