It was another dreadfully chilly night in the back of the truck last night. I made the decision at some unnamely hour last night and I lay awake freezing, that we are going to stop at a Goodwill as soon as possible and purchase a cheap blanket. Not being able to keep warm all night long is pretty miserable. We drove down the street to a McDonald’s so I could use the bathroom. We made coffee and oatmeal and then drove back into the park. Within the first 20 minutes Andrew spotted a baby black bear running about 15 yards from the road. We came across a wildlife jam a few minutes later s we headed north towards Norris. We saw several bison and an elk way back in the bushes. We had to get out and walk over, just like everyone else. We got some great pictures of all of them. Once we got to Norris, we stopped at Steamboat geyser then decided to go east towards Canyon Village.
Here, we stopped to see the upper and lower falls. While on one of the side roads we came to another vehicle jam, must be another animal. Most people were already walking back to their car at this point, but I wanted to get out and walk up in the woods. Maybe not the smartest idea…but I didn’t come all this way for nothing. We hiked back in the woods a bit, slowly and carefully, camera in hand. Off in the distance, Andrew spotted a grizzly. This was obviously what all the fuss was about. There was also a large elk in a nearby clearing. We hung out for a bit, observing both animals from a distance. We were able to get within 20 feet of the elk. We felt safe knowing that its antlers were too large to fit through the trees we were standing near. He didn’t seem to mind us either. We headed to the Grand Canyon of Yellowstone and got some awesome shots.
We made several different stops along the upper and lower falls and came to yet another vehicle jam. Tons of people were standing right next to the road. Andrew could not go anywhere, so I jumped out to see what was going on; another grizzly. Everyone was standing way too close, but it was hard not to considering it was 5 feet from the road. No one stayed in their cars though. I got a few shots and then found Andrew, who had jumped out of the car as well. I handed him the camera and he was able to stand behind 4 or 5 stacked trees that had fallen. There was a small opening where he could get these great pictures. The grizzly was about 6 feet away from him. After a few minutes, traffic cleared and we moved north again, towards Tower-Roosevelt. We were told that we’d have a lot of luck with wildlife over here as well. It had already been an eventful morning!
By the time we got here, it was mid afternoon. We didn’t see any wildlife, it was too hot. This part of the park is not nearly as pretty, but we saw some cool features and enjoyed the drive. Our last stop was Mammoth Hot Springs. As we drove into the center of this ‘town’ where all the employees live, there were red signs warning us to not approach the wildlife. What wildlife? Then we spotted all the elk roaming through the streets, grass, parks, etc. like this was their own neighborhood. In a way, I guess it is. We enjoyed watching the babies and then drove over to the hot springs. Here, we walked a ridiculous amount of stairs up to the top, but everything was dried up. We had covered a good part of the park at this point and decided we were ready to get on the road towards Montana. There were some parts of the park we didn’t have a chance to see, but we would have to back track twice in order to see them.
We left through the north entrance of the park and started north on state road 89 on our way to Stevensville, Montana. Once we got on I-90, we stopped at a grocery store to reload on reasonably priced food again. Here, we grabbed dinner and prepared for evenings drive. Just outside of Missoula, we drove alongside this beautiful view for about 20 minutes.
We pulled into John and Whitney's drive around 9:45 and were greeted with hugs and much excitement from their weimaraner, Juneau. We carried our stuff in and got settled in the guest bedroom. We talked of tomorrow's plans over a glass of wine and beer. John and Whitney had been waiting for us to arrive so they could jump in their "hillbilly hot tub" which is a feeding trough heated by a wood burning stove. Andrew and I were exhausted from today, so we each took showers and hit the sack.
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