Today was amazing! We got to spend the whole day in Yellowstone National Park, almost none of the guys have been before so we had to do as much as we could. Started the day at 6:30 am heading into the park and our first goal was to hike up Mt. Washburn which was recommended to us by a guy on the route last year. Minutes into the park we drove by a Bison just hanging out on the side of road, it was awesome. We definitely did not come prepared for the hike though, no one was expecting it to be half snow hike. I was thinking a nice summer trail and wore my Chacos. We did it anyway, I put some socks on too but it was still very cold, but well worth it for the views. On the hike we saw a little wild life, some Pica and Marmot. Once we got down and collected the rest of the crew who took a different route down we headed to check out Tower Falls, it was beautiful, the rock formations beside the waterfall look like giant towers 10-20ft at least. Unfortunately the hike to the base of the falls was closed but we got a good view from the lookout point and road. There we checked out the gift shop and I picked up a Yellowstone sticker to add to my White Pass sticker on my bike, I decided I want to add a sticker to it for as many major stops as I can, I know Denver and DC will be a must.
Next stop was the Mammoth Hot Springs. On the way there though we saw a couple bears in the woods beside the road, including a cub. The Springs were also very cool, it is basically a giant mound of calcium deposit with holes all over bubbling with water. The formations were so interesting. They have elevated platforms that we can walk around on to see the springs. What I thought was amazing about them is how deep they go, we could see some dead trees around the springs in areas of hardened deposits and I learned that those were actually just the tops of trees and the rest is burried under the hardened deposit. Our final stop was Old Faithful, of course. While we were on the way there we saw a heard of Bison from a distance and another just by the road. Seeing Old Faithful was so entertaining, we sat just waiting for it to go off for at least half an hour just being rowdy and making jokes until it finally blew, it was just as awesome as I expected.
So all the sights were amazing and I absolutely loved getting to explore all the well known features of Yellowstone but I think the highlight of the trip came as we were on our way out of the park. We came up on a big line up of stopped cars and finally when we were able to move up we realized it was stopped because a giant heard of Bison were in the road, a baby calf walked right in front of our car as we were waiting and a group were just walking next to the car on the other side of the road, the rest of the heard was already across the road roaming by the river. It was the coolest thing. One of the guys got a good video, I will add a link to it when he uploads it. Moral of the story, Yellowstone was a great success, so happy that I got the chance to visit while on this trip.
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