With the end of our long-awaited road trip, in between home maintenance chores, we have had time to think about what was the best (and in one case, worse) places and things we experienced. I asked each of our road trippers the same seven questions and all the answers were different!
Listed below are our favorites as well as one place that we don’t think we need to see again. Surprisingly, none of us mentioned the accident in Albuquerque! But we agree that we don’t ever want to go through that again!
Just one final note. Be sure to subscribe to our website and journal posts (an opportunity is listed right after this entry). Though this road trip is over, we are already planning our next and you don’t want to miss it! Also, we are working on adding a link to Campgroundreviews.com where you will find notes on the campgrounds we visited under the name BigDogsRoadTrip.
So here we go, the winners (and one loser each) are:
Glen
Favorite Campground: I have two. Thousand Lakes Campground in Torrey, Utah (we could see the rock formations like those of Capital Reef National Park from our campsite) and Rancho Sedona in Sedona, Arizona (beautiful landscaping, tall trees, great dog run, Oak Creek, lots to do in walking distance)
Favorite National Park: Rocky Mountain National Park, Colorado (the animals, the snow, and the photography tour)
Favorite Place: Birdsville, Kentucky right on the bank of the Ohio River (resting and watching the barges go by)
Favorite Experience: Driving a 2021 Corvette at the Corvette Museum, Bowling Green, Kentucy (120 miles per hour!)
Favorite Food: Pecan Pie at the Traverse City Pie Company, Michigan (Don’t tell my mom, but it was the best I have ever tasted)
Most Surprising Place: The Needles, Custer State Park, South Dakota (it was beyond my imagination)
Place I don’t need to go back and see: The Badlands, South Dakota, and Wyoming (you’ve seen one Badlands, you’ve seen them all)
Cathy:
Favorite Campground: Newhalem Campground in North Cascades National Park, Washington (right on the Skagit River-we could hear it from our campsite)
Favorite National Park: (I can’t choose one, they are all too different!) Mt Rainier National Park (mountains and waterfalls), Badlands National Park (desert and prairie) and Indiana Dunes National Park (lakeshore and historic buildings)
Favorite Place: Cannon Beach, Oregon (Really, I should have been born there-rain, mist, fog, and a beautiful beach where dogs are allowed)
Favorite Experience: Horseback Riding in Bryce Canyon National Park (we got to see parts of the park that we never could have hiked to)
Favorite Food: Fried Chicken and Grits, Greys Restaurant, Lynchburg, Virginia (but the chocolate covered cherries in Michigan were awesome!)
Most Surprising Place: Flagstaff, Arizona (mountainous, woodsy and snow, not what you think of when you think of Arizona plus a great historic downtown and a wonderful glass shop)
Place I don’t need to go back and see: Page, Arizona (no offense to Page, but it was extremely hot in early June and because of Covid, nothing we wanted to see was open!)
Cory:
Favorite Campground: Munising Tourist Park, Munising, Michigan (right on Lake Superior)
Favorite National Park: Glacier National Park (because of all the animals and I got to swim in a glacier filled lake)
Favorite Place: Pacific Beach, Washington (no people, big beach, and no leash)
Favorite Experience: Hiking Hocking Hills State Park in Ohio (it was interesting with caves, canyons, waterfalls, and my mom was with me)
Favorite Food: Crab Legs at Pacific Beach (the crabs molt and their skins float to shore; it was a smorgasbord!)
Most Surprising Place: Makoshika State Park in Glendive, Montana (there were so many pretty places and we got up before dawn to see the sun rise over the rock formations)
Place I don’t need to go back and see: Boynton Canyon in Sedona, Arizona (I thought my mom was going to die there and she kept telling me to go with Dad even though I was trying to help her)
Lark:
Favorite Campground: Countryside Campground, Mogadore, Ohio (my friend, Micah, and I got to run and chase balls in their big dog park)
Favorite National Park: Theodore Roosevelt National Park (the prairie dogs!)
Favorite Place: Cheyenne State Park, Colorado Springs, Colorado (the deer were right in our campsite, there was a secret government site hidden under Cheyenne Mountain and we hiked a lot without getting lost)
Favorite Experience: Playing in the snow in Albuquerque, New Mexico (Why? What do you think? Because it was fun? And cold?)
Favorite Food: Goose Poop in Ashland, Wisconsin on Lake Superior
Most Surprising Place: My adopted sister Christina’s house in Virginia (I thought it would be BORING, but we got to chase chickens and run a lot)
Place I don’t need to go back and see: Anywhere with rocks. Or canyons. We saw too many rocks. I think we saw 1,000 places with rocks. No one million. No more rocks.)
Great story, looks like you had a blast! Thanks for sharing!