Image of the Day – Stick Cathedral
Author: Ross
I'm the guy that runs this thing.
Image of the Day – Tree exposed under bark
Image of the Day – Tree Branches at End of Day
Image of the Day – Fairyland Pond
Image of the Day – The Pipe Fitter’s Tree
Western Journal, Day 6 (Part Two)
Saturday, September 17 (continued)
We left the park from its northwest exit and arrived in a small town called Silver Gate, which featured a short strip with a few small motels offering rooms and cabins, some shops, and a couple of bars. It was a much more sensible and worthy place to support visitors at the edge of the park. We ate a lunch in the diner. While working on our food, our waitress (and co-owner of the place) ran outside with a small radio in hand. She was talking back to someone else about a helicopter in the air and saying, “Well, the rangers didn’t call us.” She explained to her patrons that she is an EMS provider and member of the local search and rescue group. She was anxious at the possibility of being deployed, but mused that the rangers in the helicopter may have just been looking for some hunters who wandered into the park. “If you’re hunting at the edge of the Yellowstone, you need to know where the boundaries are,” she said with more than a hint of sly.
Our next destination was the town of Red Lodge. Here I should provide some background. About forty years ago, my father hitchhiked across… well I don’t even know how far he went. But he made his last visit to Yellowstone on that trip. He left the park in a hearse (that had been converted into a camper van) and arrived in Red Lodge, Montana. He was so taken by the town that he returned to Massachusetts to bring my mother there, but it never happened. And so they remained in New England. I liked the idea of a sort of alternative homecoming, so our next destination was pinned on the map.
Image of the Day – Specks on a leaf in the sun
Western Journal, Day 6 (Part One)
Saturday, September 17
I pinched my nose and went back into West Yellowstone for our packing-up-coffee. I was done first and after the morning’s organization, we went toward the park. A short traffic line at the gate was quickly passed and I presented the Golden Ticket to the ranger at the checkpoint who waved us by.
We went down a forest road closely resembling the one leading to our prior campsite, with a key distinction being that there was a lot more traffic. Yellowstone gets a lot of traffic. For many visitors, it’s essentially a drive-thru park and our experience would not be so different. We stopped at a turnout and walked up to one of its famous hot springs. Sulfury steam rose from the water and its Technicolor mineral deposits along the shore captivated the eye. Visitors are led to this particular spring by a boardwalk, which is decorated with signs bluntly warning us not to leave the path or risk death.
As I left the springs, I saw a buffalo sitting in front of the tree line some distance away. Visitors along the boardwalk were snapping photos of it and I added my own camera to the volley. I was amused to hear a couple speculating on whether or not the buffalo was stuffed until it turned its head to settle the question; “Maybe it’s animatronic!”
Image of the Day – Illustrated map of Yellowstone National Park
From the Library of Congress.
Western Journal, Day 5
Friday, Septermber 16
We woke up in this wonderful valley, finding it in yet another wardrobe of light. We packed our things and continued south along the highway. The two mountain ranges on either side of us slowly withdrew from each other’s distant company. At one point, a truck’s tire burst, sending a cloud of rubber into the air and the truck swerving across its lane in front of us. The driver skillfully recovered and settled into a slower pace, allowing us to pass. At some point, we entered the territory of Idaho National Laboratories, though there was little to distinguish it from anything else except an access road rolling off toward an industrial park in the distance and aggressive, dire warnings against trespassing.
When the mountains had become nearly forgotten humps on the horizon, we encountered a fork in the highway with a little farming town built in front of it. A little circle of community coaxed an island of green crops out of sea of rough sagebrush. We turned east, bringing ourselves into the direction of Yellowstone and stopped in Rexburg, Idaho for a late breakfast of pancakes. We left town as the local police began the chore of closing down the main road on the strip for reasons we never learned. A parade maybe?
It was my turn to drive and my dad napped in the passenger seat while I took the car across farming plains outside of Rexburg. Our approach to the mountains was met with yet another forest distinguished by its own particular flavor of color palette. Sometime afternoon we reached West Yellowstone. West Yellowstone is a town at the edge of the park founded sometime around the turn of the century. Initially it had another name I’ve since forgotten, was later renamed “Yellowstone,” and after that was given the name “West Yellowstone.”
I hate West Yellowstone.