After a relaxing morning around Virginian RV we hitched up and headed north through Grand Teton National Park to Yellowstone....this is absolutely one of the most beautiful drives we’ve ever been on.
I love Grand Tetons! This is up there with Glacier and Zion as my top favorites!
Amazing!!!!! 2 hours later, we hit the Yellowstone South Entrance and a 30 minute wait to get into the park.
This trip with the Biscamps has been 3 years and counting! We were scheduled to go in this exact trip from RMNP through GT/YNP and up to Glacier back in 2015, but due to illness in the family the Biscamps had to cancel last minute. Fast forward 3 years later, and we made it!!!! 30 minutes later, we arrived to our campsite in Grant Village, unhitched, and relaxed with a little trumpet time before heading to Old Faithful.
We made dinner reservations at the Old Faithful Inn Dining months ago, and the only time we could get was 4:45pm.....silver supper for us! It turned out to be perfect because all the tourists were leaving as we were pulling in. We made it just in time for our early dinner, and had a wonderful buffet of prime rib, trout, and huckleberry chicken, but my favorite was the soups....Bison Chili and Roasted Red Pepper Gouda Soup! Yum!!!!!! We had our fill then set off to see Old Faithful erupt!
There she blows!!!
All of the tour busses had cleared out, so we got to walk the boardwalks all by ourselves!
It’s so incredible to see all the geysers and springs around Old Faithful.
Last visit, we took the advice of our book, “Secrets of the National Parks” and hiked the two miles up to Observation Point and saw the aerial view of the basin, but were too tired to actually walk the boardwalks. This time, we were set to see all the geysers and especially the Morning Glory Spring.
Incredible!!!!
3.5 mile hike later, the sun was was setting and we were whipped. We drove the 30 minutes back to the campers, the sun was going down, and we went straight to bed!
Day 23: What I failed to mention we’re the massive amounts of swarms of mosquitos on our Lower Geyser Basin Hike last night. I had welts all over my back, arms, and legs.....yuck! I think the boys counted 10 on my back, 10 on my legs, and 8 on my arms. Crazy Chris and I are the only ones with O-neg blood, so the whole trip in Yellowstone, the mosquitos were swarming us while the rest of the group with their A blood only got a bite or two. We sucked it up and set off for another morning of touring the geysers. This day’s goal was to drive from Grant back through Old Faithful, tour the three Geyser Basins up to Madison, and on up to Norris....then drive back....off we went!
The Lakeshore Drive in Upper Geyser Basin was my favorite! Not many people, and very interesting Geysers! Here’s the beautiful Fountain Geyser!
We didn’t stay for the expected eruption between 12:30pm and 4:30pm, but it was said to be one of the biggest in the park. The other interesting Geyser here was the White Dome Geyser! This one is a cone Geyser instead of fountain Geyser, so it has a much smaller eruption.
The Schettlers made it to the top of Firehole and Lakeshore Drive and we’re done!
We turned back and headed for the Casita 2.0 to rest, but not before one last stop and Ida Lake and the Continental Divide.
The Biscamps pushed on and made it all the way to Norris! 5 hours later they returned to the campsite weary and ready to relax.
If you’ve never been to Yellowstone it’s unlike anywhere else in the whole world, but it’s completely exhausting.....and, there’s no phone or cell service anywhere in the park, so you can send or receive texts, emails, or phone calls. We tried to meet up with Cole’s buddy Vivian and the Ewing family, but had no service to even connect with each other. Cole was really bummed....and so was Mommy. I love the Ewing family. To cheer everyone up we decided it was campfire day! The boys were in charge of making the fire!
Their time in Scouts has really paid off! (note: we did allow them the use of a fire started, but they did everything else! We had a filling dinner of brats on the grill, and set off for one last excursion at West Thumb Geyser Basin at sunset!
Day 24: I must admit, we’re all getting pretty exhausted, but I was the most excited about this day for the whole Yellowstone trip....Haysen Valley and Grand Canyon of the Yellowstone. Curtis and I were up early for a sunrise run around Grant to Yellowstone Lake.
Beautiful!!!
4 miles later, we woke the boys, packed up, hitched up....again....and set off for Canyon Village Campground. Before we knew it, we were driving through Hayden Valley and the hurds of bison. This big fella was right on the road!
We made it to Canyon, checked in, did laundry, and Crazy Chris got a random voicemail. There’s patches of service here, so suddenly you’ll get in 4 texts, but cannot respond to them because nothing will send out. He was able to hear the voicemail and it was Fish Creek Campground in Glacier National Park (our next destination) saying they were late for their reservation and it was cancelled.......NOOOOO!!!!!!!!!!!! When we made our Fish Creek Reservations, we booked extra time and we’re supposed to call back and finalize the dates before the trip, but this one slipped through the cracks. We spent the rest of the afternoon trying to get phone calls out to different KOA’s and Recreation.gov to fix the cancelled reservations with no luck. We tried to plan different options where we’d leave Yellowstone a day early and all drive up there together to find a place, but they didn’t feel comfortable heading another 450 miles out of the way with no reservations, so they decided to can Glacier and start the trek back to Texas after Yellowstone. 😢. To quote Melissa, we made lemonade out of lemons, cooked an amazing spaghetti meal and headed for the brink of the lower falls after the crowds were gone.
I loved this switchback hike down into the canyon!
We hiked the 1/2 mile back up and drove the North Rim Drive around to the Grand View Overlook, then took the South Rim Drive to Artist’s Point at sunset. What a beautiful country we live in.
Day 25: We all decided to make the best of our last day in Yellowstone, so we saved the north loop for last. After the morning coffee, we set off for Tower and Manmoth Springs.
We saw a mommy bear and two tiny cubs hiding behind a tree, a coyote, and a pronghorn on the way to Mammoth Springs!
When we arrived to Mammoth Springs we toured the Visitor Center and were greeted by a herd of elk.
We walked around the local town, stopped at the Terrace Grill for lunch then on to the Map Room in Mammoth Springs Hotel for a game of chess and checkers.
I lost.....as usual.....Carson tried to help me a bit, but Curtis still checkmated me in the end. We hit the car for a drive around Upper Travertine Terraces.
After our interesting drive around the terraces it was time to head back, so we opted for the same route instead of the construction route through Norris because the Rangers said it was a 50 minute delay....yuck! Boy we’re we happy we went back the same way because we saw a pair of grizzly bear cubs up in the trees!
AND.....a Momma Black Bear and baby cub!
They were so close we had to jump on top of the truck for safety!
That’s 3 grizzlies and 5 black bears throughout our stay in GT/YNP!
Bye bye black bears! What an awesome trip in Yellowstone! Tomorrow we part ways with the Biscamps as they head east to Devil’s Tower and we head north to Glacier. It’s been an amazing trip full of awesome memories!
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