The End is Near!

So my trip is coming to an end :( I picked up Aimee in the RV at the Jackson Hole Airport on Monday June 11th. It’s a little difficult to find a parking spot with a 32 foot RV towing a car! But, if you are going to park an RV then the little airport at Jackson Hole is one of the few places you probably could get away with it. After picking up Aimee we headed to Grand Teton RV Park in Moran Junction just east of Teton National Park. The website made it look like a great RV park to stay at. Lesson learned, it was an RV park amongst a junkyard. The owner had snowmobiles, a dump truck and an assortment of other things parked around the property. It was rate 3 W’s by Woodalls, I decided that I needed to look for 4 or 5 W’s from now on! (The KOA here in the Black Hills is rated 3 W’s, but is much, much nicer. So much for Woodall ratings!)

The next morning Aimee and I drove up into Yellowstone to see Old Faithful and other sights in the Southwest section of Yellowstone. After visiting Old Faithful we headed north to Firehole Canyon drive, on the way we got stuck in an 45 minute traffic jam! We literally turned off the engine and waiter for…. a herd of 300 bison to pass. We got a lot of pictures! At the end, I had already put away my camera, when one bison crossed in front of our car and stopped and stared right at us! It was only after the park ranger on horse said to us that was a Kodak moment if I ever have seen one, did I realize that I missed a great shot. After the herd passed we headed up to Firehole Canyon to do the drive, when as I was about to take the turn a park range closed the gates on the road! Man just my luck. So we headed up the road to a visitor center to use the restrooms and to give the herd time to get off the road before we headed back to our RV. Unfortunately we didn’t leave enough time. On the way back we were stuck in another back up that lasted closed to a half hour. You thought NoVA traffic was bad!

Since we decided we really didn’t like our RV park we cancelled our third night and got a spot at Flagg Ranch RV park, just outside the south entrance of Yellowstone. Since we had to break camp on Wednesday we decided not to go into Yellowstone, but to check out Teton National Park around Flagg Ranch. We did a short hike along the Snake River, which was not real exciting other than we constantly were on the look out for Grizzly Bears! Luckily we didn’t come across any!

Flagg Ranch was a nice place to stay. It was amongst the Lodge Pole pines next to a river. That night we saw a mother Moose and her baby grazing in a field just 25 yards from the RV park! It was a pretty cool sight to see and she didn’t seem to care that me, Aimee and 10 other people were watching.

The next day we broke camp and drove the RV into Yellowstone Park, since we would be spending the next two nights at Fishing Bridge RV in the park. After parking the RV in the visitor lot we drove up to the Grand Canyon of the Yellowstone to see Upper and Lower falls. Lower Falls was magnificent. After seeing the falls we did a hike along the south rim to Uncle Tom’s trail and descended 328 stairs to see Lower Falls up close! Aimee had a little difficulty climbing back up the stairs due to Asthma, but she was a trooper and made it to the top with no real complaints! We drove to Inspiration Point along the North Rim get another view of the canyon and also did a hike based on some tourists recommendation to the Brink of the Lower Falls.

After doing our tour of the Canyon we headed back to Fishing Bridge to set up the RV so I could be back to Mud Volcano for a ranger led tour, which was something I decided I really wanted to do. The tour was a little too long for the information expunged by the ranger, but I guess it was worth it.

Friday we went up to see Geyser basin. I think it was the best thermal area in the Park. There were sections were it was just a wasteland with bubbling mud pots, steaming vents, and emerald hot springs. It was definitely worth the drive. As we headed towards Mammoth Springs Aimee indicated that she would like to go to the Grizzly Nature Reserve in West Yellowstone, since I had gotten to do pretty much everything I wanted to do and was curious about West Yellowstone, I agreed. It was definitely worth heading that way, since along the way we came upon a bunch of cars parked on the side of the road. A sure sign that animals were nearby! It was awesome; two very large Elks were grazing 50 yards off the road. As we sat there they seemed curious about our car and headed directly towards us. One crossed the road just in front of the car and the other came up timidly stopped looked at us and all the other cars, turned slowly and walked away down the road. It got blocked by a car that had just parked across the road from us. It move down a piece crossed half way across the road, stopped and looked frighteningly at two carks blocking its path. It then jumped up as it crossed between the two. What an awesome sight! t and I figured that the Elks may have been curious about our car because we had Barley in the back seat and it could smell her. By the way Barely went a little nuts, so I had to nuzzle her with my hand. Seeing those elk made the trip over to West Yellowstone worth it, since the Grizzly park wasn’t that great.

Saturday morning we broke camp again and headed back to an RV park in the Jackson Hole since Aimee had to fly out the next day. After I dropped Aimee off on Sunday, I drove the RV clear across Wyoming to the Black Hills of South Dakota. If was rough going since I didn’t get much sleep the night before and once you leave the mountains the drive is very uninspiring; just plain boring!

Today I got up early took a tour of Wind Cave, drove along a very windy and interesting road through Custer State Park up to Mount Rushmore. I hadn’t plan on going to Mount Rushmore, since I saw it was a kid and how much better can it be to see in person than in a picture? Well it was definitely worth it! Seeing it up close you really feel the size and magnificence of it! I was lucky that all the lower decks of the parking garage were full and only the top deck, which was accessible directly from the road, was available! As I drove onto the top deck, I remembered that I had the bikes on the roof! Close call!

When I was in Yellowstone I saw a news piece on the Crazy Horse Memorial near Mount Rushmore. It’s to be a huge granite monument to Crazy Horse that will dwarf Mt. Rushmore. I decided I had to see it. They have been working on this since 1948 and just finished the face in 1998. The plan is to depict Crazy Horse sitting on his horse point off to the horizon. As the lady said that I followed into the Gift Shop, it’s not going to be finished in my lifetime!

Tomorrow I get up and head home. I plan to try to make 1700 miles in 3 or 4 days. I may post a final blog on my trip when I get home. Hopefully I’ll add some pictures. Thanks for following my trip!