The Great Parks

The northwest corner of Wyoming is home to two of the oldest and most well known National parks around, Yellowstone and Teton. Up and over Granite Pass and down through the winding red canyon of the Big Horn National Wilderness, we arrived at the Eastern entrance to Yellowstone. We thought our mid-September arrival would mean fewer crowds, but as soon as we hit Yellowstone Lake, without even noticing, we had inadvertently joined a large caravan of RVs and other slow moving passenger vehicles.

We spent three days in the park jumping from geysers to hot springs to rivers to lakes. Up the continental divide and back down into a deep canyon. There’s not another place like it in the world. The colors of the geyser basins, bubbling mud pits and steaming ground make you feel like you’re on a different planet.

We fished, but the Yellowstone trout proved to smart for our woven flies. We woke up before the sun to see a wolf pack nibbling on an elk carcass, but they were too stubborn to come out for us. We hurried to Old Faithful, but searched too long for a shady parking spot for the dog and missed the eruption. Good thing it’s the only predictable schedule in the park and we returned an hour later to see the next go ‘round.

South to the Tetons, the mountains glistened in the warm sun which provided a splendid back drop for our first lunch there. However, looming thunderstorms later played tricks on the majestic peaks. As the wind picked up, dark clouds swirled around the mountain tops and lingered just long enough to provide some heavy contrast to the setting sun.

Camped at Signal Mountain, we woke up before the sun again and it proved to be a good decision this time. Dodging herds of giant elk in the weak morning light, we made it to a crusty old barn just before the Tetons disappeared behind the clouds for the rest of the day…