Yellowstone Anniversary

Well June 9th was Jana and I's nine year anniversary.  I convinced Jana that we should go to Yellowstone National Park for our anniversary.  It was kind of special to me, because we honeymooned in Island Park and took quite a few trips to Yellowstone while we were on our honeymoon.  I had a great day spending time with my wife in one of the most beautiful places on earth.

We arrived at the park at about 11:00 a.m.  When we entered the park the lady at the admissions counter told us that there may be a delay because there was a herd of bison on the road towards Madison Junction.  We we got there the bison were no longer on the road.  We took some pictures of the some of the baby bison and continued towards Madison Junction.

Baby Bison near Madison Junction.

 

When we reached Madison Junction we decided to take the north loop.  The north loop goes from Madison to Norris, Norris to Canyon, Canyon to Tower, Tower to Mammoth, and Mammoth to Norris.  We tend to see more wildlife on the north loop.  We had a 20 min delay between Madison and Norris do to road work.  When we arrived at Norris we decided to go towards Canyon instead of Mammoth.  The drive between Norris and Canyon was pretty uneventful except for a large bison bull standing next to the road near Canyon.

Bull Bison near Canyon Village.

From Canyon we headed towards Tower.  There was still quite a bit of snow on Mt. Washburn so we saw very little between Canyon and Tower.  We did see a herd of elk and some bison, but they were a long ways off the road.  The vistas were nice and made not seeing much nice though.  We passed Tower and continued on towards Tower Junction.  We ate lunch between at a little pull off before Tower Junction.  While we were pulled over we had quite a few people stop trying to figure out what we were looking at.  At Tower Junction there was a car jam heading towards the Northeast entrance of the park.  We drove towards the jam and saw a grizzly on a open sagebrush hillside.

Grizzly bear near Tower Junction.

That was pretty exciting and got our blood pumping.  We had already decided we were going to go Lamar Valley, so we continued towards the Northeast entrance.  We saw quite a few herds of bison and quite a few antelope including this young antelope buck taking a nap.

Young antelope buck taking a siesta.

We next came to another bear jam.  This one was ridiculous, yeah there was a grizzly alright, but it was 2/3 of a mile away.  It looked like a small black dot in my 20x50 binoculars.  The cool things was while everyone was looking at the bear, there was also a herd of bison, an antelope, and elk all within view.  It was pretty cool to have that many large mammals within view of each other.  As we continued through Lamar we say more antelope, elk, bison, and this bald eagle perched near the river.

Bald Eagle in Lamar Valley.

We continued on until we reached Trout Lake.  We were going to hike up to it, but we decided not to.  We turned around and started heading back to Tower Junction.  We saw mostly the same animals on the way back through to Tower Junction.  From Tower Junction we turned west towards Mammoth.  Shortly after we left Tower Junction we ran into another bear jam.  I was driving so Jana got out to take pictures while I stayed in the car because there was no place to park.  When she got out the black bear was only about 75 yards up the road.  The bear was about 30 yards off the road down a steep enbankment.  As I sat in the car I noticed the bear coming over the rise and it walk within 25 yards of the car.  Jana got back in the car and took some more pictures.

Black Bear near Tower Junction.

 

Jana was pretty excited she had never been that close to a wild bear before.  I know that is a memory I will never forget.  As we continued down the road near blacktail we came upon the closest relative of a blacktail you can get a herd of mule deer.  We were the first people on the sceen, so the deer were pretty calm, as more people showed up they became nervous and ran off.

Mule Deer near Blacktail Plateau.

 

After we saw the deer it was pretty uneventful until we got to Mammoth.  We stopped in Mammoth to get an icecream cone.  After we ate our icecream we headed towards Norris Juntion.  On the way to norris we saw quite a few elk and bison.  We got through Norris Juntion and continued towards Madison Junction.  We had another 20 minute delay between Norris and Madison and while we were stopped I saw an american dipper in the gibbon river.  That was pretty cool.  We went through Madison Junction and headed toward the West entrance of the park.  On our way we came to herd of bison right off the road.  I got this awesome picture of this baby bison laying down.

Baby bison laying down (Yellowstone).

 

I was well pleased with how that picture turned out.  They are so cute at that age.  As we continued towards the entrance we came upon a herd of 7 elk.  It was interesting because all the elk were yearlings.  There was on yearling bull and 6 yearling cows.

Yearling bull elk (Yellowstone).

 

We left the park at about 7 p.m. and headed home to Rigby.  On the way home we saw four elk along the road in Island Park.  We had a great time and enjoyed the wildlife.  We were pretty beat though from being in the car for 11 hours.  I hope everyone enjoys the pictures.  Until our next adventure so long.