"Phoenix" 5'x11' Build

[cjlangellier]

Today is the big day! We hit the road at 6:30am and pointed the truck and trailer west. Should make it to Denver around 10pm. We’ll spend a day on Denver with friends before heading to Grand Teton National Park. Full reveal will follow once we get our first site setup.

[western traveler]

That is awesome Cody!
Looking forward to it..

[cjlangellier]

Calm before a monster storm in Brush, CO.

[Capebuild]

Great photo!

[cjlangellier]

Was able to get our solar panel installed in the driveway of our friends house in Denver. Off to the woods tomorrow!

[GarthB]

Looks great Cody! Sounds like you got a good first rainstorm test.

[cjlangellier]

Looks great Cody! Sounds like you got a good first rainstorm test.

Thanks Garth! It was a test that’s for sure. The storm dumped about 3” of rain in 30 mins along with dime sized hail. Thankfully we were very near a gas station and made our way under the awning before suffering any hail damage. We did develop a very small leak in the sunroof which I diagnosed fairly quick and believe I resolved when we were in Denver.

We finally made it to Jackson, Wy! 1500 miles later and we are finally sleeping in our first camp site. It was fairly difficult to track down a campsite in the National Forest. Our first attempt found us climbing some steep very poorly maintained forest roads. The trailer and truck handled the climb and the battering from the trail exceptionally well. The only casualty was the eggs in our cooler Lesson learned only egg beaters in a carton from now on haha. We ended up in a very remote are to the south east of the national park. We have a gorgeous view and ate an exceptional dinner. All in all a resounding success for a shakedown trip of this magnitude. I’ll update with pictures as soon as I get enough signal to upload them.

[cjlangellier]

First meal from the galley. Lunch on the road to Jackson, WY



Just before our run up Curtis Canyon outside of Grand Tetons National Park


First campsite. Dispersed camping in Bridger Teton National Forest

[Bezoar]

Looks like fun - That's the picture in my mind that keeps me slogging on in my build!!

[cjlangellier]

Been a few days since I had cell service. We spent a few days in the Grand Tetons then motored up to Yellowstone. We are currently sitting in a parking lot waiting to try to get a camp site in Glacier National Park. I’ll dump photos now and update on our trip in more detail later.

[western traveler]

You may have passed mighty close to me. Hope you got your campsite. Many Glacier campground by chance? My favorite. Lots of good hiking trails from there. (I would love for my first trip with the tear to be there this year. It’s 100 miles away).

[cjlangellier]

You may have passed mighty close to me. Hope you got your campsite. Many Glacier campground by chance? My favorite. Lots of good hiking trails from there. (I would love for my first trip with the tear to be there this year. It’s 100 miles away).

It’s very possible! We came in the park through West Glacier and stayed at Apgar Campground. We had no reservations for the entire trip so we made a calculation that Apgar was our best shot at a campsite. Day 1 we arrived just before the timed entry ended and we missed out on a spot so we camped in the Horse Tooth Reservoir. It was fairly close to the park and quite for the most part. We arrived at the park the next morning at 4:45 and had to wait in line until 8:00 AM but we landed a fantastic camping site. Unfortunately we somehow didn’t get a picture of the site. I think it’s the only one we missed. We absolutely loved Glacier but it was completely overrun with visitors. We made the decision to try to hit the highlights since we were only in the park for a few days. The first two days we struggled just to find a parking spot for a trailhead on Going to the Sun road. On day three we got up at 4:45 and were at Logan’s pass at 6:30 and still couldn’t land a spot at the visitors center. We parked 0.5 mile away at a pull out and hiked up to the Highline Trail. We hiked out about 4 miles then came back and did the Hidden Lake trail. We plan to stay in Many Glacier when we return for a backpacking trip in a few years.

We left through East Glacier and followed Highway 2 over to 89 and followed that to Great Falls

[cjlangellier]

I’ll do another quick pic dump and run through a recap of our trip later this week. We are at our final campsite of our trip and I’m feeling a bit dizzy from the whirlwind our trip was. Tonight we are in Blue Mounds State Park in Minnesota. One final 8 hour push home awaits us tomorrow morning.

Horse Tooth Reservoir forest road


Black Hills National Forest


Blue Mounds State Park Minnesota


Random Pics from all our stops.








Happy Campers!

[tony.latham]

Tonight we are in Blue Mounds...

Thanks for sharing this great trip with your marvelous camper.

Have you kept track of the number of teardrops you've seen?



Tony

[western traveler]

You may have passed mighty close to me. Hope you got your campsite. Many Glacier campground by chance? My favorite. Lots of good hiking trails from there. (I would love for my first trip with the tear to be there this year. It’s 100 miles away).

We plan to stay in Many Glacier when we return for a backpacking trip in a few years.

We left through East Glacier and followed Highway 2 over to 89 and followed that to Great Falls

Great Falls is where I am buying most of my incidental supplies. It is 50 minutes East.

How sweet it must have been to park in line and jump into the tear while waiting for them to open the gate!

I usually camp in Glacier in May/mid June. Usually uncrowded that early as Going to the Sun road is seldom open yet. I heard that wasn’t the case this year. Crowded early along with Yellowstone.

You’d be welcome to roll through here on your next trip.

Like Tony curious if you got a tear count.