Roaming in Wyoming

We arrived at the Lionshead RV Park located about seven miles from the West Entrance to Yellowstone National Park.  For over 20 years Gary and I have dreamed about and often declared that we HAD to get to Yellowstone and now we are finally able to check that lovely location off our “bucket list".  Do you have a bucket list?  Want to share one of your bucket list items with us?  Post your comment on this blog below! 

Here's our campsite at the park, nestled between a few piercing pine trees. 

 

Our first night we were totally blessed with this stunning sunset.  It really knocked our socks off.  God is the MOST amazing artist … ever!

 

To capture the whole sky effect, I shot a short video.  Taking separate pictures just doesn’t do it justice.  I think you’ll agree once you view the video.

When we got up early the next morning, we were greeted with this fiery looking sunrise.  Isn’t God good?  It was the back-to-back double whammy sky delight!

 

That was just the start of our day!  The rain did, indeed, follow us to Yellowstone.  And with the rain came thunder, lightning, and …. hail!

 

Look at all the hail on the picnic table at our campsite.

 

The ground is littered with hail!

Later that day when we were in town to go grocery shopping we got caught in a major downpour that included a hailstorm.  This is looking out the front window of the Jeep.  See all the hail under the wiper blades?

 

All the rain and inclement weather didn’t deter us.  We headed to the town of West Yellowstone to stop by the Visitor’s Center and obtain park information for our week-long stay.  We thought we might not get to the actual park and then we made a snap decision, “What the heck, we’re almost there, let’s go!”  So off to the park we went and boy were we happy we made that change in plans.

We had lots of elk and bison sightings.  The first wildlife we came to were these stately looking elks.  Don’t you love the bi-color coat?  There were no bulls (males) at this location.  But we had just started our park journey.

 

Our next park sighting was this bison crossing over the creek roadside.  Pretty impressive fella, don’t you think?

 

This frothy veil of water, Gibbon Falls, plunges 84 feet then tumbles towards the Yellowstone Caldera downriver.  As the falls erode the rock below the waterfall grows higher and migrates further from the rim of the caldera.  What is a caldera, you ask?  According to Wikipedia, a caldera is a cauldron-like volcanic feature usually formed by the collapse of land following a volcanic eruption.  There you have it!

 

Here we are at Gibbon Falls, and this time someone asked us first to take their picture.  Of course we said, “Only if you’ll return the favor!”

Here is the Gibbon River rushing towards the Yellowstone Caldera.

 

Fall is on the horizon.  The weather is changing and that means the colors will also soon be changing.  Here’s the beginning of the new splash of color on the Yellowstone canvas.

Scooting back onto the highway, we came across a number of hot spots (hot-cha-cha!).  Here are just a couple of them.   There is so much thermal activity in the park it is amazing.  So far, we have not seen Old Faithful.  We did stop by but we had just missed an eruption and it only blows its top every 90 minutes.  We have so many days left in the park we decided to keep on moving--we'll get back to Old Faithful another day.

 

I think Gary got tired of me loudly demanding, “STOP THE CAR!!!!”  It was another elk sighting and how could we pass up that even though we had already seen elk?  I know, I know, you can’t answer that stupid question eitherJ.

 

What a great first half day in the park!  We saw tons of wildlife and some amazing scenery.  Can’t wait for tomorrow!  The forecast is looking better (but then, whoever trusted a forecaster???).

Deuteronomy 7:8-9 // Know therefore that the LORD your God, He is God, the faithful God, who keeps His covenant and His lovingkindness to a thousandth generation with those who love Him and keep His commandments.