The National Park We Can’t Stop Visiting
Most people have a goal of visiting Yellowstone National Park at some point in their lifetime. We were no different. As of today, we have gone into Yellowstone a total of 5 times across three trips out to the area. I guess the best place to start is how our first trip to Yellowstone came about.
Angela had taken a travel nurse contract in Rapid City, South Dakota during the summer of 2020. Our anniversary is July 24, and on July 22, on the way to work her overnight shift, Angela asked me if I’d like to make a road trip to Yellowstone National Park for our anniversary as it was only about a 9 hours drive from us. She worked all night and I spent the night trying to find accommodations for our family of 5 plus two dogs. I was not successful. Everything seemed to be booked. I broke the news to Angela on the morning of July 23rd before she went to sleep for the day. After she fell asleep, it dawned on me that my issue was finding a place that would allow dogs. I had seen a couple of hotels that had rooms available but didn’t allow dogs. I figured we could just drive part of the way on the 23rd, stay the night somewhere, and drive the rest of the way on the 24th. That would allow us get to Yellowstone National Park in plenty of time to see some of the most popular sites and still have time for us to go to dinner for our anniversary. So, I found a last minute place to board the dogs in Rapid City. Then, I booked a hotel near Bozeman, Montana for that night and found a hotel in West Yellowstone for the next several nights.
I was so excited to go wake Angela up and let her know I had figured out a way for us to make it to Yellowstone! At about 3PM, I woke her up and told her the good news. We quickly packed and hit the road, dropping the dogs off at the boarding place along the way. We drove about 5 hours that night and learned a great lesson on that drive, actually. NEVER pass a gas station in the middle of nowhere Montana if you are even remotely close to half a tank of gas. We had planned to stop at around 6PM for gas. But once we got to that location, the whole town was closed. So we had to continue on. A little later, the “fuel low” light came on. We had about 19 miles before empty and I saw a sign that said “gas 17 miles ahead”. Then, I saw another that said “gas. left 4 miles”. It was a gamble. We turned left and made it to a very closed gas station. Thankfully they had 24 hour pumps. We filled up and were back on the road to Bozeman. Finally about 10PM we made it safely to our hotel.
Early the next morning, we got up and started making our way down to Yellowstone National Park via the North entrance by Gardiner, Montana. The drive down was absolutely spectacular. We stopped along the side of the highway and snapped some photos. I posted one up and spoke of how beautiful the area was. I instantly had a reply from an RV friend we had met in 2019 in New Jersey. They were headed to the same area! We made plans to meet up on July 25th inside the park. We continued on into the North Entrance of Yellowstone, and made our way to a visitor’s center for a quick bite to eat. The place was absolutely packed!
Our first stop for sightseeing was Mammoth Hot Springs. I had seen so many photos and videos of this area and couldn’t wait to see it in person. Mammoth Hot Springs is a complex of springs on a hill in North Yellowstone National Park. It was so awe-inspiring to see the vibrant colors and bubbling, steamy water everywhere. I had never seen anything like this in my life! We had just entered the park and it was already beating all of my expectations! 
We knew we wanted to do all of the usual tourist sites in Yellowstone on day one, and then explore a little more on day two. So we continued on south and made our way to Geyser Basin. Geyser Basin in Yellowstone is where you will find sights like the Excelsior Geyser Crater, Grand Prismatic Spring, and of course everyone’s favorite geyser, Old Faithful.
Personally, I was most excited about seeing Grand Prismatic Spring. It is a spring of bright blue water, surrounded by vibrant yellows and oranges. There is actually a boardwalk that you can take and go right out by the spring. But, if you want to get a better look, you have to hike up to the overlook to get a bird’s eye view of the spring. We opted to do the boardwalk on our first day and do the overlook the next day with our friends. The walk along the boardwalk is an easy walk and we can recommend that to anyone at any skill level. It is a great way to see the spring up close. The boardwalk is a one way boardwalk and is 0.8 miles long. We completed the boardwalk and continued on our drive down to Old Faithful. 
Let’s get this out of the way now. Old Faithful is very peopley…it is absolutely packed. The roads were at a total standstill getting down to Old Faithful. So, on your trip, just be prepared for that. We finally made it through the long line of traffic and to the parking area for Old Faithful. Finding parking was no easy task. We finally found a parking spot and as soon as we got out of the Jeep we could hear the “oohs” and “ahhs” of the crowd as Old Faithful erupted in the background. We had just missed it. Thankfully the geyser is aptly named. So, we knew we could expect another eruption in about 90 minutes. We went to the store there, grabbed some snacks, and settled in for our geyser viewing. Within the next hour, the crowds started coming in again, but we were settled in our place up front. We saw several small false starts on the geyser and then suddenly BOOM!! Old Faithful began blasting hot water about 150 feet into the air. The crowd went wild! It was everything I had imagined it would be! 
The next day, we met up with our RV friends and decided to do some of Geyser Basin again that day and then continue on to Grand Teton National Park the following day. None of us had any desire to fight the crowds at Old Faithful, but we thought we’d go up to the overlook for Grand Prismatic Spring. To get to the Grand Prismatic overlook, you will follow the signs for the Fairy Falls trailhead. We found the best place to park was the Fairy Falls parking lot. It can be a little difficult to find parking here, but after driving around a few minutes you usually will find a spot open up. The Grand Prismatic overlook is about 0.6 miles and has a total elevation gain of about 105 feet. So, although not flat, it is still a relatively easy trail and gives you this gorgeous view of the spring below.
Once you make it back down to the bottom of the overlook trail, you can continue on to the Fairy Falls. We didn’t do this on this particular trip, but we did do it on the next. So, we will give details on this trip as well. The Fairy Falls trail is a total of 4.8 miles round trip. The total elevation gain is about 171 feet. I am sure this trail is crowded on many days. But, on the day we went, there were not many people on the trail. The trail itself is relatively easy. After a little of 2 miles of relatively easy hiking, the trail rewards hikers with this beautiful wispy water fall with flowers around the bottom. 
We have done several other hikes around Yellowstone National Park on our multiple trips into the park. But, let’s face it, most people go to see 2 things in Yellowstone, Old Faithful, and wildlife. One thing that you will notice almost immediately in Yellowstone is that there are bison everywhere. Usually, there is a ranger nearby doing their best to keep people away from these huge animals. I can’t believe anyone has to say this, but these are WILD animals. They may look cuddly and sweet. They’re not. Every year people end up getting too close and getting hurt. 
On our first several trips to Yellowstone, we saw more bison than we could ever count. But one thing we had always wanted to see, and that eluded us every time was BEARS. We wanted to see black bears, grizzly bears, any bears. We spoke with several people we met on our various trips and they had all seen bears. In some cases, we seemed to have just missed the bears! We mentioned this lack of bear sightings to several friends and they all said the same thing. Go to Lamar Valley. That’s where you’ll find the bears. On our most recent trip to Yellowstone, we did exactly that. We drive into the West Entrance in West Yellowstone, Montana, and went immediately towards Lamar Valley. The weather was cold and rainy, and we opted to do no hiking on this day. We just wanted to see the wildlife. On the way, we stopped at the little Tower Fall General Store near Mount Washburn. We mentioned our desire to see bears and the cashier said they had just had 2 bears in the parking lot just minutes before. It seemed we had once again just missed the bears.
We continued on North to Tower Junction and started to make a right turn onto the NE Entrance road towards Lamar Valley. As we were making our turn, our son, Dakota, started screaming “BEAR, BEAR, BEAR”! Off to the right, we saw a huge black bear. We made our turn and stopped on the side of the road. He was far enough away at first that I was able to get out of the Jeep and get a good view and lots of video. But then we saw he was coming right at us. As he got closer, I made my way back to the Jeep for safety. We let him cross the road in front of us and we continued on. 
Thrilled with finally having a bear sighting in Yellowstone, we drove further towards Lamar Valley. We had not gone far before we saw a few people looking at something off in the distance and we heard Dakota, our sharp-eyed wildlife spotter, once again yelling that he had seen a bear. This time, not one, but TWO! The side of the road was packed with cars and there was nowhere we could park. We had no choice but to continue up the road a ways. We got to the top of a hill and stopped on the left side of the road by a large rock. Another man stopped right by where we did. We could see off in the distance there looked to be two grizzlies. The man next to me pulled out his binoculars. Confirmed. Two grizzlies! We decided to move back down the hill a bit to see if we could get a better look. We drove maybe 1/8 of a mile down and found the perfect place to pull over and watched as not one but TWO grizzlies started making their way right for us! They zig zagged their way down by where we were parked and finally crossed the road behind us. It was amazing. We finally had our grizzly sighting in Yellowstone National Park. 
If there are 3 major pieces of advice we’d have to offer in regards to Yellowstone National Park, it would be the following. First, be prepared for the weather. It can change drastically in just minutes. On the day we visited with friends in 2020, it was well over 70 degrees out. While exploring on a walkway in Geyser Basin, an unexpected storm rolled in. It started raining and the temperature dropped to the low 40s within minutes. We were absolutely freezing. Second, always be sure to keep a safe distance from the large wildlife. These are wild animals. They can come after you at any time that they feel threatened. Lastly, if you’re wanting to see the wildlife, go directly to Lamar valley for that. On our drive through that area we not only saw the bears, we saw elk, bison, marmots, and I’m sure if we had continued on, we would have come across a moose as well.
Yellowstone is a park in which I never feel like I have had enough time. There are so many other things to see that we didn’t even mention above…the grand canyon of the Yellowstone, multiple geysers, more hiking trails than we could ever do, etc. I could stay here for weeks and still feel the same way. Maybe one day we can go back and actually do that. We would love to spend weeks here. 