Day 11 – June 9 Saturday (PS – Happy 1st Anniversary Mike and Jamie)
I am now going to shoot all internet salesmen. Of course, still no service.
Anyway, nothing could spoil today.
After a very filling breakfast in the delightful town of West Yellowstone, we proceeded into Yellowstone Park.
Whatever you may have heard or seen about Yellowstone is wrong. Reality is 100 times better.
You are warned about wildlife on the road, and you think, yeah right, the odd bird or squirrel. We sat in a Bison jam for 20 minutes as a herd of about 50 bison, females calves and a big old bull male strolled down the center of the road, without a flinch or skittish movement. “This is our backyard, and you people are just visiting”. Magnificent!
We saw several large herds of bison, the one herd so big that Marla had to stop counting after 100, coz they just kept coming. We saw loads of female elk, all over the place, and three huge males with antlers about a mile across, happily lying in the grass, feeding, without a care in the world. These superb animals are about twice the size of your biggest horse, so regal, and they know it, almost posing for us idiot tourists. And there are people who enjoy shooting them. Give the elk guns, that’s what I say!!
A bald eagle nest, with dad sitting proudly on the chicks was our first sight as we got into the park.
We saw in the far distance what we were told were some longhorn sheep, but they were so far away they could have been elephants for all we knew!
And yes, we did see a grizzly bear.
He was about 100 yards away, busily eating some carcass, and not giving the twenty thousand tourists any attention.
I wanted Marla to check the length of his claws, but she wimped out!!!
Although the bear was exciting to watch Marla and I agreed that the one big male elk we saw was probably the highlight of the wildlife.
We saw several coyotes, and a den with 9 small coyote cubs/kittens/pups whatever the young are called, just gamboling on the hillside.
Of course, Yellowstone is not just about wildlife, the thermal springs, rivers and scenic areas are just gobsmacking as well.
If you only get one chance to take a dream vacation, go to Yellowstone, it really is the holiday of a lifetime. Of course, we have only been to a few states so far on our odyssey, so we may tell you of several more holidays of a lifetime before we are done!!!
We spent 10 hours there today, it doesn’t get dark until 9 at night, and we didn’t even see half of it, so back we go tomorrow.
For our English fans, we did not see any amorous wolves, so it’s still been a while since I saw the wolves score!!!! That was bad.
Love from Us.
