Over the last 4 days of our road trip we travelled the Grand Loop at Yellowstone National Park, staying one night at each of four campsites (Grant Village, Canyon, Tower Falls and Madison). We got up early most mornings to see wildlife, beat the crowds, and to ensure we got a campsite (Tower Falls).
And Yellowstone gave us exactly what we came for (well, except for a grizzly bear with cubs sighting or Big Horn Sheep, but mostly...) - gorgeous and varied scenery, wildlife and some pretty great choc-mint chip ice-cream (although I am told I should have tried the Huckleberry flavour!).
The numerous wildlife sightings, including a coyote, elk, bears, pronghorn antelope and more Bison (aka Buffalo) than you can poke a stick at (nor would you) started messing with my mind a little. By by day three I was excitedly pointing out wildlife which more often than not turned out to be large rocks, tree stumps or tree shadows (and not a whole herd of bison relaxing on a hillside.... each one under a tree).
Despite my safety concerns being largely bear focused, Bison are a more present danger in Yellowstone. To the untrained eye (i.e. ours) they are just like rather stocky cows, seem just as harmless and are good, cheap entertainment. They just mosy down the road...la di da.., stopping to have a scratch, a good look around or to feed their calves, causing many a 'Bison Jam'. We did, however witness one poor lady with her service dog (which looked remarkedly like a coyote) get chased down by a very protective mother Bison - and those horns are nasty. All were okay, but consider yourself warned.
Similar to a Bison Jam, is a Bear Jam - however this involves one bear down an embankment (see photo), and 20-odd cars - sometimes just parked in the middle of the road - all just part of the Yellowstone experience.
And some pics for you - Hold your cursor over pictures for description....
And Yellowstone gave us exactly what we came for (well, except for a grizzly bear with cubs sighting or Big Horn Sheep, but mostly...) - gorgeous and varied scenery, wildlife and some pretty great choc-mint chip ice-cream (although I am told I should have tried the Huckleberry flavour!).
The numerous wildlife sightings, including a coyote, elk, bears, pronghorn antelope and more Bison (aka Buffalo) than you can poke a stick at (nor would you) started messing with my mind a little. By by day three I was excitedly pointing out wildlife which more often than not turned out to be large rocks, tree stumps or tree shadows (and not a whole herd of bison relaxing on a hillside.... each one under a tree).
Despite my safety concerns being largely bear focused, Bison are a more present danger in Yellowstone. To the untrained eye (i.e. ours) they are just like rather stocky cows, seem just as harmless and are good, cheap entertainment. They just mosy down the road...la di da.., stopping to have a scratch, a good look around or to feed their calves, causing many a 'Bison Jam'. We did, however witness one poor lady with her service dog (which looked remarkedly like a coyote) get chased down by a very protective mother Bison - and those horns are nasty. All were okay, but consider yourself warned.
Similar to a Bison Jam, is a Bear Jam - however this involves one bear down an embankment (see photo), and 20-odd cars - sometimes just parked in the middle of the road - all just part of the Yellowstone experience.
And some pics for you - Hold your cursor over pictures for description....
After Yellowstone we drove to Driggs, Idaho to drop off our trusty campervan (BTW, I strongly recommend Campervan North America - so nice to deal with real people and Bob even drove us to the airport in Jackson). A million hours later we arrived home at 2am in the morning - exhausted!
And, as this is my last Road Trip installment, our final trip stats:
- Distance: 2020 miles
- Hike distance total: 35 miles plus
- States visited: 7 - Nevada, Arizona, Utah, Wyoming, and breakfast in Montana and a drive through Idaho and Colorado
- Bear sightings: 6
- RV sightings: 64 (over the first two days, then the novelty wore off and we stopped counting), count excludes those seen within a National Park or at campsites
- And just in case you missed my other reports:
And the promised photo of our campervan
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