Wednesday, August 18, 2010

Yellowstone Adventures!

(I started this post three days ago, but got all burnt out whatnot and opted to zone out to Radiolab instead)

If you're traveling from Idaho Fall, ID to Sheridan, WY, you might as well go through Yellowstone National Park. Sure, it'll add four hours to your trip (avoiding the park and opting for the highways takes about 8 hours...our trip to twelve) but you won't see Bison on the highway.

We left dark and early at 4am. Our one goal, to breakfast at old Faithful. Our miscalcuation -- even in mid August, Yellowstone can get frigging freezing. Take Sunday morning for instance. It was 35 degrees.

Yikes!

We pulled up to Old Faithful around 6:45am. Dave went on recon to the visitor center. Claire and Lisel and I were all getting ready in a fairly leisurely fashion when my phone rang

"It's going! It's going!" screamed Dave's voice.

In a panic that only the eruption of a famous geyser could produce, I swept up Lisel, threw a blanket and scarf around my baby, and bolted put of the baby bus with Claire. Not actually knowing where we were going, we started running in the general direction that Dave had walked. Lisel thought all the running was hilarious. She was cracking up, which meant we were cracking up and then we saw him! Old Faithful! The legendary and fairly regular geyser who millions of people flock to see every year.

"Pft," he spurted, shooting water three whole feet in the. "Pft," he spurted again, this time sending water careening two feet in the air.

"Oh." we sighed.





Would we stick around to see Old Faithful's real deal? Certainly not we all agreed. It was cold to the max, and besides we had a full day of driving ahead of us. We weren't going to hang out in cold-ass parking lot for an hour and and a half. It was breakfast, and then Sheridan or bust!

Luckily, I'm a sever espresso addict. I laugh a regular coffee. I poo-poo lattes. I think people who drink mochas are wimps. I like two shots of concentrated brew cut with a drop of cream.

The first thing we bought after the baby bus? An espresso maker for the baby bus.

But the inverter was low on juice and the generator wasn't firing up, so no baby bus brew. And for some unknown reason none of the cafe's around Old Faithful serve espresso. I know this because I checked them all out(how can this be? Doesn't the park have high international traffic. What does an Italian do in the morning at Yellowstone?!??)

By the time the generator finally fired up, and I got my fix, we were only ten minutes away from the big blow. So we went. And waited. And saw it!








Totally worth it.

The rest of Yellowstone was drive by beautiful. We saw Elk and Bison (no Bears), lakes and lots of steaming geothermal activity.

Like the governator, we'll be back.


-- Post From My iPhone

3 comments:

MAYBELLINE said...

Yellowstone is a must.
Sheridan is a fun place as well.

Phillip Signey said...

Are you going to be at the Grammy Museum with Ray next week?

Carole said...

I Love Yellowstone!

Old Faithful- so cliche, yet so cool!
Next time make sure you see the "paint pots" -steaming and bubbling in the mud :)