July 15

(My blog about the Grand Teton National Park got lost somewhere in cyber space so we are jumping ahead. Will post the pics later. Not having reliable wifi can be a pain.)

It is just a short few miles between the parks but the terrain and trees changed dramatically. Yellowstone has deep canyons where the Lewis and Yellowstone rivers run. The Grand Canyon of Yellowstone was spectacular with two huge waterfalls. 

 Lower Falls

 Upper Falls

Maneuvering around those parking lots with the big bus was interesting as people would park cars in the RV parking areas so we had to make our own spots. One little boy got a big kick out of ‘Willis’, our rubber ducky, in the window.

Yellowstone is famous for ‘Old Faithful’, but did you know there are geysers all over the park? ‘Yellowstone was established as the world’s first national park primarily because of its unparalleled collection of geysers, hot springs, mudpots, and steam vents.’ We saw some places where the steam was coming out of the ground right next to Yellowstone Lake as well as boiling mud pots beside the road.

Bison roam freely throughout the park but none were in large herds or on the road. You really had to look hard for them.

There are millions of dead trees in a swath across the southeastern part of Yellowstone, evidently from a huge fire in 1988! It doesn’t appear that they will remove them and plant new trees; just letting nature take its course and in some places new trees are growing while in others none. It’s such a contrast to the rest of the park lush with old growth.

Geography Lesson: Yellowstone Lake is North America’s largest high-altitude lake with 141 miles of shoreline and is 20 miles long by 14 miles wide. Its deepest spot is about 410 feet and its average depth is 140 feet. We were surprised that there were few boats on the lake, just a few kayaks.

We left Yellowstone via the East Entrance toward Cody, WY and found Rex Hale, a Shoshone National Forest Campground, with lovely full hookups for $10 a night along the Shoshone River. We have a Senior Pass from the National Park Service and that allowed us free entry into all parks and half off the fee for camping in the National Forest. Regular fees for the parks was $30 per vehicle in each park, or $50 for both, good for 7 days and the camping fee here was $20 a night. The passes were $10 a piece so we’ve saved a bunch already. Cool. We’ll try to find more of these along the way.

There were warnings about bears in the area and we saw lots of buffalo ‘chips’ in the sites. Only ‘hard sided’ RVs were recommended in the campground, but there were lots of tents and one guy just rolled out his sleeping bag on the ground…brave or just stupid? He had Virginia plates on his car and a bike on top so it’s anybody’s guess.

Oh yeah, no wifi, no tv, no phone service.  We started our first game of cut throat Hand & Foot; Bruce is still learning the game. So far he’s ahead (beginner’s luck?) and we’ll see how often he’s willing to play. I’m hoping by the time the trip is done, he’ll be a pro or at least enjoy the game J

July 14, 2016

From Rex Hart campground we headed toward Montana with the Little Big Horn National Memorial. It was a beautiful drive and even the secondary roads (i.e. not interstate highways) were nice and wide. We headed north from Cody to I-90 and Billings and then east.