Day 8-- “You have reached your destination.”

Yellowstone National Park.  We made it!!  We entered the park around 9 am today via the South Entrance.  This entrance is at a fairly high elevation and we noticed quite a bit of snow still on the ground (we opted not to get out and play this time, though!) and it is COLD!!!.  We missed the photo op at the entrance but since we’ll be leaving and entering the park a few more times, I’ve already warned everyone that we WILL be stopping for that picture!

Michael & girls @ Lewis Falls—do they look cold??! They are!!

After a quick stop to look at Lewis Falls, we made our way to the Grant Visitors Center where the girls got their Junior Ranger books.  This will be their 5th badge—they are already ‘rangers’ at Grand Tetons, Yosemite, Sequoia and Zion National Parks!  It is such a great program to help kids really get into exploring the parks.

We then made our way to the West Thumb Geyser Basin where we got our first look at some of the thermal features of Yellowstone.   It is so amazing to be walking among all of the steaming vents and pools—it’s not hard to forget you are inside the caldera of a volcano!  The colored springs/pools are my favorite so far—I love seeing down, down, down into the beautiful deep blue water.

After West Thumb, we drove west toward the most well known icon of the park—Old Faithful.  God blessed us with the most amazing timing—we arrived just 5 minutes before Old Faithful was scheduled to erupt AND at the end of it’s eruption, the nearby (and much larger) Beehive Geyser erupted!  Beehive only erupts once or twice per day so this was awesome!  Not mention, we had all left our sweatshirts in the RV and were VERY COLD standing outside in the misty rain—so not having to wait outside very long was a real blessing.

 

Waiting for Old Faithful…

And there she goes!!

  Beehive Geyser

After the  geyser viewing, we literally ran into the Old Faithful Inn for lunch in their dining room.  Clearly the Disney architects made many visits to and took detailed notes of the Old Faithful Inn when designing their Wilderness Lodge—there were so many similarities from the famous roofline to the massive log lobby & fireplace to the light fixtures!  Although we’ve been to Disney’s version many times, it was even more awesome to be at the ‘real thing’!

After purchasing a sweatshirt in the gift shop for mommy (who apparently forgot to pack one for herself!), we left the Old Faithful area and drove through the rest of the geyser basins on the way to the West Entrance.  The highlight of this part of the trip was the animals.  We  saw quite a few elk and bison at VERY close range!  So cool!!

(Michael clearly NOT obeying the 75 ft. away from wildlife rule!)

We are staying tonight in the Gallatin National Forrest just outside of West Yellowstone, Montana.  (This now makes the 9th state we’ve been in on this trip!)  It is a nice little campground on the Madison River—they don’t take reservations but we had no problem getting a site—with electricity (and internet service!!).

Fishing with Pawpaw!

 

We have more exploring to do tomorrow in Yellowstone—but unfortunately, it will be after a breakfast stop at—yes, you guessed it—MCDONALDS!!  That makes stop #6 if you’re counting (and I am!!).