The Emery GIbbs Experinece

"It sucks to be you...if you stay up late talking....your gonna wake up (clap clap) early in the morning" Mr. Angelo sings to the boys bunk at 5 A.M. to wake us up a half hour early for our yellowstone adventure. Which I'm sure we deserved because we are always up late talking and laughing at the potency of the boys bunk after chili night. Normally we always take our time in the morning because we are always being woken up long before we should be, but today was different. Today we all got out of bed fairly easily due to the excitement of our Yellowstone trip. As we left our cabins we looked up and were in awe of the stars. This was the first morning that we were able to see them because of the thick cloud cover the previous mornings. Some just looked up for a moment, while others stood outside for almost twenty minutes just staring up into the Wyoming night sky. Breakfast was hurried due to the long van rides up to Yellowstone National Park. One and a half hours later we got off the TSS vans and loaded on to the snow coaches or vans with with army tires on them. Finally after another one and a half hour snow coach ride we reached our destination.
Bison laced the tracks of our cross country ski boardwalks. We skied a little past geysers that exploded, bubbled, and released major stenches. There were a few challenging downhill slopes that were very entertaining to watch people wipe out on. One of the highlights from the longest downhill was Craig Chiesa making it all the way down the hill only to eat it trying to show off his skiing skills on a jump. Another was Mr. Bartman crashing before, during, and after the slope; which of coarse he blamed on Joe Pond because Joe had waxed his skis and Mr. Bartman had stolen them. It was all laughing and good times, but it was made much more special from the beautiful surroundings and being with friends. We stopped to eat lunch by a large hydro-thermal pool (which didn't have the sulfur stench) and we were just in awe of the beauty. Many of us just sat back and took in the scenery with the idea of what it was like for the first people who came across this beauty and what was running through their mind. But before we knew it we were off skiing again to try and make it to see Old Faithful erupt. however we were slowed by bison feeding close to the trail and many stops for "Kodak Moments." We weren't able to make it all the way to the Old Faithful viewing area in time so we stopped across the way from it, where we still had a great view of this incredible phenomenon.
We had learned so much today and taken in so many incredible sights that it was hard to get back in the snow-caoches and leave Yellowstone. On the ride back to our cabins many were so tired that they slept the whole way even in the rough ride in the snow-coaches, while others just talked for hours. I (John Emery) learned so much on the ride back from Tinker who at twenty-five years old has lived so much as a firefighter and avid skier and snowboarder. Today was by far the most fun day of the trip and was the first night that the boys bunk didn't have trouble going straight to bed, to be prepared for tomorrow.

-John Emery & Chris Gibbs
2008