my travels in pixels

Hayden Valley, Yellowstone, WY The south entrance to Yellowstone was open the day before we were due to drive through, but it only stayed open for three hours. So when we got to it the next morning it was still closed which meant we would have to take the long way round. After going back through Jackson Hole, route 22 had a warning saying “no trailers”, so we had to find another alternative. We ran into a few blizzards along the way and texted friends to see if they knew what the roads were like – they had seen people sliding off the roads the day before! We also rang the road conditions number for Yellowstone: most of the roads were still closed and they were recommending snow tires or chains. As we got to the western entrance the sky seemed to clear up and Lindsay decided to ask the rangers what the roads were like: a bit icy, but he decided that it looked clear and the number of cars around would have cleared the roads. He was right. We made it through to Mammoth campground w...

We knew we couldn’t fit two of us in at Tower Hill campground, so we were trying for Slough or Pebble Creek out on the Lamar Valley road, which is towards the North East entrance of Yellowstone. If we couldn’t get into either of these we would have to try Mammoth. No time for lunch at the normal hour, we had to go straight there. We drove past Slough, Full. Not looking good. Lindsay raced on. It was just after two and there were a couple of spots left, two that would take RV’s. Two for us. I’ve lost count of how many campsites we went to last year and got the last or nearly last spot. Our luck is still going it seems. Pebble is really nice with streams running throughout the campground and our own resident bears in the meadow (field) nearby. Bison The animal life is very different to last year. And instead of snow we have blue, pink, white and yellow flowers everywhere. We have seen a couple of badgers, black bear and cubs, courting black bears (male and female) and single...

We had read the weather report for both Salt Lake City and Jackson (the nearest town to the Grand Tetons) and both had said that thunderstorms were on the agenda for the next few days. We found a little state park campground on the way up and it snowed while we tried to cook dinner! The little van is really only a fair weather vehicle, it is not pleasant when it's raining or snowing as the space inside is very limited and you pretty much have to go to bed. We arrived on the second day and found a camp spot in Gros Ventre campground which is just outside the Grand Teton National Park, but run by the park. It is close enough to Jackson for us to go in and get dinner. You can’t cook if it’s raining! Unfortunately Lindsay had already started cooking on the first night before we realized it would rain and he got wet. snow! Bison in our campground The next morning we woke up to snow! We spent the next couple of days in the same campground and went into Jackson du...