Our Trip to Yellowstone

Oct 12: We continue down I-90 to Bozeman, Montana. Wireless Internet, but no Nextel phone service there.

Oct 13: We make it to the entrance of Yellowstone at about noon. Here we see Mammoth Hot Springs steaming away.

Liberty Cap, a dormant hot spring cone at Mammoth Hot Springs.

More of Mammoth Hot Springs.

As late as the 70's the hot springs were pouring over these steps. These days the upper falls are dry.

Looking back toward the "town" of Mammoth.

It's a bit of a climb at 6,000 feet.

After you make it to the top, you'll find that the road comes around and you can drive to the top of the stupid thing.

At least it's a nice day to hike up to the top of a dry hot springs.

Sheepeater Cliff is dried magma.

The Gardiner River seems chilly.

Normally there'd be moose here near Indian Creek, but not today.

There were lots of buffalo along the side of the road, though.

And a couple of coyotes (yeah, there in the center, detail below). The trees show the evidence of the 1988 fire that changed the face of Yellowstone.

The Yellowstone River flows over the waterfall.

And through the Yellowstone Canyon.

We did find a moose near Canyon. Or is that an Elk?

There are lots of steaming pools around the park.

Lots of them.

And a number of waterfalls.

We found Old Faithful to be quite faithful. What, no pictures? No, but everyone's got a picture of that!! Fortunately there was room in the inn. It closes for the season on October 15th so we just made it. Whew!!

Oct 14: We head south out of Yellowstone through Grand Tetons.

The Tetons are quite grand. We continued down to Jackson Hole, Wyoming.

Had lunch there and then backtracked a bit to pass through the flats of central Wyoming to Casper. It's rumored that the place is haunted, but the ghosts seemed friendly enough.

Oct 15: We wake up to white stuff all over the place.

After a bit of a drive we find this thing. Obviously that white stuff must have been instant mashed potatoes.

Oh, it's just Devil's Tower in northeast Wyoming. Richard Dreyfus wasn't even there.

After getting back on I-90 we continued down to Rapid City, South Dakota and then south to Mount Rushmore.

It's really amazing that this natural rock formation looks so much like four of the presidents.

According to the literature at the site, Thomas Jefferson started out to the left of George but the rock there was too crumbly so he was blasted off and placed on George's right instead. His "lofty, forward looking upward gaze" was once thought to be intentional, but it turned out that there was a crack that would have run right through his nose. His head was tilted back to reduce the chance of it falling off. The crack can be seen runing through his right cheek and chin (go full screen).

We found some wildlife at Mount Rushmore as well.

Big and small.

Hunting season doesn't start until Sunday so these gals are still visible.

On the way out it started snowing again.

Chief Crazy Horse is down the street a bit. He's coming along, but won't be finished for several more decades.

Oct 16: We spent the night in Hot Springs, South Dakota and then continued south to the Nebraska pan handle. This state is flat.

We took a left onto I-76 and headed into Denver, Colorado. Our Nextel phones claim we have service again. From I-76 we hung a left and headed west on US40. At 11,000 feet there was a bit of snow on the ground.

We spent the night in Steamboat, Colorado.

Oct 17: We continued west on US40 into Utah.

After passing through Salt Lake City, we head north through Idaho. Played a game of "dodge the tumbleweed". The tumbleweed lost.

We spent the night in Twin Falls, Idaho just south of Boise on I-84.

Oct 18: We continued west on I-84 through Pendleton, Oregon. No phone service in Oregon, but we get it back after we head north on I-82 and make it to Yakima. We get back on I-90 and make it home again just in time to experience good ol' Seattle rush hour.