It was a cold first night at Yellowstone, 30 degrees
outside, low 40’s inside. We did crank
up the furnace for a while to take off the chill as we dressed and had
breakfast, and the sun warmed things up fairly quickly into the 50’s.
We went to the visitors’ center at Canyon Village first and
got some tips from a ranger about hiking trails and places to park the RV. (I
had noticed coming into the park that quite a few of the parking lots and
picnic grounds specified no trucks, trailers, or RV’s.) She led us well: we drove to the South Rim
Road and parked at Artist Point---plenty of room.
The view from Artist Point is featured on many paintings and
posters of Yellowstone, and it is simply stunning---a view of the Lower Falls of
the Yellowstone River, with all the colored rock walls of the Grand Canyon of
the Yellowstone as backdrop. It looks
much like The Grand Canyon with rock spires and lots of tans and reds
and various shades of brown in layers. I
took lots of pictures which I can’t post yet, due to limited internet, but I’ll
add some later.
From there, we picked up the South Rim Trail and hiked along
the canyon for a little more than a
mile, lots of ups and downs and plenty of spectacular views, and reached the
viewpoint for the Upper Falls, smaller but still beautiful. With Ranger being stuck in the camper while
we hiked, we returned to the RV and found a picnic area in which to walk him
and have a light lunch.
In the afternoon, we decided to drive to another area of the
park, and took a northbound road toward Tower Falls. It turned out to be a spectacular route, up
through a mountain pass. We were on the
lookout for animals, and over the course of about a two-hour drive we saw mule
deer, goats, bison, and even one wolf! I
also saw one grizzly bear, but it was down in the woods, off the road, and as
Dan was driving the winding route, he kept his eyes on the road. We did not actually stop to take the short
hike to Tower Falls due to the fact that the place was mobbed with tourists and
the parking lot was packed, as were the shoulders of the road for some
distance. We did enjoy a limited view of
the rock formations around the falls and the view of the vistas across alpine
meadows.
Upon our return to Canyon Campground, we pulled in at the office
and took turns getting a HOT shower, which felt fabulous!
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