Yellowstone National Park (North Entrance 7/5-7/13, West Entrance 7/13-7/20) Part 2

While our departure from Paradise Valley (North Yellowstone) was not without its challenges…this gave us both a chance for about 2.5 hours of "alone" time on our drive to Island Park, ID our West Yellowstone stop.  I was a bit behind Mike as I stopped in Livingston to get some potential supplies to fix the broken Brake Buddy. I arrived about 30 minutes behind Mike and he had Ruth all set up and ready for our 7 night stay.  The Red Rock Park campground was a lovely park pretty much off the grid in the valley of several large mountains.  It was a stunning location about 25 minutes from the West Entrance of Yellowstone. 

 

Mike quickly assessed the parts I was able to source in Livingston, to see if we could make it work, but none provided an ideal solution.  Mike then called the manufacturer. After a rather lengthy explanation of our issue, they Fed Ex’d a new cigarette plug assembly to us at the campground.  Now that is great service!  We were back in business baby!   What a load off our minds.  Now we can get back to the fun stuff.

 We decided to explore Mesa Falls on our first day in this location. We packed a lunch and headed out.  The parking was busy, but we found a spot.  There was an upper and a lower falls view.  After seeing it from the viewing platform, we headed out on the trail to see the lower falls.  There were signs posted about a young bear sighting in the area, so we made out bear spray accessible and headed out.  It was definitely worth the hike to see the lower falls up close, no bear sightings though. We had our picnic on the porch of the historical inn at the park.

 

We decided that we would trial going into this entrance of Yellowstone in the late afternoons or early evenings, to to avoid crowds.  We entered the park with ease around 5:45 pm and drove to the Upper Geyser Basin to view Old Faithful's eruption.  Unfortunately, just as we walked up from the parking lot toward Old Faithful, it was just winding down from an eruption.  The eruption intervals can be anywhere from 35 minutes to 2 hours.  The projected next eruption was to occur at 8:39pm.  There was so much more to see of this landscape that the time flew by.  We got a front row seat to see Old Faithful erupt at twilight.  The significant crowds were gone at that hour and it was just a lovely experience.  Sunset was not until very late in the evening and we had a tremendous drive out of the park as the sun was setting.  And we saw a lone bison by the side of the road on the way home. 

We had such a pleasant experience in the park in the afternoon/evening that we did it again the next afternoon and using the Gypsy app, explored Firehole Falls, the lower geyser basin and the Grand Prismatic.  All our of explorations were leisurely and not inundated with crowds so we were pleased with our afternoon/evening strategy. We also saw more bison, elk and a mama moose and her calf on the way home.  Natural beauty everywhere you looked. 

Our next adventure was outside the park with another UTV rental to explore the Island Park area via the extensive off-road system.  There were many trails to choose from and our lead us back near the Mesa Falls for a different perspective.  We ventured onto a very narrow trail (#100) that ran just along the river.  It was exhilarating (scary) but we made it round the edge of the bend and had a great ride.

Another 5am departure for the park got us there around 6am and it was only 44 degrees.  The landscape looked super eerie as we drove in due to the heat from the thermal pools meeting the cold air and creating huge steam columns into the air. 

We hiked to the upper view of the Grand Prismatic which is the beginning part of the Fair Falls Trail.  We couldn't see the customary bright colors due to the excessive steam clouds, but it was still a beautiful early morning experience.  We then took a "road less traveled" hike to Artesia Geyser and were treated to a gorgeous geyser pool, the Morning Glory Spring and a very large bison resting in the trees right off the trail.  We stopped for late lunch/early dinner at the Buffalo Bar on the way home.  

Our Yellowstone experience came to a close with a very enjoyable evening musical performance at the campground by one of the local work campers.  Out next destination would be a short 3 night stop in Missoula, Montana on our way to our northern most point in our trip, Glacier National Park.