This post represents the first installment in the series documenting our West Coast National Parks trip in the summer of 2017. We logged a total of 8,513 memorable miles of adventure over the course of five and a half weeks. Read all about it here – the good, the bad, and the very, very ugly.
Previously, on Reflections Around the Campfire . . . In 2007, one year after we bought our first travel trailer, Alan and I recreated our honeymoon travels with our two kids during our family of four’s first cross-country National Parks trip. The second followed in 2010. This third cross-country National Parks trip would be our final one. Not our final trip, of course, but the last one dedicated to visiting as many National Parks as possible. Once this trip was completed, Alan and I would have hit all of the Parks designated “high priority” on our Bucket List. Following this trip, we would continue to visit National Parks and Monuments, but at a more leisurely pace, fitting those visits into future trip itineraries that focused on more than just National Parks.
In 2017, our daughter, Kyra, had just graduated from high school and had no employment commitments over the summer, so the timing was perfect for her to join Alan and me on this third National Parks trip. It had been on the planning board for years, while we waited until the time was right to execute those plans. Unfortunately, our son, Ryan, five years older than his sister, was already working full time, and his allotted vacation days wouldn’t cover the extended trip. This was the only one of our cross-country National Parks trips that didn’t include both kids, and we missed Ryan (and his good luck) immensely.
