Part 1 Grand Tetons
I had planned another half marathon for the following Saturday in Yellowstone. So we spent the first 4 nights in the Tetons, and the following 5 nights in Yellowstone. The parks are only about 2 hours from each other and this was the perfect way to see them both. So like I said, we rented houses from VRBO for both locations. This was the cheapest, most efficient way for us to say (as a family of 7 especially). I booked our houses 8 months in advance, the rental car 8 months in advance and I spent 6 months planning what we were going to do, see, eat, hike.. but I love to plan, so this was fun for me! We drove up through Yellowstone on day 5 and arrived at our rental. The kids were all super excited for day 6, this was the day we were going to see Old Faithful!
Day 6:
We got up really early this day, we had a lot to see and certain geysers only go off at certain times, so we wanted to make sure we got to see everything! We headed straight for Old Faithful and the Upper Geyser basin. Now, as you know, Old Faithful erupts about every 90 mins. So pulled up to the Mall they call the Old Faithful Geyser area and found a parking spot. We got there pretty early so we did not have much trouble with parking or even finding a seat to watch. After about 30 mins of anticipation, we finally got to witness the faithful event! Honestly, it wasn't that awesome... but still pretty cool. There were lots of geysers we saw erupt through the week that were just as cool if not cooler. We all enjoyed the area around Old Faithful. There were shops and the hotel an restaurants we enjoyed browsing through. We also spent lots of time in the Upper Geyser Basin seeing all the thermal features and watching several other geysers erupt. After a quick lunch at the Old Faithful snack shop, we made our way back up through the lower half of Yellowstone. We stopped at the Biscuit Basin and Midway Basin (which is the home to Grand Prismatic Spring) and continued up through the Lower Geyser Basin and the Fountain Paint Pots. I'm not exactly sure how much we walked this day but I would guess 6 to 7 miles through the Basins. They were gorgeous! And stinky. And just all together fascinating. There was steam every where you looked and water bubbling up all over the place. I could never use words to describe the most amazing sites we saw. But I do have a few pictures...
We were so fascinated by all the buffalo roaming Yellowstone! We loved to watch them and photo them. They would stop traffic for miles.
Waiting for Old Faithful to do its thing!
There she blows!
Exploring the Upper Geyser Basin
The kids liked to read the signs about the geysers. Some erupt daily, some yearly and some every 100 years. We all found the geysers fascinating. Giant Geyser in the picture erupts every 5 years or more.
We had a great time watching Riverside Geyser erupt. The hot water would spout out right into the river. It erupted over 20 mins!
We hopped in the van and headed up just a bit to the Biscuit Basin and Midway Geyser. Midway is where Grand Prismatic is located. We really enjoyed this area, but we were all more fascinated with the hot crystal blue water of Excelsior Geyser than Grand Prismatic. The wind would blow the steam across the path so hot you could hardly see or breath. It was all so indescribable!
Me and Jada were the only 2 that walked the whole Biscuit Basin. We enjoyed our little alone time while the others rested in the car,
Grand Prismatic- not the colors of the spring!
Excelsior Geyser
She just really needed to touch and see how hot it was. (Don't worry, I checked it first.. I mean.. I wanted to touch too!)
Lower Geyser Basin and the Fountain Paint Pots. Obviously the name comes from the colors of the water which look like paint pots!
The paint pot area looked very desolate.
We headed back to the house late in the afternoon. We cooked dinner at our cabin and tried to rest as much as possible. I chose houses with free WIFI and we brought the Amazon Fire Stick along with us so the kids could watch Netflix or whatever movies we chose. Carter brought the PlayStation 4.. I kid you not. He drug that PS4 through 3 airports 6 times. It managed to make it back in 1 piece somehow. So the kids were able to unwind every night after dinner and rest up for the next day. I tried to break up the figure 8 of Yellowstone and do 4 sections, 1 each day, to see everything. Some days this meant driving over 200 miles. We saw West Thumb to Old Faithful on the drive in. We did Old Faithful to Madison on the first full day. Day 7 would be Madison to Mammoth Hot Springs!
Day 7:
My family doesn't enjoying hiking quite as much as I do, so on this day I let the family sleep in and me and little one (who gets up at 6 am regardless of it's it vacation or not) snuck off to Mesa Falls. The falls are located at Henrys Fork in the Caribou-Targhee National Forest. This was only about a 20 min drive from our cabin in Island Park, Idaho. Each day we were visiting Yellowstone we drove through 3 states.. Idaho, Montana and Wyoming! It took us about 25 minutes each day to reach the West Yellowstone entrance to Yellowstone National Park. Back to Mesa Falls... there is an upper and a lower falls to see. They were stunning. This was my first really big water fall. The ones in Georgia don't compare to what they have out west. The upper fall was 115 feet high and over 200 feet wide. I was in awe.
This was when Hooper was Snap Chat dog filter obsessed (hence the tongue in every pic)
Overlooking the lower falls.
After our little hike to Mesa Falls, we went back to the cabin to rally the troops and head north through Yellowstone. First stop was Artist Paint Pots. We all enjoyed the murky water in the geysers here. Very cool! We then headed to Norris and visited the Norris Geyser Basin. Everyone did the first loop, but only Hooper and I hiked the 2 mile back basin loop. We stopped for a picnic lunch and then headed even more north to Mammoth Hot Springs.
We all just kind of stood in awe at the geysers and vents. Very mesmerizing!
A beautiful view from the top of Artist Paint Pots
Overlooking Norris Geyser Basin
Hooper slept through the back basin hike..
Our picnic spot, which were told from the picnicker's next to us that the family before us just left because they heard bears growling down the hill! Luckily we saw no bears.
After lunch we made our way up to Mammoth. Mammoth was a whole different type of geographic feature. Deposits from below build up shelf like structures all over the land. It was totally awesome and very different from the thermal features we had been seeing.
We headed back to our cabin for dinner and relaxing! We decided to do a little more low key day for the family next. The were pretty tired and we had already seen so much of Yellowstone! Although the thought of not getting into Yellowstone and doing some back country hiking was killing me. I knew the family probably would not be up for it, so I mapped out my trails and I headed out alone (well, with my little Ergo buddy) early the next day for a solo +baby hike in the back country!
Day 8:
Me and Hoop headed out early day 8 for our hike. When we finally got the parking area, the trail I wanted to do was closed. Luckily I had researched several trails so I knew where to find another one I was intrigued by. Again, the trail was closed, this time for bear activity and mama's with babies in the area. Now, we aren't talking those cute little black bears we like to watch in North Georgia. We are talking Grizzlies! And although we only caught a glimpse of one in the wild- I really hopes to see some more! So I had to modify my route yet again. Thank goodness that Yellowstone has an app that has a map, which shows all the trails and spots on it! And thank the Lord it works with no signal if you load the map before you leave the wifi. Because I would of been lost without it. I chose a hike to fairy falls. I took the longer route through more back country. This route took me by unmanned geysers and hot springs, steam vents with no barriers. It was really awesome to get close up to them. I wondered my way through fields and forests. I was all alone, it was very early in the day. It was really very humbling. We made our way to Fairy Falls. At almost 200 feet, this is a very tall waterfall. The water flowing down is very tiny, hence the name Fairy Falls. We enjoyed the view and headed on our way. When we reached the Grand Prismatic Overlook trail, I was disappointed to find it close for construction. So we made the hike back to our car. We had a wonderful 10 mile hike that did not disappoint!
Getting up close and personal with the steam vent!
We enjoyed watching a lonely buffalo through the woods.
Such awesome little boards and bridges through the fields.
Our first good view of Fairy Falls
Got to watch a little otter for a while !
After the hike we headed back to the cabin. We decided to spend the day with the family in West Yellowstone, Montana. We visited The Grizzly and Wolf Discovery Center. Kennedy has long had a love for wolves and we are all fascinated with the grizzlies! We had such a wonderful time.. even though it was rainy and cold. After the Discovery Center we did a little shopping and had dinner out this night at a local bar.
They also had a bird display, and Hooper LOVES birds!
Downtown West Yellowstone
Award winning A-Typical bucks lined the wall of the restaurant.
Day 9:
Our last full day in Yellowstone. This was the morning of my 2nd half marathon out west. It started in West Yellowstone and the entire course was through the Targhee National Forest. It was a beautiful trail run, with some steep climbs! I loved every minute of it! It was very cold this morning so I had to bundle up for this race.
After the race, I headed back to the cabin to get the family. We still had one more section of the park to visit! Our last full day out west. We headed out to Canyon Village. Canyon contains the Grand Canyon of Yellowstone. It is quite an amazing site! We descended about 1 mile down the trail to reach the Brink of the Lower Falls. It was breathtaking. It caught every one of us off guard. We had no idea what to expect and the falls were just mesmerizing! The canyon was so deep and full of the most powerful, rushing water I have ever seen! Pictures could never do it justice.
We were showing off our new sweatshirts!
We made a stop at the general store in Canyon and Kennedy got herself a wolf scarf!
There was a beautiful rainbow that reflected off the water rushing through the canyon.
After our visit to the Grand Canyon of Yellowstone we headed further out through Hayden Valley to the Mud Volcano and Sulphur Caldron. As you can imagine, they didn't smell great.
Hot, boiling, smelly water bubbling out!
A huge bubbly mud pot!
After our last visit to thermal features, we headed back out of Yellowstone. We stopped back by the Grand Canyon again and this time took the overlook of the Upper Falls at Artist Point. Such a beautiful place!
Wiped out the back row!
We headed back to the cabin late that evening and packed up to leave out early the next morning. We had to drive back to Idaho Falls to catch out flight out. Praise the Lord the flights home were without problems ;) We had such an amazing trip. The trip of a life time! No doubt about it.
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