We slept in a Walmart parking lot in Rapid City after getting back from the Badlands. It was dark and snowing by 5pm so we just found a place to stay put.

The snow didn't seem to be sticking, the ground was still relatively warm. Louie and I skateboarded through the slushy parking lot for about an hour to build up an appetite. Dinner would consist of, you guessed it, Nature Valley Fruit & Nut Bars. They were frozen, as usual. After a dozen ice cold bars each, we attempted sleep.

I woke up that morning at around 3am. I think I might've fallen asleep around 10pm. Louie might've been up as well, but I wouldn't know. I was keeping quiet, shivering under my blanket with my arms pulled into the torso of my thermal shirt. After 30 minutes of trying to fall back to sleep and ignore my freezing toes, I decided to turn the car on to crank the heat. Louie was up at this point and we just sat there, waiting to feel warm.

Louie ordering breakfast wearing his thermals...

"We're not falling back to sleep, are we?", Louie muttered.

"Not a chance", I confirmed.

It wasn't snowing anymore so I decided to just start driving to Yellowstone. I wasn't sure if Yellowstone was going to be open due to the sudden inclement weather, but I wanted to give it a shot anyway. We were driving in the dark on I-90 for about an hour. Louie fell back to sleep minutes after I left the Walmart parking lot. At one point I realized that the snow was starting to start up again so I turned into the first available lot off the interstate. That ended up being the State of Wyoming Visitors Center. We used the bathrooms there and slept in the car there for another 2 hours or so.

We woke up in a dense fog, practically zero visibility. I could see maybe 30 yards ahead of my car. I waited for an impatient amount of time to see if the fog would disperse before getting back onto the interstate.

I drove at a leisurely 55mph behind a tractor trailer for what felt like an hour before the fog let up. We could finally start moving. The sky was still heavily diffused by a seemingly endless amount of clouds which only made the landscape appear that much more remote. The surroundings looked the way you imagine a video game looks beyond the game maps borders, rendered with grey nothingness in every direction on a looping path that seems to be repeating, making you question if you are actually covering any ground.

Soon enough we were seeing signs for Yellowstone National Park. Scenic routes to the eastern entrance were advertised and we were sold on them. The route would bend north to have us pass over the Cloud Peak Wilderness Area, something that I greatly underestimated.

As we ascended thousands of feet into the mountains, the world grew colder, larger, and began to consume me. Where were we? I wasn't sure but it was gorgeous. The mountains and trees were so vibrant with greens and blues, snow garnishing the mountain flora like dollops of whipped cream. I'm writing on an empty stomach...

As soon as the beauty took me by surprise, so did the anxiety. Where was the pavement going? It seemed to be disappearing underneath layers of packed snow and ice, featuring the tread marks of much larger and more appropriate mountiain vehicles. Alas, another terrain that Honda didn't equip this civic for. I could feel the car slipping more and more as the road soon transformed into a bunny hill. I was actually starting to freak out and was seriously considering turning around. The problem with that however was that I was going downhill and would lose my precious momentum if I decided to abort the mission. Onward we went!

Treachery ensued for another 20 minutes before we began our final descent back over the western side of the mountain range. Thank god. The pavement slowly revealed itself as we advanced into warmer weather, and just as soon as the roads became safer, that impenetrable fog returned.

We stopped at a gas station to get resources. I overheard the counter person in the gas station talking to a local, apparently someone flipped their car on their way to Yellowstone. Jeez. Gas, coffee, snacks, we were on our way.

So much snowy foggy nothingness. It was like purgatory. We did see some sheep though. Sheep in the abyss. We were so happy to see them. We could officially add them to our list of animals spotted along the trip.

We finally made it to Cody, Wyoming, the last town you pass through before heading into Yellowstone's eastern entrance. Cody's a fine little town. They have a Walmart, a big high school, a couple food joints, and a bunch of expensive hotels.

We quickly learned that the majority of the park was closed due to the weather. We could attempt the Northern entrance but that was quite the drive with little guarantee. In lieu of our cancelled plans, we made our camp in the cozy little Walmart parking lot. It was much smaller than most of the super centers we had lived at previously.

Obviously we had to visit their Chinese buffet. I give it 3 and a half stars. What can I say, we are becoming Chinese buffet snobs.

We returned to the car and prepped ourselves for what would be the coldest night we'd be sleeping in. We blasted the heat once last time before turning the car off and the waited for the cold to rock us to sleep.

When I awoke, it was 11˚F in the car. I think it was around 4 or 5 am. We were frozen. All of the windows were frozen with snow so I opened the door to see what was going on outside. The door was also frozen shut so I had to really push to open it up. I felt like a baby chick cracking through the shell of an egg. I winced into the bleach white scenery and saw that it was snowing and sticking quickly. Oh jeez.

We attempted to sleep until the sun came up. When it did we ran the car for as long as we had to so that the windshield would defrost. We agreed that we'd have to get a room in the neighboring Super 8 for the night since the snow was to continue all day long.

After getting a room, we warmed up and took showers. Our day consisted of watching Jurassic Park in the room, a long cold walk through the snow, a little whiskey, more Chinese buffet, and sleeping. We would leave the next day since the weather was forecasted to be 40˚F and sunny. The roads should be safe.

That next morning we packed the car, scraped the ice off the windshield, and received some helpful driving advice from the Super 8 staff before hitting the road. Since the snow was expected to continue in the higher elevation areas, we had to forgo Grand Tetons National Park. South for Denver it was! It would be about 7 and a half hours.

This time we passed through some beautiful valleys and canyons before hitting more plains. The canyons were detailed with signs displaying the age of the rocks exposed. Some dated back to more than 350 million years old!

The plains that followed were desolate. I remember specifically passing a town called Hiland, Wyoming, that hosted a population of 10 people. It was essentially a trailer park in the middle of nowhere. If you've ever seen the cartoon Courage The Cowardly Dog, it was like that.

Shortly after passing Hiland, going the legal 80 mph down the highway, I'm passed by a tractor trailer going what was definitely going 90+ mph. Well thhe gust created by the truck passing was so strong, that it flung the cars hood support rod out of place and into the car battery terminals thus shorting out my car. In other words, my car went into arrest. First the radio shut off, then the check engine light came on, then the check oil light came on, and finally the whole thing shut down. Idling down the interstate I quickly pull over and park the car in.

Louie was sleeping the whole time so he slowly woke up to me restarting the car. I turned the key and it came on in a jiff. Holy shit that was scary. It felt like an enemy spacecraft launched an EMP and disabled all of my ships instruments. I didnt consider going to a shop for a second knowing that the closest town was fucking Hiland, and I sure as hell didn't want to go there for help. I kept driving and had no problems all the way to Denver.

We arrived around 5:30pm or so and visited a marijuana dispensary to see what all the fuss was about. Afterwards we got dinner at a McDonalds. This McDonalds was really poppin, but not in the good way. Like a lot of aggressive homeless people just standing by the soda machine staring at you. When I told the cashier my meal was to stay, she asked me, "Are you sure?"

We stayed at Louie's friends place that night. Her name is Sylvia and the two of them went to Emerson together. We hung out at her place for the night. Louie and her caught up and we fell asleep around midnight.

After the driving I did from Kentucky all the way through Wyoming, and seeing so much barren, quiet property for hundreds of miles, I was refreshed to be back in a familiar city.

Denver would be a nice checkpoint to reset in. I knew the weather from here on out would align with our journey going forward. It was time to chill out.