Jane mentioned to me that it would be fun if I met someone from Sweden. I told her the chances were pretty small, just because there's only about eight million Swedes in Sweden. There's more people in most of the big American cities. Not fifteen minutes later, I asked an extremely fit, blond, middle aged man where he was from, and he was from Sweden. Well, then I spent a half hour speaking to him and it was so much fun. Boy my Swedish is rusty!! This man was pretty sure I was mistaken when I told him that I'd been out of the country for twenty years and then I'd only lived there for two.
My mom pointed out that I'd really been there for two and a half years but that's really that's splitting hairs after being away from the country for two decades.
ANYWAY our conversation went like this, mostly in Swedish.
"I speak a little Swedish"
"Oh wow, you speak Swedish, insert really fast Swedish that I only comprehend every third word or so"
Me "Wait, wait, there's no one to speak Swedish to in Idaho, I haven't heard Swedish in a long time."
Blond Tourist "Oh, I'm speaking to fast."
Me "WAY to fast." (haha!)
Blond tourist looking confused "20 years?"
Me, "I'm OLD, old enough to be the mother of five children!"
I told him that when my children were babies, I sung to them in Swedish but they didn't want to listen to their mother sing anymore.
Pretty much that's how it went. lol. It was great fun and both men were greatly impressed that I knew any Swedish at all, let alone that I remembered enough for some conversation. Jane was THRILLED that I got to speak to Swedes and begged me to teach her Swedish. Unfortunately I don't have the skills anymore to teach.
Jane's big excitement happened Saturday. We were circling around a trail when Jane spotted movement in the trees right below her. Kate and Ean were a few feet behind her and I was a few feet behind them. Unfortunately my mom and Kent were behind the hill, so they missed what happened next.
I looked at Jane, she had stopped on the trail. She said something to Kate and Ean and then she jumped and with a barely contained squeal, clapped her hands together in delight. At that moment, a coyote dashed twenty feet in front of Jane, across the trail and up the hill into the brush. The sun was bright enough to make his/her fur sparkle. He/she was close enough, I could see the fresh kill in his/her mouth. The fur of the kill was longer, thick and a multi-toned medium brown. I'm pretty sure it was a rabbit, the fur was to long to be a squirrel or other rodent.
In less then four seconds, the coyote was gone.
I let the kids know that all the park guidelines tell the guests to stay at least seventy five feet away from the parks wild life but obviously the coyote failed to read those guidelines. Can you believe I only got two chuckles from kids?
Saturday evening I had this urge to hurry and get the kids fed and to clean up camp. By a quarter to seven.the sky was almost black and it was sprinkling. It was to early to go to bed, and with eight bodies, we did not want to do more then sleep in the camper. So we opted to go for a drive. When we finally got out of the storm, we found this....
The pictures really don't do the rainbow justice. It was breathtaking. Just breathtaking. Our timing was perfect because by the time we got back to camp, the rain slowed to a patter and we were able to toss the kids into the camper right before the skies opened up again. A nice Dutch couple told us that we missed a huge hail storm and that a mere thirty minutes before the campsite was completely white from the hail. They had rented a camper and had just driven up from the grand canyon and were going to California after Yellowstone. Their American vacation was a month long and they said they had saved a very long time to be able to take this trip.
I hope it's wonderful until the very end for them.
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