From the Rock River Times

By Don Miller, Education Director, Severson Dells Nature Center

There was a young family out to Severson Dells Nature Center recently and they were telling me about their experience of vacationing in Yellowstone National Park. It made me think of the two times that I had visited out there, once as a kid of about eight and then later as a Dad of three kids.

As I listened to the family tell their tales I thought that the beauty of the awe-inspiring mountains had not changed through the years. The vistas, flora and fauna, the hiking trails and the feeling of wonderment of nature still remain as powerful as ever. To be in the middle of a herd of hundreds of buffalo as they cross the road, or to see bears, moose, elk or pika is as thrilling for them as it was for me at 8 or 40. What did the people that first came upon the Yellowstone area think? That’s a question I ask now as I did almost 50 years earlier. The mountain region is truly a national treasure and needs protection from all that threatens it.

The changes that have occurred have more to do with the vacationers than the landscape. Fifty plus years in the lives of people is a long time. Fifty plus years in the life of a mountain isn’t even a blink of an eye. If you are a baby boomer maybe you can relate to some of the things I am about to mention. If you are not a “boomer” well? this is the way it was. In the early sixties the minivan was a thing of the future. My folks packed our family into a wood-grain sided Country Squire station wagon and we left in the wee hours of the morning. All of us kids were stacked in the back, lying on top of sleeping bags, tents, and the weaker, younger ones in the group would be on top of the cooler or some other hard object. (It was based on the pecking order.) As we crossed Nebraska, there was a battle to stay away from the sunny, hot side of the car. I’m not sure looking back if we had air conditioning or if we just didn’t use it. Passing through Nebraska as a dad some years later it was 105 degrees, we used the air conditioning and appreciated the tinted windows.

On our last travels all my kids had their walkmans/discman to listen to their own choice of music. The family I had just talked to said their kids had iphones and video games to amuse themselves. I kind of miss the old times when there was only an AM radio to tune in. Every hundred miles or so you had to dial in a new station because the one you were listening to faded out. It didn’t really matter, because all the stations from here to the mountains played the same three songs over and over and over again. I still know the words to “Tie Me Kangaroo Down Sport” and “Baby Don’t Go”. (Yikes!) We played the license plate game as do some modern families. Unlike my dad, I feel the need to stop for ice cream often. Oh so many ice cream stands we went clapping and barking by like seals, only to see them disappear into the horizon out the dusty back window. While driving high in the mountains I didn’t pay attention to where on the road dad was driving. I was fighting the pecking order so I could get a spot with a view. I’m sure he wasn’t like me and used the yellow line down the middle of the road to straddle the car with. (I got better by the end of the mountain driving session.)

Sleeping arrangements have changed since my youth in the sixties. We all slept on the ground with no pads or air mattresses. Before our last trip, I bought a four inch queen size air mattress to sleep on. The family I was talking to said they had cots. Mom made us all wear red-hooded sweatshirts (with the hood up and tied) to bed in the mountains. I couldn’t wait to be old enough not to wear that thing. While camping in Yellowstone the last go-round the temperature one night got down into the low-thirties. As I lay there freezing in my sleeping bag, all I could think about was, “I wish I had my red-hooded sweatshirt!!”

Growing up with my brothers and sister we all thought we could be the biggest help around the campsite (and the house for that matter) by getting out of the way. (That hasn’t changed with my kids.) That philosophy of being helpful was probably the cause for one of my favorite quotes from my mom. When asked by neighbor upon us returning from our western trip, “How was the trip?” Mom replied, “It gave me a chance to do the dishes outside! (Believe it or not, some of us kids turned out to be more helpful with age.)

I think I’ll end this rambling with one last thought. There is something ageless about the jokes that can be made while walking on the boardwalk touring Yellowstone’s mud pots. With the strong smell of sulfur in the air there is a bonding of the generations between males during this experience. But, like the “Three Stooges” it seems like the female gender doesn’t find as much humor in it.

I know I didn’t mention the development going on around the Park’s border, or the slaughter of the bison, or the other issues that engulf the area. For now, I remember the smell of bacon cooking in the morning with beautiful mountains in the background, hoping my kids will remember this vacation with fond memories of family and of natural beauty shared.