It is 1976 and we are traveling west. Mount Rushmore was yesterday. Today it will be Yellowstone Park. The newspapers have been covering a story about a person that was malled to death by a bear in recentweeks in Yellowstone. That is like telling someone that a house is haunted. There is always this slightest possibility that you might see a ghost. But bears should be different, you can out run a bear! At least I think you can!
It was mid-June. Yellowstone was just opening for the season. I remember as we approached the entrace to the park, the sun was shining and there was snow everywhere. We were on the north end of Yellowstone with a plan to drive southward in Yellowstone to Old Faithful and then south through Yellowstone to enjoy the scenery.
I underestimated the vast size of Yellowstone. I equated it to a Large State Park in Wisconsin. Boy, was I wrong. It is equivalent to many State Parks. It runs from the top northwest corner of the State of Wyoming to the mid-part of the State. My second underestimation was how fast you can travel through Yellowstone. The roads were equivalent to winding through Wisconsin’s Kettle Moraine. A lot of traveling was at speeds of 25-50 miles per hour at best on two lane highways. If you got behind someone, you needed to relax because you weren’t going any faster.
My recollection is we got to Old Faithful geyser at around 11:00 AM. A combination of geophysical rock formations coupled with water being forced into natures pockets causes an eruption every 53 minutes. In theory you can set you watch by the predictability of the geyser. The reality of it all is you stand as a weary tourist having traveled 4 days to get here and the geyser erupts. It lasts a minute or so and then you wander off to wait 52 minutes for it to happen again. You can’t get within 100 yards of the geyser. There was a “reception building” designed to give information on Old Faithful. We came. We saw. We left. Ho-Hum!
More exciting was finding a place to eat. We had packed a lunch and the intent was to eat in a picnic area of Yellowstone. Because it was early in the season, wayside areas were mostly devoid of people and to wander deep into the woods with food after warnings about bears was not real appealing. We did find a place to pull of and eat but I have to admit it was less than the full Yellowstone Park experience. I have recently seen some pictures taken by your mom near where we ate. We can prove we were there.
Then it was a leisurely ride south through the park. Leisure turned into panic late in the day as I found we couldn’t travel as fast as I had estimated. My plan was not working. What should we do? What should we do? We might not make our night time destination which was Jackson Hole, Wyoming. The farther south we traveled, the road began to straighten out and we were able to pick up the speeds. The sights were incredible with mountains for a back-drop and the sun reflecting off the snow capped peaks. I think we rolled into Jackson Hole, Wyoming around 6 PM which is near the south end of Yellowstone.
There is a lot I didn’t know about Yellowstone but I did underestimte it’s size. One of my goals in life was to return and spend 3-4 days enjoying the park. They have a lodge that rents rooms and condos in the park. They sponsor sightseeing excursions. I think you might even ride horseback through some obscure trails. One day is not enough for Yellowstone.
With my next entry, I’ll talk about Jackson Hole. It was a very pleasant surprise. We pulled our cowboy boots out of the back of “the Rusty Zipper”, put on our “ten gallon hats” and headed for the wooden side-walks. Yo-Ha!
Love,
Dad