Day 6 - To Yellowstone

Wildlife Tally: pronghorn antelope, bison, elk, magpie



We are finding that the best parts of our trip are the things we happen into by chance. The drive from Gillette, WY to Yellowstone was supposed to be 7 1/2 hours. We turned it into 9 1/2. We had to cross the Bighorn Mountains, which are a spur off the Rockies. There are 2 major routes and we made quick call while on I-90 and chose US-14. What a ride! The road climbs into the mountains using a series of switchbacks and crosses through a pass at about 8500'. The scenery was stunning. It was about lunch time and we were looking for some place to stop and make sandwiches. We were pretty much in the middle of nowhere in the mountains. Susan was driving and I caught a glimpse of a stream and a turnout appeared about 5 seconds later. "Turn in here!" Good thing she has fast reflexes. It turns out this site, known as Shell Falls, is run by the National Park Service and is staffed by rangers with a nice little visitor center. It has really neat paths and bridges to give you access to the canyon and the falls (picture above). It is surrounded by dry terrain and mountains. We ended up spending about 1 1/2 hours exploring this area.

Mountains around Shell Falls

Switchbacks climbing up the Bighorn Mountains

I had not realized that Wyoming was so dry. Except near a river or where irrigation is used, the landscape looks like this shot taken out the car window. Looks like desert to me. 

Pretty good shot from a car moving at 75

As we got closer and closer to Yellowstone we started to see more and more haze. After a while we realized it was smoke in the air. We knew there was a huge fire in Idaho but that was 300 miles away. Could the smoke really come from that far? When we got to the East entrance of Yellowstone, the ranger told us that there were 5 active fires in the park. Aha! The reason for the smoke. The road we wanted to take to the place we were staying was closed due to one of the fires. So we had a long, but very pretty detour. 

This not a sunset. This is the middle of the afternoon. A red sun due to the clouds of smoke from the wildfires. 

Yellowstone is a big park. It is 71 miles across the park from the East entrance to West Yellowstone, where we were to stay for the next 3 nights. Along the way we saw our first Yellowstone residents:

I ain't scared of no stinkin' cars!

Neither am I!

After driving from the east Yellowstone entrance, through the park to the west Yellowstone entrance, we finally arrived in West Yellowstone, Montana, around 8:00.  We still needed to buy groceries for dinner that night, and food for the next couple of days.  We did not arrive to the condo until 9:00.  Think the kids were in bed finally around 11:00 and we planned an early morning the next day in Yellowstone for a ranger guided hike.  So much for sleep!  Lack of sleep for two young people can mean a day with moments of fighting, and aggravation.  And Nicole and David were bickering too!