Jelllystone

We road tripped it to Yellowstone with my parents and my brother’s family. Cole yelled from the back seat the whole way there. It was mostly painful. The only thing more painful was trying to get him to sleep in the hotel that night. We were pretty sure we were in for it.

Luckily, Junior shaped up. By the next morning, he’d had a change of heart and decided to enjoy the family vacation.

So here’s our hotel: The Three Bear Lodge in West Yellowstone.

It burned down a few years back (judging by old photos, this was probably a blessing in disguise—just sayin’). They salvaged all the wood they could and built much of the furniture for the rooms. It was very spacious and nice. And we even got two nights for the price of one; a very sweet deal.

Waiting for breakfast with 3 bears, and some stuffed ones too

So here we all are just moments before entering Yellowstone!  So exhilarating!!! This was Dave and the kids’ first time, and I hadn’t been since I was a kid so it was really a new experience for all of us.

The next few pics are of us enjoying a little geothermal activity:

The Artists’ Paintpots, a favorite

Old Faithful; turns out…she may be more “old” than “faithful”. She was about 7 minutes late shooting off.Midway Geyser Basin

Norris Geyser Basin (I thought this place was really stunning)

We saw tons of animals:

The Bison certainly had places to be; we came across two different buffalo tromping down the middle of the road. It was all a little unnerving having a 2,000 pound, horned beast casually passing by our window.

Can you see it?

A black bear! I can’t believe we actually saw one!

The elk were the most plentiful. Near Mammoth Springs they hung out on the lawns of all the buildings; walking down steps, in between cars (scrape, scrape), and could be seen everywhere you looked. So amazing! Lyle certainly found his Zen!

Other sightings included a coyote, bald eagles, squirrels, geese and ducks.

And last, here we are in the Grand Canyon of Yellowstone:

This is where “YELLOW stone” gets its name:

This is us at the top of the waterfall pictured below:

I seriously never would have guessed that a trip to a national park could be so much fun. Am I just getting old, or was it really that fun? I guess I can’t be too sure. But there really was so much to see and do that it made for a great trip.  I’d say Yellowstone was phenomenal.