2015 Yellowstone Road Trip: Day 7 & 8 July 24 - 25: Wild West

2016 Yellowstone Road Trip: Day 7 - 8: July 24 & 25 - Wild West

States: Wyoming

Motorcycles that passed us: 39

Motorcycles we passed: 0

Trivia:

The west is very, very dusty.  It's obvious why the cowboys wore bandanas

There is only one restaurant in Cooke, WY where you can get pasta for lunch.

Culinary tastes out west are much different than what we're used to.

Miles Traveled: I lost track, but definitely more hours to drive the distance than the miles would indicate.

Memories:

Gordon:

Lunch Pasta Quest in Cooke, WY

Buffalo Bill Museum

2.5 Billion year old rocks drive

Cows on the road

The road down to the Plains

Danny:

The Gunfight in Cody

Bucking Broncos at the Rodeo

Therese:

The winding road

The kid calf stampede at the Cody Rodeo

The Natural History wing of the Buffalo Bill Museum

The cool, quirky hotel in Buffalo

Grace:

Meeting all the actors at the shoot-out

The second half of our Day 7 took  place in Wyoming: a whole different world from Yellowstone Park which is also in the state of Wyoming.

The guide books and several people at the campground had recommended, if we had the time, we should take the scenic Chief Joseph Highway from Yellowstone to Cody, WY.  Several guidebooks referred to the trip as hair raising and harrowing due to the mountain drive and the many switchbacks.  So we set out with some trepidation. 

Since I discovered I like the winding road driving, I was at the wheel.  True to the reviews, the drive was mountainous and there were many switchbacks.  However, it was never harrowing.  The roads were very modern with wide shoulders and many pullouts to let the faster traffic pass.  I had no trouble at the posted speed limits.  However, there were many motorcycles on the road coming in for the big rally in Sturgis, SD.  They all passed us.  We had fun counting.  Little did we know that later in our trip, 39 motorcycles would seem like an extremely small amount.

The drive was beautiful and the view from the top of the mountain was spectacular.  

We emerged from the mountains in a small town called Cooke.  Our camp hosts had recommended we eat at the "Bed and Bun". The food, they said, was excellent. Oops.

We had been eating sandwiches for lunch for a billion years according to Grace.  So rather than pulling over for a cooler lunch, we had planned to eat out as a treat.  Well Bed and Bun only had sandwiches.   Normally, I don't tolerate fussy kids when we eat out, but this was vacation and we had promised something other than sandwiches.  Grace wanted pasta.  There was no pasta to be found.  To make matters worse, we were diverted for a significant amount of time by a rock shop with lots of shiny things in the window.  We finally found the one place in the small town that served pasta.  The rest of their selections were quite good also, so we ate and hit the road.

It wasn't much further to Cody, WY.  Much to the appreciation of our dusty, cranky kids, the hotel had a trampoline right outside of our room door in the parking lot.  It was a small, family owned place, not much to write home about - but the service was excellent and did I mention they had a trampoline outside our room?

We couldn't stay long, though because we learned there was a shootout staged every night in front of the Irma Hotel in downtown Cody.  We headed the short distance over and grabbed some fast food and hunkered down to watch the action.  It was a pretty corny show with a lot of heart.  Money collected from the nominal charge for seating was used to support causes around children's illnesses, near and dear to our  hearts.  

There was a lot of patriotism and a lot of talk of gun safety because of course, guns are everywhere.

After the show, the actors offered to sign posters and Grace eagerly got everyone's autograph.  Danny held back a bit so I collected signatures for him.  I'm sure all the gunslingers believed me when I said the signatures were for my son.

We hightailed it back to our hotel to get into cool weather clothes and walked the short few blocks to the Cody Nite Rodeo.  The rodeo is held every night, all summer long.  During the week, entrants pay a fee hoping to win a prize.  On Saturday night, professional rodeo people participate..  We were there on an amateur  night and the whole thing had a feel of minor league baseball.  The stands were full and the crowd was very enthusiastic as were we.

It was really thrilling to watch the calf roping and cheer each contestant on as they tried to beat the previous best time.  The rodeo clowns had microphones and kept up a steady banter with the announcer and the crowd.

The highlight came at halftime when it was time for the calf stampede.  They called all the kids out to the field.  Before the announcement was even over, Grace was heading for the aisle.  Danny wasn't far behind.  In all, about 75 kids ended up on the field.  Their objective was going to be to snatch a ribbon off the tail of a calf for a prize.  

Before the contest began, the rodeo clown had the kids do some stretches.  Then he told them to grab handfuls of dirt and put it in their pockets. Finally he had them lie down and roll in the dirt.  Gordon and I just sighed - the kids had just had a quick bath, the first one of our vacation, before we headed to the rodeo.

The following morning we had no pressing agenda and decided to grab breakfast at the highly recommended restaurant directly across from the hotel.  This cemented our belief that we should never take recommendations from Wyoming people.  The food was fine.  But it was just pancakes, eggs, bacon, etc.  Nothing special - nothing you couldn't get at any average diner anywhere.  Oh well.

Our next stop was much more satisfying.  The guide books had listed the Buffalo Bill Museum of the west as a "must see". One of our Yellowstone camp friends had especially recommended the Gun Wing of the museum.  He said the collection was even larger than the NRA's collection.  We figured it would be a quick stop and a nice diversion before our drive to Buffalo.  However, it turned out to be everything and more than what we had heard.

The museum is actually an affiliate of the Smithsonian and is very modern and state-of-the-art. Buffalo Bill Cody is a huge focus with an entire wing devoted to him.  But this is only a small part of the museum.  The Natural History wing was very well done and kept the kids' interest as well as ours.  They also had a beautiful wing featuring art of the west.

Of course there were guns and it got a little creepy seeing people so into the annual variations of various types of guns.  There was a game you could pay to play which involved shooting at targets.  We were really impressed with Grace's aim as she hit about three of the targets.  Her form wasn't great, though as she balanced the butt of the gun on her chin.   Then the kid behind her got up to shoot and hit every single target.  We were, to say the least, out of our element.

The coolest part of the gun wing for me was the gun that was recently found in a forest after resting against a tree for over a hundred years.  There had been an article in the NYT when it was found and it was cool to see the actual gun.

We spent most of the afternoon at the museum and then made the short drive to Buffalo.

There was really  nothing to do in Buffalo but it was a nice launching point for our upcoming adventure in the Black Hills.  The hotel was a very pleasant surprise.  It was similar to the Cody Hotel in that it was the 50's style with doors that opened onto the parking lot.  But the woman who owns the hotel had turned the building into her personal sandbox.  Her art and collections of nests, feathers, bones, fossils, etc. were everywhere.  Whenever the whim hit, she created art in the hotel grounds.  She was a very interesting person as well and we enjoyed talking to her while enjoying the treat she baked, as she does every day.  She even took us into her residence off the lobby to show us her pride and joy, a raven made out of chicken wire and tar paper.  Super cool.

I needed to grocery shop that night and the kids seemed to have major screen withdrawal so we let them watch TV.  It happened that Charlie and the Chocolate Factory was playing so everyone was happy.

The next day we set out on our drive to the Black Hills.  It was another beautiful drive with some more mountain and valley driving.  We got to see both cows and sheep on the roads as this part of the country has open ranch land and you never know when an animal is going to get the yen to stroll across the road for greener pastures.

Another unexpected treat was the road signs that informed us of the age of the rock we were driving through.  We started with rock that was 2.5 billion years old!  Practically as old as the planet.  As we climbed the mountain the rock became younger and younger.  Soon the black hills appeared and not long after that we reached our campsite and that is a story for another day.    

Oh, and did I mention?...the kids got cowboy hats.

2015 Yellowstone Road Trip - Days 4 - 7

Miles: 475 - all in Yellowstone

Anecdotal conclusions:  People from Idaho are very impatient; people from Minnesota need to be at the front of the line; people, in general, get very stupid in the presence of dangerous wildlife.

Temperatures: 39 degrees - 85 degrees

Rainbows spotted: 4

Hailstorms: 1

Memories:

                                                         Camp Site View 

Therese: 

Grace sleepwalking in the tent and vehemently insisting that Danny was on her camp pad.

Heavenly sleep on an air mattress

So nice that the kids help out a lot with the set up and tear down of the campsite

Stress at getting a "first come first served" campsite

Elk walking through the campsite at 5:30 in the morning while I was cutting up apples

Mamma bear and her two cubs crossing the road in front of our car on our last day 

The beautiful vast expanses of land

Driving on the lovely winding  roads

Swimming in the juncture of the hot springs and the boiling river

Grace

Itchy ear

Water flowing backwards, upstream, over the Yellowstone River rapids

Playing the game Flux

Clepsydra geyser

Frozen Yogurt in my hair

Almost getting an ice-cream topping

Eating a billion sandwiches for lunches

Gordon

Waiting for the wagon train to pass before we could cross the road

Waiting for the impatient motorcyclist driving up the wrong side of the road  and through a buffalo herd to get gored.

Osprey nest in the "Grand Canyon"

Hiking down the canyon with Danny

Buffalo bellowing at the cars on the highway

Watching Old Faithful off the Lodge Porch

The tent getting blown down on the first day

Danny

Getting beat in Flux 2 times

Waking up early

Paint Pots

Long line for ice-cream

Herds of Buffalo crossing the road

Freezing cold in the death water (walking through the river to the hot springs area.)

Eating beef stew and planning to make it with mom

The buffalo we thought was a grizzly for about 3 minutes

I don't think it's possible to understand the vastness and beauty of Yellowstone unless you stay there for a few days at least.  If one were to drive in for a day it would seem like merely a crowded, touristy park with a beautiful landscape.  But after spending four days in the park and driving the depth and breadth of it, it becomes obvious that even visiting time after time, year after year, a person would never see everything or discover all the unexpected treasures just around the bend or up the trail.

I'll let the pictures give you a sense of what we  saw and I'll provide some details about our days.

First Day:

We got up early, but not quite  as early as we had hoped.  We packed quickly but not quite as quickly as we planned.  We ate the super delicious breakfast just a little slower than normal because we threw in a cake and candles for Danny  on his birthday.  As a result, we left around 7:15, an hour later than we originally intended.  Traffic  was light, though, and with the exception of a bit of construction just outside the park, we made good time.

From everything we'd heard, if we arrived at the campgrounds before 11:00 we were sure to get a spot.  However, as we were standing in line we heard the camp host say there were no more tent spots.  It was a bit scary hearing person after person stepping up the window to renew their site for one more day and no one checking out.  Just as I got up to the window a RV/Tent site opened up.  As we would later learn, this was probably the least desirable camping spot.  We could have stayed at the office and crossed our fingers that another spot would open up, but it seemed wiser to take what we could get and get the tent set up.

After a sweaty, windy, dusty set-up and lunch, we decided not to look  for a hike since we were exhausted.  We chose to drive to Old Faithful which needed to be checked off the "Yellowstone" list and seemed like possibly a more relaxing choice for the first day.

This was probably our only tactical error; and a necessary one as we learned that any place worth going involved a very long drive which had no relation to the number of miles it took to get there.  We had been told this by many people but I think you really need to experience it to "get it."  In addition, the "short" way to Old Faithful is undergoing major construction and narrows to one lane in some spots and is unpaved in many others so this added to our delay.

It was a very busy day in the park and the road was packed.  Every roadside parking lot was so congested that the road slowed to a crawl for about a mile in each direction.  Finding parking at Old Faithful was tough.  But we got into the lodge with about 10 minutes to spare before the next scheduled gushing.  It  started while we were in line for Ice-cream.  So I sent the others out to watch and got my view from the window next to the ice-cream counter.  Still cool to see and the ice-cream was delicious.  

Another long drive, dinner and then a relatively luxurious night's sleep on our new air-mattresses.

Second Day:

Campers who were leaving the day we arrived told us that swimming in the boiling river was not to be missed, especially for families. As an added bonus, it was a short drive from our campsite.  

We headed over around 9:00 after breakfast.  The pools at the Boiling River are one of only two hot springs areas Park visitors are allowed to swim.  The pools are formed at the juncture of a cold, cold river and hot, hot springs.  To reach this happy medium, visitors must travel about 25 yards through the freezing cold river water.  The water is shallow but very uneven and full of rocks of various sizes and questionable traction.  So the going was slow.  In a couple places, water from a hot spring poured into the river.  Depending on the current, the water could suddenly become extremely hot so we had to keep the kids on the other side of us and take the brunt of the temperature extremes.  

But once we reached the pools which were walled off with rocks to keep the rapids on one side we were able to relax in calm waters.  The kids had a great time in the warm water and especially enjoyed standing in a spot where hot met cold and having one leg in the hot water and one leg in the cold.  We lingered as long as possible knowing that a very cold crossing was ahead of us.

After lunch we headed for the main Visitor's Center in Mammoth. The park has about a dozen visitor center areas which usually mark a lodge and or campsite.  There is usually a small general store, gas  and an information station.  Just to give you an idea of how big the park is, we had to fill up with gas twice during our stay.

Our next stop was the Mammoth Terrace, a beautiful hike through many geothermal features.  We hiked out on boardwalks that went past beautiful clear pools of extremely hot water.  The pools ranged in color from blue to green to red depending on the temperature of the water.

We planned an early dinner because we wanted to drive out to the Lamar Valley which is referred to as "The Serengeti of America" because of it's landscape and variety of wildlife.  The animals start to come out after the temperatures drop below 65 degrees.

We didn't see any grizzlies or moose but we saw many buffalo who often crossed the road right in front of our car.   We also saw a black bear as it crossed the road and started up a tree on the other side of the road.  The drive was beautiful and yet another entirely different landscape and climate than anything we had seen so far.

It took about an hour to get out to the valley and we drove on for another hour before turning back so by the time we returned it was  time for bed.  We planned to get up early the next day to drive the big loop around the entire park.  

Day Three:

This was our last full day in the park and we left our campsite at 6:45 in the morning to head out on our adventure which would be a 10 hour road trip within the park.

Because we left early, we were able see some of the more popular sites on the road to Old Faithful at the south end of the park.  We stopped at a couple paint pot sites.  Grace had read up on these locations and was able to provide a nice guided tour.  She pointed out the "bobby socks" trees in the distance.  These trees were also called "drowned trees" because of a flood after an earthquake that rose to a high enough level on the trunks of the trees to kill them.  Along all of our drive, we also saw the natural consequences of the fires that raged through the area several decades ago.

She also located a geyser that was almost constantly gushing and we enjoyed watching this for quite a while.

The day  was very cold and very wet.  Some of the beautiful bodies of hot water, while beautiful, were not as spectacular as they would have been on a clear, sunny day.  This was especially true at the Prismatic Pond which was a deep blue, large pond.  We had hoped to hike behind this pond to get the full effect, but by this time the parking lot was full and the rain was coming down.

We reached Old Faithful just around lunchtime and this time our timing was perfect.  We grabbed a bite to eat and  sat in rocking chairs  on the lodge porch and watched Old Faithful show off.

Our way back to camp was the east loop which was about three times as long as the way down.  The rain was really picking up, but the drive was beautiful.  

Probably the most spectacular spot was the "Grand Canyon" of Yellowstone.  We pulled up to the parking lot just in time for a major hailstorm.  We watched hikers desperately scramble back to their cars while ate our lunch of, as Grace would say, our billionth sandwich.

The sun came out briefly and we hiked to the overlook which had stunning views.  We started on the hike down to the valley below but the pitch was extremely steep and neither Grace nor I had shoes with enough grip to make it.  Gordon and Danny hiked down far enough to see an osprey nest.  

Our next stop was quite unexpected.  We had the usual random traffic jams when wildlife was spotted but we came upon a jam outside a nearby campground that seemed to have no explanation.  About an hour earlier, we had seen ranger vehicles with their lights and sirens on rushing down the road ahead of us.  This was evidently their destination.  As we got closer we could see crowds on the road, people with nearly their entire bodies hanging out of car windows trying to get pictures.  More rangers seemed to be dealing with the people than with whatever the commotion was.  We drove a bit down the road and asked someone what was going on.  He said that a bear had been loitering around the campsite and rangers were chasing it back into the wilderness. At that moment, I saw the ranger in the distance shoot some kind of air cannon or projectile into the bushes.  Moments later, a big black bear was high tailing it for the hills.  It was kind of mind blowing that people seemed to think that because they were within a few feet of a ranger and thus a few feet of a bear, they would be safe.

We returned to our waterlogged campsite around 5:30 and were contemplating splurging and going out to eat when suddenly the sun came out and along with it, a beautiful rainbow and our last camp dinner was on!

Day four:

This was our last day at Yellowstone and also our coldest morning.  I woke up at about 5:00  freezing cold and couldn't get back to sleep.  So I got up and made my coffee and was treated to a chorus of coyotes howling at the sunrise in the distance.  Then suddenly, an elk wandered through our campsite.

 We decided to take the northeast exit from the park rather than the east entrance because this would lead us to some beautiful driving  in Wyoming.  So we headed out through the Lamar Valley again, not expecting to see much wildlife because it was already mid-day but we were wrong.

Amid chorus of "I'm Bored" coming from the back seat, we came upon herd after herd of buffalo.  All were right near the road and crossing from both directions.  Often they would walk along the shoulder of the road and if we had been foolish, we could have reached out and touched them.  As it was, we were treated to really cool Bison bellows and a few minor skirmishes between bulls.  At one point s motorcyclist, evidently not wanting to wait like the rest of us, made his way up the road in the wrong direction, weaving through bison.  We were ready to video tape in case we needed to record the 13th bison goring at Yellowstone this year, but this guy lucked out.

About 45 minutes later, when we thought our excitement was over, we came upon another traffic jam with no apparent reason.  We waited and waited and all of the sudden, right in front of us, out came a mother bear and her two cubs.  They slowly walked across the road and while the mother bear lumbered up the other side of the ditch, we got so see her cubs galloping and frolicking alongside of her.

Not much later  we said goodbye to Yellowstone and headed on to our next adventure.