Yellowstone: For The People

Next on our tour of U.S. National Parks was Yellowstone. This was the first National Park and it was really created for the people to enjoy and it is a very ecologically diverse park. Personally, I think Yellowstone is going to erupt. That place is a hot bed of bubbling, gurgling, inter-earth stuff! Then you turn the bend and you have beautiful mountains with fresh water and wildlife. Very diverse. I can't imagine what the first explorers or native Americans thought when the smoldering bubbling ground came into view... or why they didn't run the other way.

Yellowstone symbols

Steve and I took the Yellow Bus tour around the lower loop of Yellowstone. We also saw Old Faithful erupt a few times. I was very impressed by the huge lodgepole pine trees we picnicked under for lunch.

More Yellowstone pictures...

Not one but TWO Grizzlies

The pictures speak for themselves...

More Yellowstone Pictures

Love the Aspens in the elevation. Waterfall pictures are in the "Grand Canyon" of the Yellowstone.

Wildlife in Yellowstone

These are two different bull elks -the close up is beautiful. The velvet on his antlers is so vivid. The big horn sheep was a nice find - I didn't think we would see one until Glacier NP. The three chipmunks peeping out of the hole were too cute to pass up. People get way excited about Bison in YNP - I don't know why. But I watched this one for several minutes while Steve and I were having lunch. The birds kept landing on it and eating insects off of it's back - it had been laying in the dirt. The buffalo got very irritated at the little birds and kept shaking them off and trying to get them. Very funny for the little guys to get the best of the big buffalo.

While in Yellowstone we saw Grizzlies; Big Horn Sheep; Mountain Goats; Elk - Bull, Cow, Calf; Bison; Eagles; Prairie Dog - Chipmunk things; and much more that I'm sure I forgot.

More Grand Tetons

More pictures of the majestic Grand Tetons

Tetons

The Teton National Park is gorgeous. This was probably one of my favorite places. One, because you are so close to the mountains (without driving on them) and two, there is a lot of wildlife. The only MOOSE we saw was at the Tetons. We actually saw more Glaciers in the Tetons than we did in Glacier - go figure. We also took a tour of Jackson Lake and got an up close view of the Grand Tetons.