Yellowstone National Park/Grand Teton National Park, Day 2

Day 2, after an early awakening, was a jampacked day filled with a lot of driving, mostly done by mom. I took over when the sun went down and the skies opened. Lucky me. :)

We were staying veryclose to the Grand Canyon of Yellowstone. So, of course, our first stop was to see if it lived up to its name. We opted to be sightseers versus hikers this trip, and we stopped at many a viewpoint. There are two different paths, and we chose to drive down a little jaunt that took us to the brink of the Upper Falls. The Upper Falls drops 109 ft. It's a beauty:







Impressive, yes?

We then backtracked and drove down the one-way North Rim drive, with stops to look at the Lower Falls, And at Lookout Point, Grand View and Inspiration Point (recommended to us).











We unsuccessfully tried to see a bear, but all I have to show from that side trip is this lovely dandelion picture:



You can still see where the wildfires in Yellowstone were - and how they were naturally reseeded by the fire:



We braved the crowds at Old Faithful, because you can't go to Yellowstone and NOT go see Old Faithful:





Old Faithful, was faithful, but we decided that yesterday's geyser was much more explosively impressive. We visited the famous Lodge and got ourselves a generous helping of ice cream.

And then we were off to the Tetons, but not before we crossed the Continental Divide, three separate times.



The weather was slowly turning dreary and storms-a-brewin' but we didn't let that dissuade us. Sure the Grand Teton range wasn't displaying itself in crystalline clarity, but it was nevetheless impressive.

We passed Jackson Lake which runs the length of the Yellowstone entrance to Grand Teton:









THE Grand Teton:



Jenny Lake, a lake we definitely visited the last time I was in Yellowstone/Grand Teton National Parks - 21 years ago:







Now the highlight of this trip, was our unexpected wildlife encounter. There was this amazingly beautiful spring, but it was hard to find listed on any of the literature. It's colors were supposed to be phenomenal but boy was it the hidden gem of Yellowstone. Since it is not listed on half of the literature. So we decided, despite the gloom, clouds, rain and lateness in the day, that we'd at least pull off in the parking lot to take notes for next time.

It was one of the smartest moves we made. For we found this in the parking lot.





He was wandering around the parking lot, and I scrambled for my zoom lens because though he was close, he wasn't that close. I'll admit we did stalk him around the parking lot and I took lots of pictures of him. it was truly amazing. We'd seen another coyote earlier in the trip, but you could barely see him, even with at 250mm lens.

It took us awhile to drive out of the park and back to our hotel in Bozeman because as soon as mom and I switched driving duties, it decided to pour. 1) we were driving a rental card, 2) these were unfamiliar, winding, unlit country roads and c) it was raining cats, dogs, coyotes and bison. So our relatively short trip took half the night and we reluctantly ate at McDonalds because we didn't want to spend the time waiting for a home-cooked meal. Another smart decision, surprisingly.

We had to unload all of our stuff into the hotel in the pouring rain to repack - and gladly collapsed in our beds. We were a little disappointed, having missed our time in the hot tubs in the hotel courtyard.

All in all, we saw a great portion of Yellowstone and fair portion of Grand Teton. I can't wait to go back, but hopefully it won't be another 21 years until next time. And I definitely have some items on my list to see next time.

Yellowstone National Park, Day 1

Since we were in the area, Mom and I decided to add a 48 hour trip to Yellowstone, complete with an overnight stay in their pricey but lovely cabins. It was WELL-worth it. We saw a lot of the park and even some of the Grand Tetons, and mostly missed the rain.

Here's just a few photos from our 1st day in the park.

We saw lots of wildlife included a ton of elk from up close:



And several bison:



An unexpected member of a wedding:



And even a doe and her fawn (who I uncreatively nicknamed Bambi) at dusk:



We were treated to beautiful landscapes:






And hot springs (Artist Paint Pots and Mammoth Hot Springs):





And geysers (Great Fountain and White Dome)

White Dome:



Great Fountain:



Great Fountain we waited for 2+ hours in the hot sun, but it was well worth it. When she blew, she blew big (wide) and high (tall). Very much worth the wait. And we saw White Dome in the distance go off every half hour or so.

And, making this blogger very happy, we saw two rainbows:

First this hard-to-see one:



And then this one:



It was a very long day where we got so excited we forgot to eat a proper lunch and ended up collapsing in bed at or around 10pm. Two very tired but mostly happy people (we were both slightly cranky from being in the car for awhile, food shortage and one of us was not feeling 100%).

You can see the rest of the 71 photos in my Yellowstone Day 1 set at Flickr. Day 2 might be a bit delayed due to my computer going into the shop.

#43 - Complete

43. Be a bridesmaid.



My cousin on my mom's side got married this summer in her hometown of Bozeman, MT to her man of five years. It was a fun-filled week of getting to know her again (we don't see each other often), and getting last-minute details done. Had my first mani-pedi of my life, as well as my first experience in making bridal/bridesmaid bouquets.



It was a lot of craziness, a little stress and a lot of fun overall. Here's to a lifetime of happiness for JNA and CMA!

(Ceremony photo by my mom - because, obviously, I can't take it if I'm *IN* the wedding)

I'm Still Here!

And I have LOTS of pictures... I took over 2100 photos in Yellowstone/Grand Teton/Bozeman and another 1000 at the Zoo on Thursday. I'm still sorting through them majorly.

My photo theory is that I take many many photos. Then after upload, I delete the obviously bad ones: out of focus, blurry, etc. I let them sit for a day or two and take another pass. I delete more - duplicates, blurry ones that I missed first time around.

Then I choose from that diminished pool to upload to flickr... and then I write the post for here.

I'm still in the choosing from the pool to flickr, and since I'll be uploading so many photos, I'll be stretching it out.

So look for a post in the next couple of days or so. :)

A Rainy Day Off

This summer, in our schedule of crazy, we did have a few days off towards the end. And without fail, it would rain on said days off.

Even with the looming thunderclouds, my friend KS and I decided to go up anyway. We had plans on visiting the Zoo and the Botanical Center. We did both - but not without complication.

The Zoo is where we got caught out in the rain. No mere sprinkle - it DOWNPOURED. We were soaking soaking wet. Unbelievably so. We managed to make it to shelter in the Zoo's train station and waited for it to die down. We ran back to the main entrance where there was an inside exhibit. We wandered through there where I got some amazing photos of seahorses.





And then back outside when we'd dried out a little and it had stopped raining. We visited the Wallabys & Roos (where they are allowed to roam free) and the goats (which we fed).







And a gator who was sitting on a log, but not how you think:



We then went to the Botanical Center where we dried off further courtesy of a bathroom handdryer and explored raindroplet-ed flowers:












I think it was worth the soaking we got - even if both of the places were smaller than expected. As always, you can see more photos in my Des Moines, IA set at Flickr.

Des Moines Sculpture Park

When I can, I enjoy visiting other cities' outdoor art. St. Louis has an amazing sculpture park called Laumeier and I visit it not often enough. On a rare evening off, a friend and I went up from Indianola to Des Moines and explored a few sites I had earmarked to revisit when I had the time.

Specifically, I wanted to see the Sculpture park, and at night. During the day time, it's a nice little collection of great art, but at night, they gain new life.

Example:



looks great by day, but spookier by night:



What I really wanted to see was this:









Amazing, eh? I thought so. Explore more in my Des Moines, IA set. :)