Forays into Travel Blogging: Days 6 & 7: The Tetons & Yellowstone

Yesterday was a weird day. It started off beautifully; our AirBnB in Idaho was delightful (did I mention in the last post that I got to meet a day old lamb?), the weather was gorgeous, and we didn't hit the road TOO too late. Plan was to drive up to Yellowstone via Teton along a different highway from the one we took on the way in (this allowed us to skip driving through Jackson, which is a tourist/traffic nightmare, and also put us in direct line to take a side tour that our host in Idaho recommended). So our new highway took us along Jenny and String Lakes in Grand Teton. I'm all about it. Snapping pics, planning routes, begging to get out of the car and go for a quick hike. Dad thinks we're pedal to the metal-ing it to Yellowstone where he'd prefer to spend the day. As you might imagine, this difference in vision for the day caused... tension. So our great start had some bumps.

As my crankiness was peaking (and Dad's, for that matter), I requested that we stop at a picnic area for lunch and a quick hike. Mom decides to join me, we abandon Dad in the car, and away we go. It. Was. Stunning. We didn't even go 2 miles on this trail along String Lake but it afforded us amazing views of Mount Moran.

Mount Moran

Grand Teton

Overlooking String Lake

The water was insanely clear

She was so patient with me

So we're loving this hike, right? But I'm a Moran, so I start to feel guilty that we've abandoned the Papa Bear on HIS retirement adventure. So we head back to the picnic area for lunch. Not only is he shocked to see us back so fast (we were gone for an hour ish), but he's, like, hopping to get back on the road. So we eat some sammiches (this little fellow popped in for a visit) and get rolling.

I loved the Tetons and would return in a second but it was time to get going to the next thing (I think I'm going to become familiar with that feeling in the coming weeks). Dad's driving still, he's worried that we're never going to make it to all the places we want to go, and so we're making good time. I think he finally realized that Mom and I were going to rebel over the forced fast pace though, so we stopped soon into Yellowstone to check out Lewis Falls.

Then on to Old Faithful (baller timing: we got there 25 minutes before the next scheduled showing, which has a +/- 10 minute window) and our first buffalo sighting:

We were so hyped (yesterday) about the buffalo. He was right by the side of the road! Just chomping away! Little did we know, this was going to turn into a regular thing. But anyway. So we've seen some things, it's getting late, so we decide to route through the Grand Canyon of Yellowstone before heading to our B&B. It begins to POUR rain but we've got rain coats. We go to the North Rim driving route and only realize after stopping at all three lookouts that the North Rim Drive doesn't have great views of the falls. It has great views of the Canyons. Which would have been amazing if we hadn't been expecting amazing views of the falls. So we're soaked, have an hour and a half drive to our next home, and Mom and I are starting to get motion sick. The drive wasn't great, but we made it. All we want is dinner, a shower, and bed. Easy enough, right?

Wrong. I picked a place on Yelp and we're headed that way when we see a sign for another restaurant in town and the front window advertises pasta. I'd been hankering for pasta, so we go in. Do not make this mistake for yourselves, friends!!! ALWAYS CHECK YELP. We're pretty slap happy by the time we get into dinner so when Mom and my pasta primaveras show up and are clearly made with veggies straight out of a freezer value bag, we can't stop laughing. We're SO hungry that I house mine even though the pasta is so overcooked it nearly can't be twirled. The carrots come in two varieties: the thin strips that come in pre-packaged salad mixes and the round, crinkle-cut variety that come in freezer bags of mixed veggies. Dad's bison lasagna is so bad he doesn't even finish it (I am honestly not sure I've ever seen my Dad turn up his nose at dinner - even when it's burnt to a crisp, he doesn't waste food). The servers were lovely and the view of the park was gorgeous, but the food was literally the worst I've ever paid for in my life. So if you ever find yourself in Gardiner, MT, don't eat at Rosie's.

An awful dinner plus a nauseous drive plus being pissed at Dad for a while there made us all pretty exhausted, so we fairly crashed when we made it to our place. High hopes for a better second day in Yellowstone.

Today I took the Pop dispensation from Mass when M&D went. I spent the hour getting my game face on for the day (ie. sleeping some more) and our B&B innkeeper (actual B&B, not Air) made us chocolate chip pancakes for breakfast. Hard to start a day off on the wrong foot with chocolate chip pancakes in your body. It worked. Today was wonderful. We drove a giant loop around the park (park is shaped like a giant 8, so by driving the outer edges of it - think a 0) and managed to see everything we hadn't gotten to yesterday and still wanted to investigate.

As we were deciding how the finish the day's drive, we decided to re-trace the last leg of yesterday's loop to hopefully see more of it since the rain had stopped (and yesterday's drive was VERY wet). Amazing decision because at one of the overlooks we stopped at, we got to watch a herd of bighorn sheep and two lambs do their gravity-defying thing and scramble along a sheer rock wall! It was SO cool; their utter abandon in just flying down these insanely steep slopes was unreal. Amazing way to wrap up the driving portion of the day.

We took so many photos of so many beautiful things. It rained a lot but we managed. I drove and Mom rode shotgun so we didn't get car sick. Dad did his best to not backseat drive and I did my best to drive the speed limit when we were on curvy mountain roads (aka all day). We even had dinner at the place we had originally planned to go to last night - and it was EXCELLENT. It was truly every bit as good as last night's dinner was bad (The Raven!). We wrapped things up for the day with photos at the archway (Gardiner was the original park entrance when it was founded as the nation's first National Park).