Day 67, Grand Teton NP, WY- Yellowstone NP WY, 2

(TA’s day)It’s 6 in the morning and time to get up. Not going hiking, not planning on watching the sunrise or even see some dawn wildlife… No, we have to get on he road in order to try and secure a campsite at our next destination: Yellowstone NP.

Possibly the busiest or number 1 National park in the USA and as such attracts a lot of people… 4.2 million people visit Yellowstone each year! With limited campsites it’s a battle of first come first serve unless you have booked far in advance, which we didn’t do.

The park entrance is a meer 60 kms up the road. But the park is huge and it took us another hour to hour and half to get to the center where we wanted to camp.

Along the way a brown bear and 2 cubs slowed down the progress. We stopped along the road and watched them for a while and took pictures along with a big group of other travelers.

Once off again it was non-stop to the first visitor center to try and get some idea of what we were in for… campsites where still available at the south end of the park (the least interesting part) but filling fast further north.

We pinned our ears and made our way to Canyon Village. As I queued it quickly became apparent that the campsite was full for the coming days. From there we blazed over to the next place 20 minutes away where the results were the same… worse  news, the whole park was full! So, we headed back to Canyon Village again and this time Zoe went in to see if they could help us. She managed to get us a camp site for one night back down by the lake towards the south end of the park.

With a place to sleep we could now go about visiting. I had already seen the park so I was more concerned with finding a long term solution to the camping issue.

So Zoe and I went separate ways, Zoe went to explore the canyon and I went to set up camp and find out if there was anything anywhere available. As I checked in the lovely lady at the counter made some phone calls and after about 20 minutes of negotiating managed to find us a campsite normally only available for large groups at one of the other campsites. We now had 6 nights secured in the park. That was great news! Zoe arrived from her adventure shortly after I set up the tent and the rest of the day was spent sourcing food,cooking, listening to a ranger talk about the geology of Yellowstone NP and a good night sleep.

(Zoe’s day)

It was indeed an early rise, quick breakfast and we hit the road as the sun was still low in the sky (rises early and set quite late already). I realised there was still so much of the North end of the Tetons we hadn’t yet driven through. Near the end of the park we slowed down as there we cars everywhere, a few orange cones and a ranger directing traffic. Our initial thought was there was an accident; no, just a bear! A huge female grizzly was grazing in a small meadow no more than 20metres from the road. I drove by as slow as possible to check her out, then parked between cars and enjoyed watching her and her two cubs from 100feet away. -(this is the ranger imposed ‘safe’ limit, as close as you are allowed). The Cubs were super cute, playing with each other and running around the meadow. The mom (dubbed #399) wasn’t bothered by our presence and of the vehicles; just ignored us.We stayed taking pictures until they moved into the forest edge, then headed off to our initial mission of campsite hunting.

Yes the park is huge – it took along time to get to Canyon village! Didn’t arrive until around 11. We parted ways as I was more excited by Yellowstone than Tanguy, he’s been here twice already and knows the drill. I stopped to take pics of Bison grazing right by the road, did a short walk to ‘Mud Volcano’ and ‘Dragons Mouth Vent’ some thermal features on the east side. Then did a short steep hike to the lookout of Lower Falls in ‘Grand Canyon of the Yellowstone’ an impressive, light coloured canyon with two large waterfalls. They were however pretty popular features, lots of people milling around and full car parks.

Lower falls in Grand Canyon from a viewpoint

A still iced covered lake just after the entrance into Yellowstone

Completely nonchalant bull Bisons grazing on the meadows

After my canyon adventure, met Tanguy at the campsite, which was in the warm sun. Grabbed some snow from one of the snow drifts for our beer and enjoyed a relaxed evening. The following morning, there was a bison casually strolling through the middle of our loop to trim the grass!

–Zoe