Yellowstone National Park

Prior to this trip I had never visited Yellowstone national park. Alison visited when she was younger, but really couldn't remember much about it. Yellowstone wasn't that high on our list of places to visit, but with covid-19 shutting most of the world down it made 2020 an ideal time for a visit to Yellowstone.

We woke up early and hit the road ~5am. Jackson is about an hour from the South entrance of Yellowstone and we wanted to be in the park early so that we could, hopefully, see some wildlife and to beat the crowds. To get to Yellowstone from Jackson you drive through Grand Teton National Park. During the drive we had great views of the Teton range. Dan told us about his experience climbing Grand Teton. We also saw bison along the route. 

Skylee had a whole bench to herself so we could stretch out and sleep while we drove

Skylee's newest stuffed animal "Wolfy"

Kristin and Dan's traditional photo pose at national park signs

We made it into Yellowstone and headed toward Old Faithful. We arrived and the parking lot was mostly empty. We did find a Park Ranger who told us the gyser would go off around 7:50. This gave us enough time to find a spot. There were a couple other families there, but we had a whole section of benches to ourselves. I set up my camera and we waited. The gyser erupted and we took pictures and watched. When it was all done, Skylee asked, is that all it does? Apparently, she was expecting more. 

Skylee loves to help take pictures

We got back in the car and continued our drive through the park. Along the way we saw more bison. We stopped to observe them and take some pictures (from a responsible distance). 

Our next stop was the Midway Geyser Basin. I was particularly excited for this stop because I wanted to see the Grand Prismatic Spring. Before visiting the Grand Prismatic Spring we hiked the overlook trail to get an aerial view. We are grateful Meg gave us instructions on how to find the trail. It is fairly new and it was definitely worth the short hike. The overlook platform is accessible via the Fairy Falls trail. The hike is mild, it is about a mile round trip. Along the way we saw lots of people fly fishing in the rivers and streams. We also saw a teal tree swallow, a red squirrel, some chipmunks and another bison. Along the trail there were many beautiful wildflowers. To our left was forested and to the right was open fields with hot springs, mud pots, rivers, and streams. As we walked Kristin gave Skylee a lesson on the meaning of geothermal. 

Our trusty rental car

How Skylee feels after hiking for a while

After the overlook we drove over to the Grand Prismatic Spring parking lot and walked along the wooden walkways built throughout the area. It was a cool crisp day, which made walking through the steam quite an experience. As we walked through the steam there would be a blast of warmth, followed by a blast of cold as the wind blew the steam by us. When we got through the steam we were covered with little dots of condensation. We marveled at the beautiful colors and unique features of these hot springs. They are truly stunning. I have seen pictures, hence my desire to see this for myself, but they don't do it justice. We were able to take our time and enjoy the experience, there really weren't many other people there. Between covid-19 and getting up early we were able to avoid crowds. 

Next we stopped at Gibbon falls. This is a nice waterfall right off the main highway. We were right there so we decided to stop and take a look. 

Gibbon falls was on our way to our next destination - the Norris Geyser basin. This basin is a large volatile, geothermal basin. It is home to many geysers, including one of the largest geysers in the world. These geysers are not predictable, unlike Old Faithful. We hiked around the basin a bit. We went over by Steamboat geyser, the big one, but it didn't erupt. It can erupt anywhere from days to 50 years apart. While we were there we overheard an older gentleman explaining that he and some friends track the geyser. They visit daily and can recognize a lot of indicators that let them know if the geyser is likely to erupt. It had actually erupted three times in the past three days. Each eruption was three days apart. It had been three days since the last eruption, but he said it looked unlikely it would erupt again. We continued along the path stopping to look at various colorful hot springs and geothermal activity.

Skylee did not love the sulfur smell 

We drove to Canyon Village. Here we found a table and we set up a little picnic. When we planned this trip no food establishments within the park were open, so we planned to pack in our own food. Yellowstone did end up opening up some food establishments and shops, but we stuck to our original plan. It was great. We used a small butane stove to grill some hamburgers. We also had potato salad, watermelon, clementines, potato chips, and carrots. Our spread looked better than the food we could have bought in the park. 

We continued to drive through the park. As we were driving we stopped to look at an elk, when a nearby individual told us that there was a grizzly bear that was spotted three minutes ago up the road. We hurried and headed that way. We found a large group of cars in the area, but they told us the grizzly had moved on. We continued driving in the direction they indicated the bear had gone, but we didn't see it. 

Instead we headed to the Grand Canyon of Yellowstone. From here we could see the upper and lower falls on the Yellowstone river. We also drove out to Artist Point for more views of the lower falls and the Grand Canyon of Yellowstone. This area was stunning. 

At this point we were about done for the day. Everyone in our group was ready for a nap, except for me. I am usually not a big fan of napping. We completed the lower loop on our way out of the park. We drove past Yellowstone Lake and headed back to Jackson. We did stop on our way when we saw a large group of cars pulled off on the side of the road in Grand Teton National Park. Kristin and I got out and talked to a Park Ranger. He told us there was a bear and some cubs that had taken down an elk calf, but they left the area 45 minutes earlier. He said they might come back, but we decided not to stick around. 

By the time we got back to our hotel a storm had blown in. We found a nearby restaurant to get dinner. This restaurant was owned by the same restaurant group as the place we at the night before. They had the same policies - QR code menus, social distancing, etc. After dinner it was raining so we headed back to the hotel. Skylee came back to our room for a little while to watch TV before we all called it a night.