Yellowstone - Nature's Wonderland

Just before sunrise - Wyoming
Sunrise

Golden fields bathed in sunlight

Majestic Grand Tetons

Mr Elk

Bison Family

Bison coming out of the Yellowstone River - everyone stops to watch them

The alarm went off at 4am - yikes. That's right folks, we wanted to be on the road and at Yellowstone's door by 8am to have the optimum viewing time to see the animals. Our campground was 2.5 hrs away, and we needed to shower, breakfast and make a quick stop into the 24 hr Walmart to pick up fresh supplies before heading off. Little did we know that an hour after we walked out of Walmart, the police apprehended an escaped criminal just one hour north of us. He and his 2 accomplices were supposed to be hiding out in Yellowstone, so we expected to see lots of police in the area, but never saw one. Hmm. Perhaps they were working undercover, disguised as bears!

Sunrise occured at 6.15am and it was a real treat to be driving along the Wyoming countryside and watching the darkened landscape slowly become suffused with the day's first light. Magical. It was lovely seeing antelope and deer out enjoying the fresh new day. Further afield we saw a female moose in the distance - you don't see too many moose around, so we pulled over and just watched her for awhile. Before long we came within view of the majestic Grand Teton mountains - unbelievable. The last time we visited the area it was the end of Jun 2008 and there was a lot of snow on the mountains. Not so this trip though, as it is well into summer, but they were still a sight to behold.

Entering Yellowstone and driving past the pristine lakes and heavily forested areas, you really thank the conservatives and get a sense of how astute the early US Presidents were to designate National Parks to preserve nature lands for future generations to enjoy. Yellowstone being the first NP in USA. Our first animal sighting in Yellowstone were of two healthy male elk. Murray pulled up beside the road and I got out and got a good photo of one of them. The other was moving away and was hidden amongst the trees. We decided to make a bee line for Hayden Valley which is our usual bison spotting area, but were pleasantly surprised to see them a lot sooner. A herd of them were conveniently milling beside the river and adjacent to a large parking area, so we had plenty of room to park parallel to the road, open the RV door, and just sit on the step, soaking up the sun, the view of the river and of course, the bison. We stayed on the RV steps as you are not allowed to approach within 25 yards of the bison, and we were a lot closer than that. There were three large bulls in this group, and they were constantly bellowing as they shadowed a female - seemed as though they were saying to the other males, 'keep away mate, this one's mine'. The one nearest us was getting increasingly agitated, and I pressured Murray to unlatch the door in case we needed to escape inside quickly - didn't want any 2000lb (900kg) bull dribbling on my steps and trying to get inside our RV! They may look cumbersome, but they can move at 30mph (48kph) and only 3 weeks ago in Yellowstone, a woman was rammed and flipped by a bison. Further north we saw a line of bison swimming from one side of the river to the other, then they had right of way on the road as they crossed to the other side. We didn't see any bears this trip, but made do with having seen them here on our last visit. At day's end, we headed out of the North Entrance gate and crossed the border into Montana and right into a thunderstorm. Thankfully our RV park (right on the edge of the Yellowstone River) was not far away, and the rain kindly abated while Murray connected us up. We are only 170 miles (274 km) from where Custer faced Sitting Bull and died at the Battle of Little Bighorn - Benn was with us on our visit there back in 2003.