The End of the Road

We have finally arrived home, safe and sound!!! For those of you that are thinking "But, I thought they were still in Colorado?" Well, we were but Nebraska and Iowa do not really tickle our fancy so we drove straight through. The last few hours in the car we had a lot of time to reflect on our trip. What an amazing experience this was and we are so lucky to have seen so much of North America. We gathered some statistics that we thought our readers might find interesting...

We were gone for 193 days.

Our blog has had 7,760 views (Excluding this post, obviously)

We drove through 16 states (Including WI) and 3 Canadian Providences.

We put on over 20,000 miles on the Jeep. Plus 3000 miles more in RV's.

We put roughly 15,000 miles on the Sweaty Yeti.

We took meticulous notes of the money that we spent on this trip and we managed to save  $2268.42 with our National Park Pass, Alaska State Park Pass, coupons, and AAA membership. 

The most we payed for gas was $4.94 per gallon at Muncho Lake, British Columbia, Canada

The cheapest gas we payed for was $1.97 per gallon at Buffalo, WY

For the trip home we spent 155 hours and 55 minutes in the Jeep. 

We visited 20 National Parks in America and 3 National Parks in Canada. 

We became Jr. Rangers at 14 of those National Parks.

Below is the complete list of National Parks that we visited:

Badlands National Park (South Dakota)

Mt. Rainier National Park (Washington)

Olympic National Park (Washington)

Denali National Park (Alaska)

Kenai Fjords National Park (Alaska)

Wrangell St. Elias National Park (Alaska)

Jasper National Park (Canada)

Banff National Park (Canada)

Kootenay National Park (Canada)

Glacier National Park (Montana)

Yellowstone National Park (Wyoming)

Grand Tetons National Park (Wyoming)

Great Basin National Park (Nevada)

Zion National Park (Utah)

Grand Canyon National Park (Arizona)

Bryce Canyon National Park (Utah)

Capitol Reed National Park (Utah)

Arches National Park (Utah)

Canyonlands National Park (Utah)

Mesa Verde National Park (Colorado)

Black Canyon of the Gunnison National Park (Colorado)

Great Sand Dunes National Park (Colorado)

Rocky Mountain National Park (Colorado)

We actually decided to rank the national parks that we visited and created several categories to judge them on. These categories include the visitor center/gift shop, niceness of rangers, Jr. Ranger booklets, how much we enjoyed our time there, geologic uniqueness, and if they had "The X-Factor". They were also deducted points for large crowds and lack of ability to accommodate these crowds. Out of a total of 30 points the top 5 parks were:

1. Great Basin National Park (28 points)

2. Canyonlands National Park (25 points)

3. Wrangell St. Elias National Park (23 Points)

4. Bryce Canyon National Park (20 Points)

5. Kenai Fjords National Park (19 Points)

Looking back over the entire experience there are definitely some days that stand out in our mind as days we will treasure forever. At the top of our list was the glacier hike we took over the 4th of July. Hiking 6 miles over our first glacier with a great guide in great weather was our absolute favorite Alaskan memory. Tied for second place was halibut fishing with Ashley's parents in Homer, AK and the glacier cruise with Adam's family. We could not have picked a better experience to have with our family's. This trip was truly amazing and we consider ourselves to be so blessed in that we could have this experience. It is something that we will remember for the rest of our lives. 

Seeing as this is our last blog we thought we would end it on a happy note...here are some blooper photos that did not quite make the original cut...

Some may ask "Why?". To that we say "Why not!"

Bring it bears, try me! 

Now that is the face of astonishment. 

Oh, did you call my name? 

Touche Adam

There was just too much excitement...

We are waiting on Trya Banks to recruit us for America's Next Top Model any day now.

The fear is real. The science is unknown. 

Oooooooo, bubble. 

High Fashion

Awwwwwwwww

Someone is impressed with her own work

"I'm too sexy for this lake." 

Scandalous. A bear pooped in the woods! 

Blue Steel

Hey Girl Hey! 

Don't worry, Adam doesn't know what he is doing either!

Someone got too excited, shocker. 

Ashley attempting 007...this is just one of many attempts.

Disco on a glacier

Of course he bought the shirt. 

Meat, cheese, and bread. Doesn't get much better than that for a Wisconsinite. 

Again, Ashley was just a little bit excited to go hiking on  a glacier. 

Ashley was ready for the photo, Adams face speaks the truth. Pure exhaustion. 

The tunnel must be at least three times bigger than this!

The face of pure excitement. 

CLIFF EDGES! 

We don't even know where this photo was taken. The background gives us no hints whatsoever. 

Ashley's hair was even scared of the cliff edge.

We would just like to thank all of you from the bottom of our hearts for reading this blog. Writing this and sharing our adventures with you was so much fun! Never in our wildest dreams did we imagine that the blog would be read by so many of our friends and family and people whom we have not had the pleasure of meeting. We hope that you got a laugh or two from it and will go out and adventure the next chance you get. Until the next adventure.

-The A-Team