Traveling the USA Part II

We want to see the Cody rodeo tonight so we decide to stay another day at the Yellowstone RV Park and Inn in Wapiti, Wyoming.

Our last grocery trip was about two weeks ago, so we start the day by making a trip in town for lots and lots of groceries and getting two prescriptions refilled at Wal-Mart. I'm not a fan of Wal-Mart pharmacy, but it's great to get prescriptions refilled while on the road.

We return to the campground for lunch and some time at the campground's swimming pool. The scenery is unique at this pool: Wyoming mountains and horses roaming around the field across from the pool. Joe is thrilled to spend time in the pool and keeps us there for as long as possible.

After swimming we drive into Cody, Wyoming to walk around the old town. I look at several "cowgirl" shirts, but don't purchase any. Joe convinces us to eat dinner at Wendy's versus a local restaurant so he's happy about dinner.

After dinner we walk down to Buffalo Bill's original Cody hotel, The Irma, for a gunfight. It's kind of corny/cheesy but the price is right--free. The guy portraying Wild Bill Hickok sounds exactly like Kevin Costner, so I give him a good look and decide there is no way that it really is Kevin Costner; too bad.

We do some souvenir shopping after the gunfight and notice that they have started to set up the Grizzlies on Parade artwork along the main street. These are grizzly bear statues that artist name and paint accordingly. We have seen Pigs on Parade, Cows on Parade, Ponies on Parade, etc and always enjoy looking at the creativity some of the artists portray in painting these statues.

Then we head down to the Cody Wyoming Rodeo.

They do a rodeo show every night during the summer and it turns out to be a lot of fun. The cowboys are not as talented as the national professional rodeo circuit, but still lots of fun to watch. They have quite a crowd there, with people from all around the country and even some international visitors.

Our favorites are the clowns, bronco riding and bull riding. The show is very "Wyoming" and enjoyed by all.

I wake up early and we are packed up and ready to leave the Fishing Bridge RV Park in Yellowstone by 8:30am!

We drive down the road a few miles and see a bear jam....I'm excited. This is the area where there is a mama grizzly and 2 yearling cubs. We park the rig and watch the 3 grizzlies for about 15 minutes before they disappear into the woods.

Then we drive through some incredible scenery to Wapiti, Wyoming (Yellowstone Inn and RV Park). As we drive through Sylvan Pass, the road is blocked by several big horn sheep. One big guy refuses to move out of our lane and we finally end up driving around him.

Just before leaving Yellowstone we come to a "moose jam": there are 4 moose in a creek beside the road. No parking for our large rig so no goods pics, but still fun to see so many moose.

The scenery continues to be great; the road between Yellowstone and Cody is supposed to be one of the most scenic highways in the country. I'm not sure if that's true, but it definately is scenic and we enjoy it til we are stopped in traffic due to a highway accident. (We find out later that it was a head on collision between a motorcyle and truck). It's a nasty one and we see there is someone laying beside the road, covered, and obviously not alive. I'm not sure why he is still there; I'm assuming they used the ambulance for the other crash victims. Very sobering/upsetting knowing that there is a family out there who is going to get "the phonecall" that you never ever want to receive from the police. I say lots and lots of prayers throughout the rest of the day.

So we silently make the rest of the drive to Wapiti, Wyoming. The campgrounds in Cody, Wyoming are full for the weekend. There's an indian pow wow in town this weekend. Wapiti is about 16 miles west of Cody. We set up, have lunch and head to Cody. On the way we stop at the Buffalo Bill Dam/Reservoir Visitor Center for a quick look.

We spend the rest of the afternoon at the Buffalo Bill Cody Historical Center, where they have 5 museums in one: Buffalo Bill Museum, Whitney Museum of Western Art, Natural History Museum, Plains Indian Museum, and the Winchester Firearms Museum. (I go the coffee shop while Jere and Joe go through the gun museum--looking at 3000 guns is just not "fun" to me.)

We return to the campground for dinner and I spend the rest of the evening trying to upload some of my travel blog. We did not have TV or internet or cell phone coverage for the 10 days in Yellowstone's Fishing Bridge RV Park.

Our last day at Yellowstone. We have had such great weather the last few days; we are going to miss the cold mornings and pleasant afternoons, but we’ve seen the entire park so time to move on tomorrow.

We have a good breakfast and then head off to “hike” Uncle Tom’s trail. On the drive to the trail we stop at Hayden Valley to watch a grizzly and her cub.

Uncle Tom's trail has been closed due to ice/snow, but was opened up yesterday. The trail is not much of a trail—it’s 328 stairs down to the bottom of the Lower Yellowstone Falls.

Views from the trail:

We then visit the brink of the Upper Falls, have a picnic lunch and then hike the North Rim Trail to the brink of the Lower Falls. (The North Rim Trail is closed beyond this point due to construction).

On the North Rim Trail, we pass a huge waterfall that also will eventually drain into the Yellowstone River:

We stop for ice cream (Buffalo Chip) and then head back to the campground.

Joe and I go in the woods behind our trailer and he builds a “pirate ship” with logs that are laying in the area. Kindof like playing with really large “Lincoln logs”.

We bike down to the Fishing Bridge before dinner for one last look at the Yellowstone River.

After dinner we start packing up so we can leave by 9am tomorrow. Jere and I go for a short ride to see if we can spot the grizzly and two cubs that we’ve heard are often seen up the road. No luck seeing bears, but pretty sunset to finish out our day.

We had such a long day yesterday, we decide to simply hang around the Fishing Bridge area. We spend much of the day catching up on chores, but after lunch we take a hike around Indian Pond to Storm Point. It’s a nice walk, but nothing special. We see several marmots along the shore and a buffalo near the trail.

After dinner we all have some “me” time. I spend my time walking down to the Fishing Bridge and watching the pelicans, a beaver and an osprey. Jere spends his time on the computer and Joe watches a Pirates of the Caribbean DVD. It’s nice to spend time with family, but I enjoy the time by myself, listening to my favorite songs on my mp3 player and watching the wildlife.

Jere and I attend the ranger campfire program on grizzly bears, and call it a day.

A full day of touring Yellowstone today. We start off with stopping at the West Thumb Geyser Basin and walking the boardwalk. The hot springs are interesting to watch, but the two busloads of international students are the highlight of the stop: Jere and I hope that U.S. students act more respectful when touring Europe than this group of students. They are loud (one group is screaming out the French national anthem) and clowning around near the hotsprings. I can see how people fall into the hot springs and get burned after observing this group’s behavior. There are large numbers of international visitors at Yellowstone, especially at the popular areas of the park; this rowdy group of students is NOT typical of the international visitors—most are very friendly and very respectful of their fellow tourists.

Our next stop is at the Grant Visitor Center where they have an exhibit and a film about the 1988 wildfires that burned millions of acres of the park. It’s a very one-sided exhibit by the park, and all the exhibits and the film focus on the unavoidability of the fires and how the fires have helped the park. Interesting museum, but very “pro national park service”.

We drive up near the Old Faithful area to take a 7-mile hike. Long hike, but some wonderful things to see, including seeing the colorful steam coming off the Grand Prismatic Pool

and a great overhead view of the Grand Prismatic Pool:

We take a long break to cool off at Fairy Falls.

And then walk a little farther to view a very pretty geyser that spouts off for 3-4 minutes every 30 seconds, Imperial Geyser.

On the hike back we encounter a large bison near the path and take a detour to keep the required 25 feet away from it.

We are exhausted after the hike and drive down to the Old Faithful Lodge for Bison Meatloaf for dinner, before driving back to the campground. On our way back we drive around another geyser area where I get a cool picture of the sky reflecting in the Fountain Geyser.

And we see a large herd of buffalo in the road, so we stop and watch them for awhile. There are some newborn calves in the herd, and several of the bulls are fighting/playing with each other. They have no fears of our large truck and walk right next to it.