We were at Yellowstone from 9:30 am – 7:00 pm. We saw so much of the park, but of course not everything (though we felt we did). Here’s a top 10 list from our trip, in no particular order:

1) BISON!! There were wild bison all over the park. We drove next to a pack of almost 20 of them that were on either side of the road. They were each about 10 feet from our car. Super cool.

2) BULL ELK! These guys were all around the hotel / town section of Yellowstone. They were close to cars, on the post office lawn, walking around all over. On the way out of the park about 30-40 of them were grazing and caused traffic because so many of them were in the road.

3) OLD FAITHFUL! We waited about 45 minutes to an hour to watch it go off. It was spectacular! Apparently it can go over 100 feet high, which I don’t think was the case for us, but it was still extremely impressive. There were TONS of people filling the benches to wait and watch Old Faithful go off.

4) OLD FAITHFUL INN!! This beautiful building has so much history and is skillfully crafted out of timber. There’s an enormous pendulum clock in the main section of the hotel. The woodwork in the building is stunning.

5) PICKLE BARREL! We picked up sandwiches a the Pickle Barrel in Livingston on our way to the park. We enjoyed a lovely picnic in the park.

6) MAMMOTH HOT SPRINGS! A natural wonder for sure. It smelled like rotten eggs (they all did), but this geothermal hot springs was super cool.

7) NORRIS GEYSER BASIN! A boardwalk led us all around these geysers. Some sections had really pretty colors formed from bacteria.

8) ARTIST AND FOUNTAIN PAINT POTS! These geysers had stunning color schemes, hence the paint pots names. I was wearing my Rochester sweatshirt and ran into a guy who graduated in 1987. MELIORA!!

9) ARTISTS POINT! This view of the waterfall in the “Grand Canyon of Yellowstone” was incredible. It didn’t seam real – all it was missing was a rainbow and a soaring hawk to make it the most perfect scene in America.

10) YELLOWSTONE LAKE! The river runs into the lake, which is surrounded by mountains and trees and all that beautiful nature stuff. We drove around the west side of the lake from south to north on our way out of the park. No wildlife near there, but still amazing.

After leaving the park we got some drinks and snacks at a local grocery store. We drove the hour or so back to Livingston to get dinner at The Mint, per the recommendation of my cousin. We each got a steak served with mashed potatoes for $16. Great price for a lot of delicious food. We got back to my uncle’s and watched the movie Chef via Alex’s tablet, also a fantastic movie. At midnight we cheers-ed for my birthday! We finished the movie and were in bed around 1:30 am. Birthday celebration tomorrow!! WOO HOO!!!

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