 |
| Firehole River on the way to Lone Star Geyser |
 |
| Kepler Cascades |
Well, we've completed our third trip to YNP and our second since retirement. Our first trip in 2009 took us to West Yellowstone, MT while our second trip in 2011 took us to Gardiner, MT. As you read last week, we went back to West Yellowstone just to check out the Yellowstone Grizzly RV Park. The RV park lived up to its reputation as it was nice and provided plenty of overflow parking for those of us who couldn't fit our tow vehicles on our sites with our trailers. Utilities were excellent and the restrooms kept clean even though the park had numerous vacationing families with tons of kids. Only issue I had with the RV park was the challenge to find an overflow spot that didn't get your vehicle washed each night by the lawn sprinklers.
While there's plenty to do in West Yellowstone, you'll blow it if you don't visit the nat'l park. Donna and I are beginning
 |
| Wild flowers along the Cascade Lake trail |
We continue to try to accomplish hikes that we haven't walked in the past. This year we got to Lone Star Geyser, but just missed the eruption. Our second hike was our first every
 |
| Cascade Lake |
On our third day out in the park, and despite my best efforts to outrun the only thunderstorm within a couple of hundred miles of West Yellowstone, we got to see YNP's Grand Canyon area and the drive along the Yellowstone River to Yellowstone Lake under dramatic thunder and lightning effects. It made for a scenic trip to our intended destination - Storm Point trail. In 2011 this trail was closed due to grizzly activity. This year the trail was just too muddy. Yes, that may make me a wimp but remember: I'm retired & I don't have to do mud.
 |
| A young elk gets lunch. |
On the upside of our rainy drive: the area along the Yellowstone River above Fishing Bridge was the bison hangout. So that made the rainy drive very enjoyable. And I got to wash the truck (second time in two days) when we got back.
Anyway, our backup hike was to go to West Thumb Basin and walk the circuit trail to the West Thumb Basin Overlook. In my opinion this was our prettiest walk of this visit. It didn't hurt that we almost physically ran into elk, which for me got pretty tense for a few moments when one of the elk began making a high pitched call which I was concerned was announcing us as intruders. Turns out it was a young elk that was hungry. The small herd meandered off the trail and the young elk had lunch while we just stood there in amazement. Then we got the views of Duck & Yellowstone lakes. The panorama, bottom, is our attempt to give you a feel for the view. Unfortunately, pictures just don't do it justice. It's a hike we'll do again.
Since I'm able to see the statistics that indicate some search engines will send people to this blog when I type in popular names such as "West Yellowstone, MT", let me end with a few comments on the town of West Yellowstone. First and foremost it's a resort town and should be treated as such. Second, Montana DOT apparently continues to believe that people want a rustic trip to YNP. This year they decided to throw dirt on a nicely pave road (US 191) and then put water on it (and I'm sure that's due to a EPA requirement to cut down on dust.) Your guessed it, a muddy, paved road. And to add to everyone's experience, the route between Tower and Canyon was under construction (and legitimately so) so that you traveled on a dirt road while in that area. Almost every vehicle & RV that arrived at the campground while we were there had mud on it.
Furthermore, Verizon Wireless indicates West Yellowstone is a 3G area and both our MiFi 5510L and our Google Android Version 4.0.4 smartphone indicated 3G with easy 3-4 bar signal strength, but it really didn't exist. Phone calls are fine, but don't plan on data transfer being available while you're here. We found periods that allowed us to send emails, update this blog, and post pictures to Facebook. But the times were inconsistent and unpredictable. From our arrival on July 24th until we left, the MiFi refused to transfer data while we were in West Yellowstone.
Lastly, let me suggest you bring an iPhone when you come to West Yellowstone. The Verizon Wireless signal in West Yellowstone apparently activated every bug in Google's Android Version 4.0.4 software on our smartphone. (The generic name "smartphone" is the industry's name for it. I, however, have a more "appropriate" name for it that's inappropriate for a family blog.) The phone, while doing a great job as a hotspot where the MiFi 5510L failed, was constantly in screenshot mode (meaning we took a lot of pictures of the phones's screen by forgetting & hitting the "Home" button or the volume bar while in West Yellowstone.) And pushing (or pushing & hold) on the on/off button became a game worthy of the one-armed bandits in a casino. It would work just often enough to keep you trying, but pushing that button never produced consistent results. At one point we removed the battery just to turn the phone off. The next day we took several pictures on the smartphone, but couldn't find the photos in order to copy them over to our laptop. After an hour's search we found them. It seems the hard reset we did by removing the battery the previous day now has the pictures being saved to an old folder left over from the previous Android Version 3.0+ software that came on the phone and renaming those new pictures beginning with IMAG_0001. And, by-the-way, we're now in Billings, MT and the Android smartphone & the MiFi are working great. And we're no longer in screen shot mode on the phone. However, my new nickname for the "smartphone" has stuck.
Anyway, that's it for this week. We're headed east to Michigan. David
 |
| Yellowstone Lake as seen from the West Thumb Basin Overlook |
No comments:
Post a Comment