Yellowstone - Fall Break

For Fall Break this year we opted to take a road trip to Yellowstone.  It was a bit risky because there is potential for some winter weather, but the upside is there would be significantly less people at the park which would make the crowds much smaller. Another benefit is the park smells less in the colder months from all of the sulfur and geysers. My friend Dave Fowles let us borrow his Thule cover for our Honda Pilot and it stored our luggage quite nicely.  Then we could have room in the car for backpacks and some food and essentials. 

On the drive North there was a Pocatello open house for a new temple.  We stopped to check it out, but it was closed on Sunday by the time we got there. 

We stayed in Island Park in a beautiful fairly new Marriott SpringHill Suites. It was open and spacious and even had some activities for guests. 

Our first night we ate at Cafe Sabor across the river.  The food was pretty good, but the scenery was really amazing. Island Park is gorgeous with all of the trees and rivers.  You can see in the picture there had been snow recently. 

We were really spoiled with a large room with space for everyone.  Jill and I had our own sectioned off room, the boys both had beds, and Alyssa had a pullout from the sofa.  Everyone was happy with the sleeping arrangements (which is not always the case on vacation). 

Our lobby had some cool things including billiards and a huge game of connect 4. 

Driving to Yellowstone took about an hour, but there weren't very many people in line so we were able to get right into the park. 

Jill bought an app that knew our gps location and would talk to us about the various spots along the road. The tour guide was very entertaining and told us all sorts of historical facts about Yellowstone. We hadn't been in the park very long and there were more than a dozen huge elk across the river right off from the road.  We pulled over and took some pictures of the majestic elk!

Then we hadn't driven even 5 more minutes and a bison walked right by us on the road. This was an early indicator that there would be a lot of wildlife to be seen in the park. 

There is so much water in Yellowstone, rivers and waterfalls are in abundance. 

There are also a lot of geysers and thermal hot springs. 

Yellowstone is made up of two large loops that people drive when visiting the park.  We opted for the top loop on day one.  We saw a ton of animals and finally saw a bear while in the visitor center at the north side of the park.  We drove out to Lamar Valley and were pretty much skunked on seeing any animals. 

On our way back, we stopped where some cars were gathered and looked across a gorge.  We were told by others there is a bear in a den with some cubs.  Sure enough after being there a short time, we totally saw the mother bear come out.  It was so fun for all of us to see a black bear in the wild. 

From our audio tour the guide told us the difference between a black bear and a grizzly bear.  "If you see a bear, you should climb a tree.  If the bear follows you up the the tree, it's a black bear.  If it pushes the tree over, it's a grizzly bear" the guide said. 

On our return trip through Mammoth Hot Springs there were tons of elk all eating the grass form building in the small village.  We got so close to these elk, they were really amazing. 

Day two in the park we drove the other loop and saw a lot of rivers and waterfalls.  

The Grand Canyon of the Yellowstone was one of our top stops.  It was like the Grand Canyon..... only in Yellowstone.  It was a bit colder this day but we were warm in the car and we could get out for short hikes and bundle up. 

Meanwhile back in Riverton, Shanel sent me a text that a tree blew down and missed my truck but hit our house!  What???  It didn't do to much damage, but talk about a close call. 

Back in Yellowstone we saw more waterfalls and finished our day with Old Faithful. 

We had gotten to Old Faithful toward the end of the evening so we drove back to West Yellowstone in the dark and stopped at a diner and had a hamburger dinner. 

Day three in the park we would spend the first part of the day hiking around geysers and thermal pockets and then made it back to Old Faithful again for a 2nd viewing.  This time we were able to walk around the trail system behind Old Faithful.  It was so much fun. 

For our afternoon drive we drove down to Jackson Hole.  We saw more beautiful trees and lakes and stopped a few times to get out and walk around. One of those stops was Jenny Lake.  From here we could see the Grand Tetons. 

Our hotel in Jackson Hole wasn't quite as large and spacious, but we made do.  For dinner we splurged and ate at a nice steakhouse.  

We walked around Jackson Hole and saw the antler arch. We went into some of the shops and found a huge Grizzly Bear (in the store). 

Before heading home we stopped by Teton Village.  It's a really cool ski resort that we had to ourself because it wasn't ski season just yet. We walked around saw the resort and then drove home. 

Yellowstone was so amazing we will definitely have to go back.  We all loved it and think the time of year we went was really just perfect.