Yellowstone

 Monday, June 28

We headed out toward Yellowstone soon after 10. It was about a ten and a half hour drive to Helena, Montana where we checked in to our motel. We didn't waste much time settling in for a night of sleep. 

Tuesday, June 29

We only had about a three and a half hour drive but we wanted to leave early enough to snag a campsite. Chris had done a lot of research on lodging in and around Yellowstone. Motels even an hour and a half away were more than we wanted to spend on four nights. In the aftermath of covid, the crowds at national parks has doubled, and any campgrounds where sites can be reserved are filled within hours of reservations opening. There are some first come first serve campgrounds, so we wanted to roll in early to find a campsite. 

The second campground we checked out had a couple spots available, so we drove right in to Baker's Hole and set up camp.... just four miles from the Yellowstone entrance.

Later, we realized there were sites that had electricity and we wished we had reserved one night and then tried to snag one of those. Oh well. This way we can look back and proudly say we camped for three nights with no electricity and no showers and had a lot of fun doing it. (We won't talk about how we looked or smelled or felt...)

We made some hotdogs and baked beans and then headed in to Yellowstone to see what we could see. 

The scenery driving in is absolutely gorgeous. I didn't take a lot of pictures, mostly because puctures just don't do justice!

We looked around a bit and then hung out to wait on Old Faithful. 

We got one of our best buffalo views right beside Old Faithful. 

This is how it normally looks...

And this was our first view of it erupting. Pretty amazing. 

And the evening and the morning were the first day.....