Family Driving Vacation-Day 18: Yellowstone National Park, WY

Yellowstone adventuring continues today!  Today we hit the road by 9:45/10 and swung by the General Store near our lodging to get some fruit and milk.  The General Stores are only open from 9-6 so you have to plan ahead somewhat for the day since if you don’t grab snacks or small meals by 6 you’ll be paying a good bit for a fancy dinner here in the park.  Unfortunately our room doesn’t have a microwave or mini fridge.  Having a fridge with these little ones is pretty necessary since Woodrow’s still drinking milk primarily, and a microwave would open up some food options. 

Anyways, we went to Storm Point Trail in East Yellowstone, but relatively close to our lodging.  The trail was 2.3 miles long and took us an hour and a half.  The trail started in an open meadow that overlooked Indian Pond and the trail cut through some forest before taking us along the shore of Yellowstone Lake.  It was a BEAUTIFUL walk.  The hike didn’t have many steep hills so it was a great hike for us.  The trail map said that this trail can be closed frequently for bears, but we didn’t see any. 

We finished our hike just before noon so we continued along the Eastern road of the park.  Mason wanted to do the Avalanche Peak Trail (4 miles, 3-4 hours, extremely strenuous, and climbs over 2100 feet in the first 2 miles).  This is also a trail that says it’s not recommended in September and October due to high Grizzly bear populations. Ummmmm…no thank you!  But, I knew he wanted to do it, so I offered to feed the kids lunch and play near the parking area (which was by a lake and hilly area) As we stopped and Mason was loading up his backpack and I was making PB&J sandwiches in the back of the car, a man walked up wearing all camo, carrying a large backpack, what looked like a bow and arrow in a bag, and a walking stick.   He had a long story, but basically he needed a ride about 4 miles East to where his broken down car was.  Mason dropped me and the kids off and drove him.  At this point I was thinking either Mason was going to die because he just took this crazy man for a ride or the boys and I would meet our fate with a Grizzly Bear.  Overactive imagination here.  
   The boys liked running around where we had stopped and Theo found several small sticks and made us a “steak dinner.”  Boy am I ready to cook some meals back home and not be eating out on the road.

 

 

Mason made it back alive and set off on his adventure.  He agreed that he’d just go an hour and be back by 2.  I told him if he wasn’t back between 3-4pm I’d be visiting the Ranger Station.  I decided to drive East with the boys and check out the scenery.  It was a pretty drive, there just weren’t really any more trails to explore.  But we pulled off at a couple of spots so I could snap some photos and then we reached the East Entrance to the park, so I decided to turn around.  On the way back, Woodrow fell asleep, so when we parked back by where we were going to meet Mason I sat out and read some more while Theo played, and Woodrow slept.  Mason arrived just minutes after we did, which was a relief and then he took Theo to walk around the lake a little bit.  He went about two miles round trip in 50 minutes and said it was pretty much all uphill. As he reached his turnaround point he said he could hear other hikers coming down the mountain with their bells and noises, so he figured he wouldn’t be seeing a bear. 

By this point we were a little hungry so we decided to go back up to the Canyon Village (where we’d heard there had been a bear sighting in the morning) and we’d grab some snacks, more milk, and hook up to their Internet (you had to pay an hour fee-not much service up here on phones or radio).  The boys were both asleep on the drive so we sat in the car for a bit letting them sleep, and by the time we’d grabbed a late lunch, taken care all we needed to we were pretty tired so we debated on whether or not to go check out another area or head back to our room for some adult rest.  We ended up heading back to our room-which had been out of water all day-so we went back up to the lodge to use the restrooms, get some ice, and they told us the water would be on shortly .

For dinner, we thought we would check out the Yellowstone Lake Lodge, but the wait was 90 minutes and the meals were fancy and expensive.  I also felt we were a little under dressed in our hiking grubs.  We decided to check out the dinner in our lodge main area, and it worked out well.  It was cafeteria style serving, so we each got what we wanted.  It was decent tasting and Woodrow devoured his macaroni and made friends with everyone around us!  When we headed back to the room, I stayed to clean up Woodrow and have some quiet time straightening the room, and snuggle/read with Woodrow.  Mason grabbed some glow sticks that he had in this backpack and he and Theo went out on a night hike adventure.  They were gone a little longer than I thought, but Theo had a BLAST!  They took a decent walk, and saw a storm along the lake.  Theo in his sweet little voice said, “I was a little scared, but Dad made me feel brave.”  Heart melt!  The two of them together are just adorable.