Most importantly of all to begin, Mark and I would like to THANK our daughter and son in law for including us in their vacation plans by inviting us to join them on their venture to Yellowstone National Park in Wyoming this summer. We always try to take at least one vacation together each year. Our daughter did most of the planning of the activities while in the park and she did one outstanding job! This was one of the most wonderful and enjoyable vacations that we have ever taken. Words or photos cannot begin to express the beauty and tranquil feeling of the area. The areas are so vast. You can gaze for as far as the eye can see and see nothing but the beauty of the land and what it holds. The mountains are so tall and the valleys so deep. The sky is so blue and the waters so clear. The animals are so relaxed and freely roaming the area without a care in the world. The park has done a wonderful job of incorporating a real country feel to the area and make it appear as it was from the time it was created to be a National Park by President U.S. Grant as he signed the bill in 1872. The views are unobstructed by overhead wires or cell phone towers. Somehow most of these were very well hidden.

There were Yellowstone General Stores in most of the larger towns in the area of the park. This one below, with Mark under the sign, was the one closest to our camp at Fishing Bridge. We left a few $$ here at several of these General Stores, but we will sure enjoy the memories that they bring to mind each time we use the items we purchased.
One thing that we are thankful for is that we had the foresight to pack our trailer with plenty of food and other neccessary items for our stay in the park. Food items were rather expensive with milk at $2.99 a half gallon and a loaf of bread at almost $4.00. Bananas were 33 cents each. Diesel prices in the park ran at least 25 cents a gallon more than outside of the park. The park price was $3.39 a gallon. We drove up to the North Entrance to the park one day and passed through to the town of Gardiner and paid $3.14 a gallon. We also found a nice little grocery store there that we purchased some groceries to hold us through the final days before we left the park. It was a 2 hour drive back to our camp at Fishing Bridge, but the cooler kept the milk and produce plenty cold enough until we got back.

This old bison below seemed to just beg for someone to take his photo. There were several laying out in the heat of the day in the Hayden Valley. This valley and the Lamar Valley seemed to be the favorite areas of the bison. On one day we spent most of the day away from our camp. When we returned and Mark took Barney out for his walk, Mark noticed some rather large foot prints along the blacktop edge. Later a fellow told me that a huge bison had strutted his way down the road earlier that day and right past our trailer! Wow....wouldn't that have been a photo to get?

On another walk with my daughters dogs, we saw a wolf at a distance in the woods. Of course nature called right at this time for one of the dogs. We did our best to steer their eyes away from the wolf. He couldn't have been more than 100 feet from us. My daughter was distraught that she didn't have her camera with her to capture the photo.

This is a photo that we took at the brink of the Yellowstone Falls. The upper and lower falls are in a canyon that they call the Yellowstone Grand Canyon. More photos of this area will be included in later blogs. On this day we only stopped at the brink of the falls. The sounds of the roar of the Yellowstone River crashing down the cliffs were relaxing and the sights of the flowing water so graceful at the same time.

We were on the road in rather heavy traffic on our way up to Roosevelt for our Cookout wagon ride when this guy below passed right in front of our truck and down the side of the road. I can't tell you how exciting it was to see this black bear. I could not make up my mind whether to do a video or take a digital photo. I did manage to capture this guy on both. Just a few feet up the road were several on motorcycles. I cannot imagine trying to pass this guy on the road while riding a motorcycle! There was a rock wall on one side and a steep cliff on the other side of the road.

Here below are the ones from our group that took the two hour horse back ride to the cookout dinner in Roosevelt. Our son in law's sister and her husband along with our daughter took on the challenge.

The covered wagons that the rest of our group took to the cookout are shown below. Each was drawn by two draft horses. These horses and the wagons in front of ours did stir up a lot of dust. They had not had any rain for weeks we were told. I had put a few napkins into my bag and we used them to cover our mouths and eyes. We had a cowboy that told stories to us about Yellowstone and the old days as we rode the trail. A coyote ran inbetween our wagon train and chased one of the wagons for way down the road. We looked off into the hills along the way and saw prong horn antelop. Once there at the campfire, we all were happy for the refreshments that awaited. We picked out our table and waited for those that rode the horses to arrive.

My daughter told me that I would not have enjoyed the ride because they rode along the edge of a deep cliff. I do not like heights! Our daughter had the misfortune of getting thrown from her horse, Jose. He got spooked by the horse that her brother in law was riding. Jose dropped to his knees and rolled over to toss her off of his back. Thank goodness this did not occur while they were on the edge of the cliff! She noticed once at the cookout that she was missing her sunglasses. She said that was the last thing on her mind when she bit the dust. Her face was full of the black dirt and she was covered from head to toe in dust. Thankfully she was not hurt. All three did have a different strut to their walk for the next few days! LOL
We were treated to a meal of steak, corn, cole slaw, corn bread, watermelon, beans and a choice of canned pop, lemonade, hot cocoa, water and campfire coffee. Not too many took the hot cocoa, but I was told that the coffee was outstanding!

This below is our campsite at Fishing Bridge. Not much to brag about, but fit the bill to hold our trailer and tow vehicle. There was a tiny space on the door side of the trailer, but not enough room to open an awning because of the pine tree on the lot. You parked your truck next to the trailer. Some of the sites were arranged a little better and they were able to open their awnings. Didn't bother us much though as we were out and about for most of the day each day that we were there. Everything had to be parked on the backtop. Across the road from the site was a nice shaded area where you could sit in your lawn chair. You had to be very careful not to leave ANYTHING outside as this park is in known bear country. You were not allowed to leave out a grill or any sort of cooler or food that might draw bear to the area. The kids in the park built several forts and loved riding their bikes on the blacktop roads of the park. Even though there were no playgrounds, the kids still loved it in the park there.

On this day below, we all went down to the beach area in front of the Fishing Bridge Visitor Center that faced the Yellowstone Lake. This was about a mile or less from our camp. The water was extremely cold even though it had been in the mid to upper 90's there for several days in a row. Only our grand daughter ventured all the way into the water and swam. The rest were happy to just wade along the shoreline and skip stones across the water. Had a very enjoyable few hours there. About half of the lakeshore is sided by the mountains that you can see in the distance in this photo.

Here were are below at the Continental Divide marker along side the road in Yellowstone National Park. We all took turns posing for a picture.

Hope you are enjoying our adventures as much as we did!

More to come......