Yellowstone NP

Well the dark clouds that brought the rainstorm on the way into Yellowstone yesterday brought an inch of snow overnight !!  I awoke to a white town, although the roads quickly thawed in the sun.  But it stayed cold.  Minus 3 deg C when I went to clear the snow off the car before breakfast, and during the whole day in the park I only saw it reach about 5 deg C a couple of times - Rest of the day it was between 0 and about 2 or 3 deg C !   But clear blue skies, so I had the roof off, and the thermals on, and had a great day in the Park.  Bison, Wolves, Big Horn Sheep, and just missed a bear sighting on the road by about 10 minutes.


                                   
I decided to drive to Cooke Town first, at the end of the only open road, so I could see the park and what was available, and then planned to stop somewhere for a hike on the way back.  Not 5 miles up the road, in the middle of Mammoth, I saw a statue of a bison beside the road and wondered why anyone would make a statue with the head hanging down.  Then as I got beside it, the head lifted up and looked straight at me !!  From about 8 feet away !!!  First Bison !!!  And no camera ready !!!  Gave me the fright of my life.  Right, so thats what they look like !! 

After that of course they were everywhere, sometimes in the distance, sometimes beside or even crossing the road.  And let me tell you, when you are in a little Elise, with the roof off, and cars in front of you and behind you so you can't move, Bison are B-I-G !!!  I kept waiting for one to come and put his head over the top of my side window for a closer look - But fortunately they weren't too interested in a Lotus !!!

Quite a lot of places with snow still on the road when in the shade of the trees, so one needed to take care on the road.  And with the temp still hovering around freezing, it was only sections that were actually in the sun that were thawing out.

I had bought my bear spray yesterday, so feared nothing today !!  After about 40 minutes my morning cup off tea had come back to haunt me, so without thinking, stopped the car and leapt out and went behind a tree.  Turned round afterwards - And there was a big bison looking straight at me !!!!  And both my camera and my bear spray (Hey it works on bison too !!) were in the car !!   A few moments of heart in mouth, and then the bison obviously didn't think I looked appetizing enough, and ambled off,  while I sprinted for the car and took off up the hill in a hurry !!  Lesson learned  - Look before you pee !!!!!  Ha ha.

Lovely scenery, varying between steep gorges, mountains on one / other / both sides, and even the wide open plain of the Lamar Valley which so reminded me of Glencoe in Scotland.  I wandered steadily towards Cooke City, and when I finally reached there started to understand why the road on the other side is closed.  A lot of buildings have snow half way up them, and cars that have obviously not moved since the first snows fell last autumn.  At the far end of town, the road just suddenly is covered in snow, and the sign just says "Road Closed" and thats it !   Bought a couple of gallons of expensive fuel just to be safe, and the petrol guy wanted a photo of the car to show his mates, so I sat him in it and took pics of him in the car, which left him a happy chappy.  Then just down the main street I saw a little coffee shop that was open, so went in and met some great guys, two were off snowmobiling and a couple going fishing, while the owner had been up there all winter - Lots of interesting stories.  The guys with the snowmobiles had come up the valley not 10 minutes behind me and a black bear had crossed the road right in front of them !!  So I just missed it unfortunately.

After that, set off back down the hill, looking for an interesting walk that didn't look to "bearish" !!!  Found some buffalo to look at at Soda Butte Creek so was there a while, and then down in the Lamar Valley I passed a bright yellow Nissan 4 WD that last night a guy in Gardiner had told me a Wolf expert called Rick drove.   So I stopped and went back, and sure enough it was Rick.  Incredible guy - Works for the Parks and Wildlife Dept, and is the expert on wolves, and has worked in many NP's all over the US.  Wolves were almost exterminated in the 50's until they realised they were part of  balanced eco system, and in the 80's wolves were bought in from other areas that had plenty, to restock Yellowstone.  Now they are tracked and studied extensively, and Rick is a major part of that.  There was a pack on the hill on the other side of the valley and using his telescope I was able to watch them, which was a rare opportunity I am told.  I spent a couple of hours with him chatting about all sorts of things, including his Scottish ancestry !  His parents were from Oban up on the west coast, and even he remarked on the similarity between parts of Yellowstone and the Highlands !

Ater leaving Rick, I went on one shortish walk called Forces of the Northern Range, which explained all about the volcanic activity that formed Yellowstone - Very interesting.  I then went on down to the Mammoth Hot Springs Terraces and spent about an hour or two climbing up all the stair cases and walkways that meander all around the thermal springs.  Not as pungent H2S wise as Rotorua in NZ, so much easier to spend time walking around.  But once again, being still up at about 6000 ft in altitude, all the climbing gets you puffed quite quickly, and you need to stop occasionally and catch your breath.  After nearly two weeks above 5000 feet, I should be getting used to it by now !!

By now it was nearly 6 pm, so time to get back down to Gardiner before it got even colder !!  A fascinating day in the Park - I have to say that coming here (and to all the other NP's I have visited recently) in the spring may mean I don't see all the attractions, but it is SO nice having almost no people here !  No queues of cars or people, or finding everything jam packed.  Many of the people I talk to come regularly at this time of year, or in the Autumn after schools have gone back and it is getting cooler, just for that very reason.  Some of the park may be closed, but the rest of it is far more enjoyable.

So once again I have been incredibly fortunate with the weather.  Tomorrow I am heading NW up to Missoula, Montana where I will overnight before dropping SW towards Portland on Hwy 12 which is supposed to be very scenic and dramatic,  across mountains and through forests all the way down to the Washington / Oregon State Line where I will be staying for a couple of days.  I have a couple of minor brake problems to sort out and someone there has a garage and hoist I can use to get the undertrays off so I can see what is wrong.  I m looking forward to dropping down closer to sea level too - One often forgets that much of the central US is so high, much well above 5000 feet.

Some pics of Yellowstone here :- https://picasaweb.google.com/117739775480775657932/YellowstoneNP?authkey=Gv1sRgCLqPorDx69aKigE#