We made our way up through Hayden Valley, Tower, and over to the Lamar Valley. In Hayden we had our first major wildlife sighting (I am no longer counting bison or elk unless exceptionally unusual). We saw a beautiful wolf...this time we were very certain it was indeed a wolf! What I loved was how healthy he looked, obviously finding plenty of food! In the early 1900's wolves were almost extinct in the US and in 1973 the US Fish and Wildlife service listed the northern Rocky Mountain wolf as endangered and the Greater Yellowstone area was designated as one of three recovery areas. In the 1990's they were gone from Yellowstone and in 1995 41 Wolves from Canada were released into the area, they grew in numbers and today about 500 live in the Yellowstone ecosystem.
With a major find under our belts we headed up to the Tower area. As the Fall season begins, bears head up into this northern region where whitebark pine nuts provide much needed fat for grizzly and black bears right before hibernation. As we rounded a mountain curve a slew of cars were semi pulled off the road so of course, we stopped too. There we were treated to a mama black bear and her two cubs, both probably over a year old. Cubs stay with their moms the first two years! They stayed until motorcycles came by and scared them into the woods farther!
Exhilarated we headed on up near Mount Washburn the smoke from the Slough Creek fire was evident!
A stop at Tower Falls, 130 ft waterfall into Tower Creek at the confluence with the Yellowstone River.
These interesting rock formations, much like hoodoos, were formed by lava and the cool blue stripe is not paint...it is glacier till formed from a melting ice cap!
We heard this screeching sound in the canyon, turned out it was an Osprey flying by with a fish that was almost too big for him to carry. Once he landed we snapped this picture, see the fish under him on the branch!
These birds decided a bison ride was just right!
Next we made a quick stop at Mommoth having been there the week before. This elk was evidently waiting for the Federal Office to open to pay a ticket😱!
We finished our circuit with a trip out the North Entrance where the Roosevelt Arch was a great picture stop!
It's me, Finn here, I asked Mom if we could go out the East entrance to look for critters.
Near Fishing Bridge we saw lots of Moose potential but saw none!
The drive out the East side was beautiful with rocky cliffs that reminded us of rocks like Sedona but brown...
Unfortunately no wildlife to be found, but the day was beautiful. The next day Mom and the gang headed out for a hiking trip to the Canyon area at Yellowstone Falls. Along the way a buffalo traffic jam of what I call, "the good, the bad, the ugly, and the baby!"
The oldest portion of the canyon formed 640,000 years ago with volcanic eruption. Hydrothermal activity altered and weakened the rhyolite, the stone that gives "Yellowstone" it's name. Our first stop was a 500 ft drop down a steep set of over 300 steps on Uncle Tom's Trail! My fear of heights was challenged going down and my knee going up!
This first picture was from later, looking across at the steps we took down, yikes!
We were treated with a view of the 308 ft Lower Falls and rainbows to boot!
The "Yellowstone"...
And the whole motley crew!
Next we did a pretty hike down to the upper falls and Chittenden Bridge. We saw bear scat but no furry friends. The Upper Falls are smaller, only 109 ft but seem more powerful!
The girls took a break...
And Wayne explained about Artistic pictures😉
Speaking of artistic...we made our way to Artist Point, the most photographed place in Yellowstone...
We made our way to the Brink of the Lower Falls...
And up to Red Rock Point for a full view of the Lower Falls
Wayne and Vickie posed for pics...
Now to get the best view the trail drops 500ft in .38 mi. Three years ago we did this trail but after the Uncle Tom Trail my knee said no way, but we encouraged Bobby and Sharon to do it! Sharon is in gray, Bobby in Orange...
Victory!
A great day...
On Saturday Mom and dad learned that our friends Sandy and Russ Peterson had moved from Mammoth in Yellowstone to Colter Bay in the Grand Tetons. Mom asked me if I'd like to go visit them and look for Moose in the Tetons, I said, "OH YES!"
The Teton area has a lot of Aspens that had started to turn, just beautiful!
But soon we hit the fire area, both sides of the road, so very sad...
After a nice visit with Russ and Sandy we headed down to the Moose-Wilson Rd in Jackson, known for moose. Along the way we took a few pics but the late hour, clouds, and still some smoke didn't make for pretty pictures!
Not a single moose😰, so we made the long 21/2 hr trip home, only seeing a lone fox on the road.
This next picture was on our way to the Tetons on our previous trip, but we forgot to include...this unusual sight caught us off guard, a pheasant!
Next we are snuggled down awaiting 3-7in of snow😱! Hope we get to see some!!...well no snow in West Yellowstone, just very cold rain, at least it damped down the fires and the sky cleared! We said goodbye to Auntie Sharon, Uncke Bobby and Vickie and they left for Jackson.
Mom, Dad and I stayed in West Yellowstone and left the next morning for northern sections to see if we could find some bears or wolves. It was early when we left so I snuggled down!
It was very foggy and we saw big herds of elk out in West Yellowstone!
We also saw deer as we headed north...
As we reached the Tower area and the fog lifted, we got to see fresh snow on the mountain tops!
It was neat to see the combo of the Aspen turning and the snow at higher levels!
As we made our way out to the Lamar Valley we began to see more wildlife, first this Osprey caught our attention...
And then a huge crowd on the side of the road drew us to a new find...River Otters! The photos were a bit too distant and into the sun, but they were so cute!
As we moved north we saw more bison, of course, some that decided blocking the road would be a good idea. Now that wasn't remarkable but the silly people who got out of their cars and walked right up to huge bison...just crazy!
We also saw pronghorn antelope again, one of our favorites!
We headed out the Northeast Entrance up the Beartooth Scenic Highway, the last corner of the park we hadn't seen...
And we stopped at the coolest small town, Cooke...really it is...
As we made our way back, we saw a very sad sight in Lamar, a wolf that had just been hit by a car on the side of the road...Mom and I were so sad😰. As we headed down through Tower we saw the same bears from the other day, just farther away!
Our final day we went back to Prismatic Spring...still a little chilly to get a good picture, but pretty!
And now we head East...we've loved our time out West. This probably will be our last post for this trip, we hope you enjoyed the pictures, we enjoyed sharing with you! We especially did this blog for our dear friends Lila and Brandon whom we wanted with us in spirit! Can't wait to see everybody when we are back next month! We have a few stops to make, Devil's Tower, the Badlands, some Newmar Motorcoach dealers, my oldest BFF, the Newmar factory and we will land back in HHI in October when we hope the weather has cooled!
Thank you for sharing your adventures <3 , what an exciting and terrific trip and scenery was beautiful. Again thanks for sharing, have a safe trip back home <3 Biscuit and family
ReplyDeleteYou really got some beautiful pictures. Looked like you also had really good weather.
ReplyDelete