Yellowstone National Park

Yellowstone just amazed the both of us. Even before we got there, the scenery just became more and more breathtaking as we approached. We drove in from a small western town named Cody, Wyoming and cruised in through a river valley surrounded by tall cliffs of colourful rocks.

Thankfully, after making the long drive from the Black Hills, we made the call to camp out before hitting the park entrance and had a campsite all to ourselves, except for our talkative camp host Bob (who had "killed a man"). We had a spectacular site, right on a river bank, where another couple had told us that they had seen bears... we had our fingers crossed, but didn't see any. The temps dropped real low and there was frost on the car windshield in the early morning. As I pumped water from the river, and Cheryl slept, the sun rose across the southern ridge and lit up the valley and warmed my bones.

We drove into the east entrance of Yellowstone which is a spectacular drive in itself. Our first views of wildlife were tatanka everywhere and a lone grizzly bear having a nap near Lake Yellowstone. We spent the next couple of days in Yellowstone, touring the park. Although the summer crowds had definitely subsided, there were still more people than we expected and we had to chill out on the roads to make way for the RVs and bison herds crossing our path. From atop a nearby hill, we caught an awesome view of the Grand Prismatic Spring, showing all its brilliant colours, steam being swept aside by the breeze.



We camped at an area called Indian Creek, near the northern portion of the park. The first night, we continued north towards Mammoth and saw our first (live) elk, resting in a field to the delight of a slew of professional photographers. After watching for 1/2hr, the bull elk finally rose and emitted his tell-tale bellow for a mate. It is elk mating season, and we slept soundly to elk calls throughout the night.

It was cold again during the nights. We usually made it back to our site by dusk to prepare out dinner and warm up by a campfire. Cheryl is an incredible camp cook and we are eating some pretty fancy fare, albeit a touch meatless for my palate. My duties usually involve setup/teardown of the homestead and fetching water and chopping wood. Our ankles are coming along well, and hiking and walking present us will no problems at all.

As we left Yellowstone, we drove through the west exit. It seems as if the entire West side of Yellowstone park was devastated by a forest fire in 1988. A lot of new growth has started to fill in, but the majority of the west side of the park is dominated by 10-20ft new evergreens and 50-100ft tall burnt-out tree trunks.

Off to Bend, Oregon we go!!