Yellowstone National Park

Yellowstone National Park

Yellowstone National Park is one of the most spectacular displays of geothermal activity in the world, and if you haven't been there yet, it should definitely be on your bucket list. Yellowstone has it all – beautiful mountains, a grand canyon, lakes, amazing wildlife, and of course the geysers and hot springs. Bob and I have been there twice – for a week in 2003, and again in 2010. There is so much to see and do that it would be impossible to ever get tired of this national treasure.

In 2003 we were lucky enough to be able to stay in the Fishing Bridge RV park, which is within the park. In 2010 they were renovating the Fishing Bridge campground, so we stayed in the Yellowstone KOA which is in West Yellowstone, Montana. Although expensive, the Yellowstone KOA was a great place to come home to after a long day of touring the park. We absolutely enjoyed the indoor swimming pool with the spa. Located only six miles outside of the West Yellowstone entrance, it was an easy drive to get into the park.

You need at least three days to see most of the major sights. The Grand Loop encompasses the Upper and Lower Loops. This takes you through most of the major areas of the park. If you only have a day to tour this park, the Lower Loop probably has the most to see, including

• Old Faithful, of course!
  
  

  

  Old Faithful, Yellowstone National Park

  
  
• Midway Geyser Basin and Lower Geyser Basin including Fountain Paint Pot.
  
  
  
  
  
• The Grand Canyon of Yellowstone
  
  

  

  Grand Canyon of Yellowstone - Yellowstone National Park

If you get a chance, make sure to take a swim in the Firehole River. We did that in 2003, and it is one of my favorite memories of the park.  Located on the Firehole Canyon Drive, past the scenic Firehole Falls, there's a swimming hole with a changing room. The water is comfortably warm since many of the geysers drain into the Firehole River.

Here's a three minute video encapsulating what we saw on our 2010 trip.

This last trip we took the time to tour the Wolf and Grizzly Discovery Center in West Yellowstone. It was worth the visit just to see the wolves and bears up close. 

Wolf and Grizzly Discovery Center, West Yellowstone

It was more interesting, however, to see the bears in the wild.  We were lucky enough to get a real good view of a mother Grizzly bear with two cubs climbing up Mount Washburn.

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As far as seeing wildlife goes, I think Yellowstone is by far the best National Park.  Wherever you go you're bound to see bison, deer, elk and pronghorn antelope.  

Pronghorn antelope, Yellowstone National Park

Bison, Yellowstone National Park

If you're lucky you'll see bears, coyotes, moose, bighorn sheep, and wolves.  The park also has mountain lions and lynx.

We have yet to see the wolves in the wild, although we've traveled to Hayden Valley many times with a spotter scope. Guess we'll just have to go back for another visit!

Our Trip of a Lifetime

Yellowstone National Park

My husband Bob and I love the National Parks, and have made a point of visiting these treasures during our travels. So far we have visited 25 of the 58 National Parks, as listed below:

Acadia National Park
Badlands National Park
Bryce Canyon
Carlsbad Caverns
*Crater Lake - Oregon
*Glacier - Montana
Grand Canyon
Grand Teton
Heleakala
Hawaii Volcanoes
Joshua Tree
*Kings Canyon
*Mount Rainier
*Olympic
*Petrified Forest
*Redwood
*Rocky Mountain
Saguaro
*Sequoia
Shenandoah
*Theodore Roosevelt
Wind Cave
*Yellowstone
*Yosemite
Zion

We visited 11 of those parks (the ones with asterisks) in one trip!  In 2010 we took a fabulous trip that we designated the “Trip of a Lifetime” since we don’t think that we will ever get that ambitious again. We traveled 14,000 miles in five months , and not only got a good tour of those 11 National Parks, but also Custer State Park, the Cooley Dam and some other wonderful state and federal parks. We even traveled over to Vancouver Island in British Columbia Canada. Since Bob and I love wine, our trip had to include a tour of the California, Oregon and Washington wine country. We bought ourselves many wonderful bottles of wine, and then were presented with the problem of what to do with them when we entered Canada. We had no idea that you were not allowed to bring the wine over into Canada without paying a huge amount of taxes. We were in Olympic National Park before we took the ferry over to Canada, so we rented a small climate controlled self storage container in Port Angeles (the monthly rate was only $50.00). We would have had the wine shipped home, but we live in New Jersey and they do not allow wine to come into the state. On the way home we had the misfortune of breaking a trailer axle and got waylaid in Santa Fe New Mexico for nearly three weeks. We were going to stop in Santa Fe anyhow, but we got to know it much better that we expected to. If you are going to get stuck somewhere, it’s certainly not a bad place to hang out. We quite enjoyed it even though at this point we were anxious to get home. Outside of that the trip was one of the most memorable experiences that we will ever have.

Butchart Gardens, Victoria BC

San Francisco

Feeding the Donkeys Custer National Park

Yellowstone National Park

Mount Ranier in July

Hiking in Mount Ranier

Theodore Roosevelt National Park

Sun Lake State Park Washington

Yellowstone National Park

Yellowstone National Park

Oregon Coast

Redwood National Park

Crater Lake National Park

 Glacier National Park

Rocky Mountain National Park

Custer State Park, SD

Crater Lake

Robert Mondavi Winery Napa Valley

Washington Winery

View from our campground in Victoria BC

Custer State Park

Victoria, BC

Mount Saint Helens

Golden Gate Bridge

Sequoia National Park

Rodney Strong Winery Senoma CA

Point Reyes National Seashore