Family Road Trip 2021 – Keeping Up With the Allens

Spontaneous is not really a word I’d use to describe myself, but, our family recently returned from an extremely impromptu road trip that took us out to Jackson Hole, Wyoming and back!

{All of us at Jenny Lake in Grand Teton National Park}

The trip was absolutely incredible. I’m going to use this post as more of a photo dump than anything, but my goodness, it was wonderful.

We left our house on a Saturday and made the short 4-hour drive to Coeur d’Alene, Idaho the first day. We stayed overnight there and enjoyed the afternoon at a huge park right by CDA Lake.

{First pit stop on the trip, overlooking the Columbia River.}

{Coeur d’Alene Lake – absolutely stunning}

The next day we got to pass through Missoula on the way, then met Alex’s friend, Kelli’s new baby once we arrived in Bozeman for the night.

Monday brought us to Yellowstone National Park. Wow. Just wow. I had been there about 15 years prior, but had a whole different route and agenda. What an incredible place.

{The beauty of The Grand Canyon of Yellowstone is truly breathtaking.}

{We did Uncle Tom’s hike to Artist Point on the south side of the waterfall. I’d highly recommend it, though it is a bit precarious with little kiddos. There are almost no railings anywhere and it’s quite exposed. We ended up carrying our kids almost the whole way.}

{A really, really big highlight for us all was the wildlife we saw on our trip! We saw several herds of bison, coyote, pikas, deer, elk, antelope, and MOOSE!}

{We couldn’t have timed it better for Old Faithful!}

{The hot springs were so fun for us to see.}

{The Grand Prismatic Spring. I was most excited to see this – what a unique and stunning natural beauty.}

{Maybe one day Hannah will look at the camera!}

We powered through Yellowstone {gosh we did SO much} all the way to Teton Village, Wyoming, where we’d spend the next few days.

{The tram 2.0 was down on the ground and we got to pop inside! My dad was a Jackson Hole tram operator back in the day and this was the tram he ran.}

Jackson Hole is such a special place. Alex and I had been skiing there several times, and I’d been there once in the summer before.

{Alex spent part of one day mountain biking while the kids and I hung around the village.}

While we were in Jackson we decided to make the short drive up to Grand Teton National Park. The beauty of the Tetons is absolutely striking.

{Mormon Row – it was quite hazy that morning so we didn’t get to take in the full effect.}

Thursday quickly rolled around and we decided to power through and drive the entire way home in one day. The drive was a bit longer than 12 hours and I am still marveling at how well the kids did in the car.

We had an absolutely fantastic time on our trip. Ben and Hannah were such troopers and they loved our time in Jackson Hole! It was really fun for them to stay in hotels and experience so many different things. I’m excited for our next one!