July 24th

****I know, I know, I said in the last post that I wouldn't add any more until this weekend. But, I woke up at 4 am and haven't been able to get back to sleep. And I'm so close to finishing, I thought I'd get up and write about Thursday in Yellowstone. Cheers!****

The Grand Canyon of Yellowstone Day

As with Old Faithful, we knew the Canyon area was a popular one, so we wanted to get there as early as possible. We got right up and out. We arrived at the canyon area at around 8am. It was everything we hoped it would be! It was BEAUTIFUL! In fact, I think this was Jim's favorite area. (I liked the thermal features, even though they were crowded.)

Our first stop was the upper falls. The North Rim trails take you closer to the top of the falls, but they are under construction, so we didn't venture over there. Next, we hiked farther down the trail to Uncle Tom's Trail!! Yep, I HAD to take a picture of THAT! (We were thinking of you, Uncle Tom! Hope you are doing well in Iraq today!) What is special about Uncle Tom's Trail, you ask? Well, it is NOT for the faint of heart. Nana, you would not have made it down the trail. There are 328 stairs leading to the bottom. Mostly metal stairs...that you can see through.


Teresa had a hard time with this trail. She is very nervous about heights. She kept saying she couldn't do it, and then we'd walk together a bit farther and she was fine. Once we were at the bottom, she was fine. We had great views of the falls and the canyon. We really found out why they call this area YELLOWstone. That's exactly what color the canyon is! Breath taking!

After we made it back to the top, we hiked the rest of the mile to artist point. This is supposedly the most photographed site in all Yellowstone. I'm not sure about that...I saw people taking pictures EVERYWHERE! Anyway...at this point, Teresa was starting to be DONE. Jim indulged her by walking back the mile to fetch the car. Alan went with him. As soon as they were headed back up the trail, Teresa and I were sitting and waiting when I heard the following conversation:

Woman (with children): Hi! I thought you were going to hike up the trail and we were going to meet you at the other parking lot.

Man (with baby in backpack): Well, I was, but I saw a grizzly bear, so I turned around.

Woman: What?

Man: Yeah. There was a grizzly bear on the trail. He was about 10 feet from me, so I turned back.

Woman: Oh. (Me...puzzled...they were all so calm about this...like it happens all the time)

Grandma: So, you're telling me you turned around and put the baby between you and the bear? (OK, good...at least someone is freaking out a little! It's a BEAR!)

Man: Yeah, well...but the funny thing was that I was headed back here and passed a man. I told him there was a grizzly bear on the trail and he said, "REALLY!" and started running up the trail.

(AT this point, I ALMOST asked him if the man was wearing a long sleeve red shirt and accompanied by a little boy in a ranger hat. You see, Jim was DETERMINED to see a grizzly bear. He even got up at 5am and went out by the lake because we had seen bear prints on the banks of the lake the day before.)

Eventually Jim and Alan showed up in the van. They were NOT the ones running TOWARD the bear. The only thing they reported seeing was a ME licence plate.



After this, we headed toward the mud volcano area with a stop at Hayden Valley to eat our lunch at Grizzly Overlook. That's right, Jim was still determined to see a grizzly bear. Unfortunately, no one told the bears Jim was going to be looking for them today. He did see lots of bison (haha) and some cool birds.



The Mud Volcano area was out next destination. There were 2 Earth Caches here. One of the caches was VERY difficult, requiring 5 questions to be answered including providing the coordinates for 3 different features. One just required THIS picture:

This area proved to be the most STINKY of all the areas we explored. I think it contributed to my voice issues. (if you have talked to me on the phone in the past couple of days, you will know that I basically have no voice.) Anyway, it was very interesting to hear and see the mud bubbling.
Jim tried his hand at making a video because a still photograph doesn't quite capture the experience.



After leaving the Mud Volcano area, we decided to back track a little, passing the canyon area toward Tower Falls. At this point, I have to tell you, the photo part of our trip ends abruptly. For some reason, the pictures didn't download off the camera, which I didn't realize until I had already cleared the memory stick. :( The pictures included Tower Falls and, yes, A BEAR. It was a Black Bear, but we DID have pictures of a bear...honest. We saw a black bear briefly on Monday when we were driving, but were not able to get a picture of it because it was headed back in to the woods. This time, I did take about 6 pictures of the bear, but they only exist in our minds now. Sigh...

Tower Falls was nice, but CROWDED. We did get some ice cream before headed back to the lake, though.

We finished the day by having drinks in the hotel lobby and listening to the 4 piece string ensemble. Alan fell asleep on the couch we were sitting on. I'm guessing this was the first sign that he was sick, though I didn't know it at the time.

Aloha!