Yellowstone!!

Sadly, I’m posting my Yellowstone trip before I finish the rest of my Sagehen trip…oh well.

Anthony had the PLEASURE of going to Yellowstone with me and my family :) It was his first trip. We had an AMAZING time. (I suggest stop reading now if you’d like the summary, because that was it…the rest is a day by day detail of moose searching and geyser watching.)

Let me back up a few days…We kept looking at the weather and at one point there was a chance of snow while we were going to be there, and highs in the low 50’s. We were not looking forward to being bundled up the entire time, but pack our snow coats, stocking hats and warm clothes.

Fast forward a few days…we had AMAZING weather. It was perfect outside, mid 60’s to low 70’s. If it had been any warmer it would have been too hot!

Day 1: Spelunking…need I say more? Ok, I will. We stopped at Craters of the Moon and went “caving” or spelunking…but we weren’t really as prepared as some of the people we saw…and my phone wouldn’t let me type spelunking…so…we went caving. We also hike up to the top of the “null” which didn’t look so bad, but I decided to race Anthony. He won…by a long shot. I ran about 10 yards and couldn’t breathe.

We drove to the Tetons that afternoon and stayed just outside the park. Day 2, we took a short hike around String Lake and got to see a beautiful view of the Tetons. We drove into Yellowstone and set up camp.

We were so happy to use our brand new tent…boy…what a tent! It’s beautiful, and big, and I can stand up in it :) It’s probably one of the best things I’ve ever bought from Costco…besides our couch. Don’t get me wrong. I love our old tent. It’s perfect for weekend camping, but any more than a couple days and I feel cooped up. I like to be able to stand up while I’m changing and have some space to throw all my junk around (if you’ve seen my bedroom you’d understand what I’m talking about…it’s huge too…and sometimes I still think it’s too small).

So, our entire goal of the week was to find a moose. And thanks to one of my parent’s friends “guaranteeing” we would see a moose…ummm we actually did! I’m not sure how some guy guaranteeing it would happen, made it happen, but apparently it worked. Day 3? I think it was, Anthony told my dad to pull over because down in the VERY bottom of the canyon he was pretty sure there was a moose, sure enough, there she was! Anthony then proceeded to run down the hill further than us to get me a good picture (he really does love me lots) :)

We also had the pleasure of seeing a grizzly and her cub the first morning at Yellowstone, a bison and a bull elk laying together, lots more bison and elk (not together), another grizzly, a couple coyotes, birds (including a bald eagle), and a stump that looked a LOT like a moose until we ran up the hill and figured out it wasn’t…Yes, our wildlife searching finding was top notch. We also asked a lady at the store where to find more moose. She gave us a location (which we quickly forgot) and off we drove outside the park to Cody, Wyoming. There was had lunch and saw a miniature replication of the Old West, well worth the drive, but no moose. On the way home, mom and I began yelling at Anthony simultaneously to pull over we were SURE we saw a moose this time!!!! And yes, we did :) a bull, just across the river. These pictures were much better!

Ok, enough rambling about moose. We also saw lots of geysers and pools. We took a short walk hike to Ferry Falls. I’m going to brag for just a moment, and say how happy I am that I’m in shape enough that 5 miles didn’t faze me, even after the 4 miles of walking around Old Faithful. Ok, moving on…We sat around for…oh…about 2 hours waiting for Grand Geyser to go off. We had bets on who though it would erupt first, Jason won…I didn’t  But, thankfully Warren didn’t win, because we would have been there MUCH longer. And, yes, it was worth the wait…what an amazing show it put off! Much more impressive than Old Faithful! All in all, that was our trip….now if blogger would be nice to me, I’d post this with some pictures :)

Spelunking

Tetons

Bear #1 and cub - so cute!

Bull Elk

Far away moose # 1


David and Anthony - humoring me

Grand Geyser


Ferry Falls


Grizzly Bear # 2 - it did look at us, but this was the best picture I could find.


And behold!!! our beloved moose!

Well - that's it for now! We're home for a few days until our next adventure. And...I'll be posting my new and improved couch soooo soon! A word to the wise, I should never go in to upholstery.

~~Erin~~