A Great Day in Yellowstone

Yellowstone is definitely everything that it is cracked up to be and more. The beauty that surrounds you is every changing. The park is divided into 6 areas. With much amazement we saw it all in two days. This is a place that we all would like to come back and visit again. We would not change anything about this place. Mammoth Hot Springs Hotel is so quaint. They have 8 elk who come down from the mountains every night to feed on the grass in the village. Again we were privileged to watch them tonight. They were majestic.

Now as for our adventure today. Well let's just say that we encountered more animals than you can imagine. We saw about 250-300 bison. These giants are not as gentle as we thought. Nick enjoyed videotaping them. They were so close to the car that I could have touched them if I opened my door. We could hear them grunt. It was too funny to watch them stop traffic. These creatures are not afraid of cars. Bison will stare down the car. One bison even laid down in the middle of the road. Traffic was at a complete stop. The kids eyes were as big as saucers as they watch these creatures meander across the road. It was too fun!

We also saw two male deer and a female deer on a back road that we took. It was a dirt road. As the car bumped around we laughed and said we were on a true animal trek. Next we saw 4 prong horned animals. They look like mountain goats, but a bit more elegant.

Now here is the story for all stories. I have been on a quest to see a bear. We combed this park and still no bear. We took every back road possible....still not a single bear. We asked every person we met, "Have you seen a bear?" Many people said take the Roosevelt Highway to Dunraven Pass. If you are lucky, you might get to see one. Driving through Dunraven Pass we saw all these cars stopped on the road. Well if you guessed bear, you are right. There it was a beautiful black bear digging for grub on the side of the road. You will not believe the pictures. We were only about 10 feet away. I think some people will think that we took the picture while visiting a zoo, but we did see a bear in the wild. Then only about 40 minutes later, after a couple detours and u-turns we saw another bear walking up the road. This one was so fast, we couldn't get the camera ready fast enough. It was an amazing day. Haley and Nick are still so excited about the bear. Haley can't wait to share the pictures with Katelyn, Leah and Nikki. We feel so blessed because we had wanted to go on the Cowboy Cookout dinner but it was sold out this week. If we had been on the cookout, we would never have seen the bear. This is another example of divine intervention. Now we are still on the lookout for a Grizzly and a male moose so we can see the antlers.

Tomorrow we will travel down the Beartooth Highway. It has been dubbed the most beautiful highway in America. Then it will be off to Cody, Wyoming to check out Hal's relative Buffalo Bill Cody...no joke. We will spend the night in Buffalo, Wyoming in a beautiful historic hotel. President Roosevelt, Buffalo Bill and Calamity Jane have all stayed here.

Much Love-Lisa
PS-Downloading pictures takes so much time. I am going to try to put them on shutterfly tomorrow. We are leaving tomorrow morning at 6 and I need to get in the shower and go to bed.