Day 61- Yellowstone

 August 11

I was not in a rush getting everyone up and moving this morning.  I figured if Yellowstone was like Glacier then everyone goes early and it's opened up a little more in the afternoon.

We just kinda got ready for the day and everyone's own pace.  Made and ate lunch and packed snacks and waters.  Heidi started not feeling well so she was going to stay back and rest.

They have several webcams throughout the park so I checked out the cam at the West entrance.  It was cars lined up as far as the camera could capture.  By the time we got there about 1:30 we were able to drive right in.  My theory was correct.  

They didn't give me a map at the entrance so I wasn't sure what or where to go.  I do love the app, but there is no map.  We had planned on Old Faithful so we followed the signs for that.  

It didn't take long to see some wildlife.  Maybe a mile on the road down to Old Faithful was a bison just hanging out in the shade under a tree.  

We saw a large area of steam and maybe some bursts of water so we pulled in to the parking area.  It had a boardwalk to explore the area.  I gave the kids the option of exploring it and Old Faithful now or wait until Heidi was with us.  They were unanimous that we needed to wait for Heidi.  

Almost all the geysers and thermals have pull outs.  The bigger ones have parking lots.  We just stopped if we saw one that looked cool.  We figured we would do some hiking.  And you can if you want, there are trails everywhere.  But we were perfectly fine driving and stopping to see things as we wanted.  

The girls were pretty amazed at the water boiling up from underground.  They seemed generally interested when I explained how as the water cooled at the edges of the pools the minerals in the water would reharden to create the sides of the pools.

We finally arrived at Old Faithful.  I only wanted to stop to go to the visitors center as there was not one at the entrance.  However, it was erupting so we had to check it out.  It was at the end so we didn't see the full height.  We will come back tomorrow.  

At the visitors center I got my map.  The park is divided into two connected loops.  I think the plan is to get there earlier the remaining two days and do a loop each day.  We also watched a short film that centered around the Nutcracker bird and its role in helping to spread the forest of white pine.  It was very interesting and held the girls attention for the entire film.  

One of my most important question for the Rangers was where the big horn sheep are.  They are the only large animal we have not seen on this trip.  We have amazingly seen everything else.  Even the more elusive animals.  They are in the more mountainous part of the park which was roughly an hour and a half drive to the northern loop.  We got there and drove up a dirt road to a freshly paved lot.  Weird that they would haul material and equipment all the way up there, but not do the road as well.  There was a 4 mile round trip hike to a peak.  Libby and I decided to hike up to a plateau roughly 1000 feet up the trail.  I'm defiantly out of shape but being 9000 ft plus a steep climb had me glad I was not doing the full trail.  

Unfortunately we did not see any sheep.  I didn't have much hope being so close to the parking lot.  We might go up there again with Heidi.

It was getting late and everyone was hungry so we headed towards the camper.  It was at least an hour and a half to get home.  We turned on to the road to leave and traffic was at a stand still.  I was a little worried it was going to be 14 miles of stop and go.  About 5 minutes late I found out why.  Everyone was rubber necking for the bison that was standing on the side of the road having a midnight snack.  I would not be surprised if it was the one we saw earlier in the day.  

We finally got out of the park about 9:30.  I had planned on burgers for dinner but by the time we got back and food maid it would be about 11.  Luckily there is a McDonalds just as you leave so we picked up something there.