Yelowstone

Our next National Park was Yellowstone. We got there in the early afternoon, having come over the pass and down out of the Beartooths that morning. We, of course, did the obligatory Entrance Sign photos. Mine, in Beth Grimaldi's honor, pointing out the Bison Butt helpfully included on the entrance gate.

There was still plenty of snow in the high places in Yellowstone, several feet deep in the 8,000-foot elevations. We got a mix of sun and clouds all day long.

Yellowstone is a great park for critters, and they didn't disappoint. Never did find a grizzly, but we came across a black bear. Elk and bison (butts and otherwise) were everywhere. On the way out, in the valley just north of the park entrance in Montana, we saw a small group of Dall sheep up on the cliff face, basically straight over our heads. Chris got a nice photo of a mommy and baby sheep, with the baby getting herded back behind the rocks and away from the silly photographers. I'll put all the critters at the end of this post.

Once we got down to the lower elevations in the northern part of the park, we got into the geothermal stuff. Very stinky and steamy, but lots of pretty colors to see. Chris and I especially liked Firehole creek, where the not-very-sulfurous steaming-hot water pours straight from the boiling cauldron into one of the best trout streams in the park. Not really sure how this helps the fishing, but the highest density of trout fishermen was certainly on the Firehole.

Here's one of Mammoth Hot Springs, which was much stinkier than the Firehole, but likewise had great colors and lots of boiling water.

From here it was off to try to get into Glacier National Park.

We'll get the critter pictures posted soon...