Richard & Sylvia's RV Adventures: Day 69 Wednesday, May 9, 2007

Thursday, May 17, 2007

Day 69 Wednesday, May 9, 2007

West Yellowstone to Old Faithful in Yellowstone National Park

This morning we got up and checked with our camp host at Lionshead Campground to see if they would keep an eye on Lucy while we headed into the park. We had found out previously that National Parks are not pet friendly since they are concerned with pets possibly chasing wild animals.

We headed into the park and right off the start Emily spotted a Eagle sitting on its nest.

There were abundant Buffalo roaming around freely. Their gentle nature can be misleading as several tourists have been gored when they came too close to them. They weigh upward to 2000lb and can run 30 miles an hour (3 times faster than humans). OK got it! Do not get too close! We saw new babies less than a week old hanging out with mama.

We next came upon a few Elk grazing across the river.

Not far from the eagles nest we spotted something moving in the woods…. a gray/white wolf..awesome. I came eye to eye with a gray wolf (via binoculars). His eyes where gray blue and totally mesmerizing. I swear he looked right at me, it gave me chills. It just made our whole day.

Later on we came across a Grizzly, again via binocular. Before today I though of bear as rather large animals heavy on their feet swathing a things somewhat comical. I now have total respect for the animal, for all it size it moved deliberately and gracefully full of power and purpose. According to a Ranger, Grizzles used to be common in all 48 states, they are now relegated to mainly the western mountain states with numbers ranging in the 1200. Ask if it is the most dangerous animal in the park, he replied the most dangerous animal in this park has two legs and comes with 4 tires. Point taken…be mindful when driving in the park. Still no Moose sightings….

There were many visitors in the park from all over the US and even from Europe. As we drove through the park we would see cars stopped along side of the road and found that was always a good sign that some animal had been spotted. Not unlike rubber necking on 95, you have to pull over as well to be sure to get a look. While pulled over at a particular busy spot where the Grizzly had been sighted I passed our binoculars over to a German couple for them to get a better view of the Grizzly. At the next animal sighting stop when I saw the couple again I had to ask them where they were from; they were from Leipzig, but now living in Munich.

As we drove along we came across the first Geyser Fields and had to stop and walk the board walk to get a closer view of these things.

Moving on down the road we came up to the Old Faithful Geyser area. We went into the Visitors Center

and noted that they had actually posted the time they had predicted the next eruption of the Old Faithful Geyser; we had about 15 minutes to look around before taking our seats at Old Faithful to see the show. As predicted, the eruption took place within a couple minutes of their estimate. A really awesome sight to behold!