The last half day of my solo camping trip in Yellowstone National Park came too soon.  I was still having fun!

After putting away the tent, etc., I, like the previous 3 mornings, headed for the Swan Lake area hoping, once again, to see the mama griz with four cubs.  I spotted a familiar vehicle at a pullout and pulled in next to Dave Shumway.  He told me they’d been seen but were currently out of site.  After a not-too-long wait, they emerged from behind a rise, but still much obscured by the sagebrush.  By that time Dave and I were at different pullouts.

I had set up Dad’s scope and was watching the fivesome “up close and personal” at 78x and visiting with a family watching through their scope.  When the bears got close enough that I became optimistic of photos I set up my camera tripod.  Upon seeing my Canon camera, the man I was visiting with asked if I knew much about Canon cameras and then asked if I knew what a “CF Error” meant.  He was afraid his camera was dead.  I told him I was fairly sure it was his CF card that had crapped out and offered to loan him one of mine for a test and so he’d be able to get photos of the bear family.  He most gratefully accepted my offer. A quick test proved his camera to be fine.  I told him 2GB CF cards were conveniently available at the Mammoth Gas Station for twenty bucks (more expensive than elsewhere but well worth the price to be able to take photos of the family trip to Yellowstone) and that he could use mine for the bears, download to his notebook, return it to me  and go get a replacement there in Mammoth.

That settled, optimism reigned.  The bears were headed straight for us and showing every indication that they’d cross the road right where we were.  Then…  a little red car pulled off the road on the bear’s side, dragging muffler/tailpipe.  The screech was painful to everyone present, and changed the bears’ course.  The uncharitable and unworthy thought “I hope it’s an expensive repair” crossed my mind, I’ll confess.

Nonetheless, I did get to see the family at a reasonably close distance.  The hopes for a closer encounter and good photos that I had so briefly held were crushed by the red car.

Dave Shumway, meanwhile, had trotted down to the next pullout, where the family DID cross, and has much better photos in his online gallery for his trip.

Nonetheless, I’m mindful that it’s a rare treat to see a grizzly with four cubs and I’m grateful for the experience.  Speaking of grateful, the guy with my CF card was beyond grateful for its use allowing him to get pictures of the griz family (he hoofed down to the same pullout as Dave so probably has some good photos, too). Instead of taking time to download before parting company, he asked if I had enough cards that I could part with one and just sell it to him. Deal.

I pulled out happy to have seen the bears and happy to have done my good deed for the day and headed for the Lamar.

Just around the curve in the road to the east of the Yellowstone Picnic Area I came upon a small but growing bear jam where I met and had a nice visit with fellow YNETTER photosbycharleen before continuing east as far as the Pebble Creek CG before turning west to begin to head in a generally homeward direction.

Along the way, I stopped briefly to take the photo of these rule breakers on the Soda Butte Geyser cone.

I trust they can read (Alabama plates, so I’m confident English is their primary language) so I’m completely baffled as to why they think the rules against climbing on the feature, clearly posted on signage right there at Soda Butte, don’t apply to them. Shame! I took a photo of their license plate, too, hoping to come upon a Ranger but as luck would have it I didn’t see a single Ranger all day.

My “generally homeward” course of travel took me over Dunraven Pass where I was attacked by the nap monster and was forced to pull over. I set my iPod alarm to go off in one hour and it was immediately lights out. When I woke up I discovered I had slept through a bear jam caused by the Dunraven sow and pair of cubs who had just gone out of sight. Doh!

I then went south as far as Fishing Bridger where I turned east to see if Circus Bear was putting on a show. A storm was brewing over Yellowstone Lake.

Circus Bear was a no-show, so after quick detour up to Lake Butte Overlook, I turned around. In just that brief period of time the storm had passed and blue skies were making a return.

My drive back to Canyon, west to Norris, south to Madison and out via the West gate was uneventful. Herds of bison along the Madison saw me off until next time.

Friday night  through Tuesday evening I enjoyed my first solo camping trip to Yellowstone National Park.  I had a wonderful time!

I drove through the Roosevelt Arch around 10:00 on Friday night, headed for the Indian Creek Campground, having received a kind and well-timed message from Dave Shumway that there were open campsites to be found there.  Indian Creek CG also had the advantage of being a short drive in from Gardiner and also smack dab between two promising bear areas — the territory of the grizzly sow with four cubs of the Swan Lake area and the grizzly sow with two cubs of the Norris area. I found the campground 2/3 empty (while the others in the Park were full).  I made camp in the dark under the very dim light of a sputtering Coleman lantern and climbed into the tent where I enjoyed the lullaby of romantic frogs.

Following the late night arrival I didn’t get a super early start, but early enough (around 7:30am) to enjoy morning light at Swan Lake Flats.

And if that view weren’t enough, I was also privileged with my first look of the family of five as the mama griz and her four youngsters were briefly visible before they dropped over the ridge down into Gardiner’s Hole. At 78x with Dad’s PF-100ED and variable eyepiece, I was able to enjoy a good look. The day and trip was off to a GREAT start!

After the bear family dropped out of sight I headed east toward Tower. Between Roosevelt and Rainy Lake I saw a black bear immediately next to the road. It was in a high contrast sun/shade poor light spot and there was no where to park so I continued onward and headed up Dunraven. Had I lingered there at the black bear I would have missed my next grizzly family of the day, a sow with two cubs on Dunraven Pass.

I drove through the Hayden Valley and then turned east at Fishing Bridge and went as far as Sylvan Lake before turning around to head for the Lamar Valley and then Trout Lake.

As I rounded the bend approaching the bridge over the Yellowstone River (across from ‘Wrecker’), I ran into a small collection of cars parked off the road and people with cameras and binoculars trained on the hillside to the north. The object of their attention: a fox sitting still as a statue with eyes trained on a marmot sunning itself on a flat-topped boulder. I joined the audience. After a few moments the fox made a move on the marmot. I was not surprised to see that endeavor fail. However, the fox immediately grabbed a consolation prize.

The fox carried its Columbian ground squirrel take out across the road and down into the gulch on the other side after some misadventure with a jerk with Ontario plates who tried to prevent it from crossing the road by blocking its path with his moving vehicle, angering the fox’s audience and prompting me to shout out “Hey! Ontario! KNOCK IT OFF!!!” which earned me a finger out the window. Oh, well…

I enjoyed a pretty, but uneventful drive through the Lamar Valley to the Trout Lake trail head. I packed up the backpack with water, snacks and rain gear and headed up the trail. I planned, originally, to wait up to an hour for otters. However, I found the lake so peaceful and was adequately entertained by Audubon’s yellow-rumped warblers, tree swallows, rough-winged swallows and muskrats that I sat in the light rain and just enjoyed the peace for three and a half hours.

I was hanging out near the inlet and the ‘dining log’ from which vantage I had watched an otter fish in the area, swim alongside the log (teasing me), and have a roll and a poo about 50 yards from me. What a tease! When she did catch a fish, she ate it partially under the roots of a tree on the east bank. Between the dark clouds, the rain and the shade of that hollow, she couldn’t have picked a tougher spot for photo light. Okay, maybe she could have, but it was bad enough. ISO 1600 makes noisey photos.

After finishing her dinner, she swam across to the west shore where she slid up on a grass covered log, rubbed her belly, took a look around, then slid back into the water.

I took that as my cue to leave. I got back to the car and started my drive back west to Indian Creek. Shortly thereafter I discovered that my cell phone was missing and that checking in with family and friends for the next three days was going to be sketchy.

I arrived back at camp just before dark and enjoyed a burger and a couple beers at my campfire before turning in for the night.

On Sunday of Memorial Day Weekend, I suggested that since the kids’ trip to Old Faithful with Mom and Laura the previous day had been aborted due to snow/slush/rain, I’d take the kids and make it a hydrothermal feature day including West Thumb, Old Faithful, Black Sand Basin and Firehole Lake Drive. I also planned to get Elisha and Reannan started on their Junior Ranger bear badge and Bridger started on his Junior Ranger wolf badge. Laura joined me on this mission. We got a late start into the Park after rearranging which van had which food and gear.

We headed south from Mammoth on the lookout for the griz with four cubs that had been in the area between the Hoodoos and Sheepeater Cliffs. Near miss, I’m guessing from the traffic jam in that area. Foiled again. Ah, well…

When we got to the area near the Museum of the National Park Ranger I thought we’d had another near miss. However, I was pleasantly surprised to realize that this time our timing was just right.

The kids enjoyed that trio almost as much as I did. 4GB of photos later we continued south and turned east at Norris Junction. Passing through the Hayden Valley I stopped at an overlook to see what the people set up with scopes there were looking at. Sleeping griz. Not terribly exciting but it added another griz to the day’s tally. One of the guys I visited with there during that brief stop said there’d been a griz around Steamboat Point earlier in the day.

When we got to Fishing Bridge I wrestled with indecision. That detour would take enough time that we’d be short for hitting all the thermal areas I had in mind for that day. I couldn’t resist. Good call. We enjoyed this griz for another 4GB worth of photos, sometimes as close as 25 yards from the car. The kids don’t get very excited about binocular or scope bears but bears they can actually see well with the naked eye are another matter! That brought our griz count of the day to five.

Time now being a bit short, we skipped West Thumb and proceeded directly to the Upper Geyser Basin with fingers crossed for good timing and a short wait for Old Faithful. Predicted eruption was about 40 minutes away. Laura and the kids decided to hit the OFI gift store while I went to check out Castle Geyser. I visited with a guy there who told me that Grand Geyser was at the end of its predicted eruption period. Luck had been so good thus far that day and I have, despite all my trips to Yellowstone, never had the right timing to catch a Grand eruption. Over to Grand I went and waited, and was rewarded.

Given the lateness of the day, we decided to skip Black Sand Basin. We did take Firehole Lake Drive as we headed back north to Gardiner. A bit north of Tuff Cliffs there were a few cars pulled over and people looking across the Gibbon River. The people there, an Indian family, told me a black bear had disappeared into the trees. We proceeded slowly north with eyes peeled. I spotted the bear. Black bear my butt! It was a very dark griz, but a griz nonetheless, as was apparent to me when I first spotted it, with half of it concealed by a tree. The half I could see was the rear half but clearly too big to be a black bear. When it emerged Bridger agreed with me (nice to have a 9 year old agree!). Griz. Our sixth of the day, and another “naked eye bear,” prompting Bridger to declare “We are grizzly stinkin’ rich!” I couldn’t agree more!