wyoming Archives - ETB Travel Photography

Hiking Lakes Trail

Well, I left Wyoming with a bang! I couldn’t be happier with my final hike of the summer. Medicine Bow-Routt National Forest is a hidden gem! I can’t believe I overlooked this place when I lived only 3 hours away in Denver. The Lakes Trail is fantastic.

Towns Near Medicine Bow-Routt National Forest

The biggest city closest to Medicine Bow-Routt National Forest is Laramie, Wyoming, approximately 45 miles east. Fort Collins, Colorado is about 1.5 hours southeast and Denver 3 hours. As a result, day trips are good options, though camping along with mountain cabins dot WY-130.

Additionally, two very small towns flank both side of the forest, Saratoga to the west and Centennial to the east. Centennial is equipped with a small general store and a restaurant. Saratoga is much bigger. It has a gas station, some restaurants, hot springs, a museum, a grocery store, and a nice dog park.

HAPPY HIKING!

Hiking Pole Creek Trail

Pole Creek Trail is located in the Bridger Wilderness near Pinedale, Wyoming. It is the main starting point for popular backpacking loops in the wilderness. As a result, there is a huge parking area, pit toilets, and a basic campground at the trailhead.

After two days of consistent rain, I wondered if hiking the Pole Creek Trail to Elklund Lake was worth it with the collection of people in the trailhead. It might have been the most people I had seen preparing to hike during the entire month I have spent in Wyoming. That said, it is not like a Colorado 14er or any other popular hikes near Denver when you can’t even find a parking space after 7am.

Additionally, I got a later start than usual and I hiked on the weekend…two things I avoid to enjoy the solitude of nature. Anyway, most people in the parking area were loaded down with heavy packs and were definitely prepping for a backpacking trip. Donning just a day pack for a long day hike to Elklund Lake, I was able to stay ahead of the traffic.

HAPPY HIKING!

Grouse Mountain Trail and Ice Caves

My first 24 hours in Wyoming were a little rough. I drove through two hailstorms. While looking for a camp spot, I got stuck in the mud and had to get a tow from some nice cowboys. And finally, Annie cut her paw and lost her brand-new bear bell on our first hike to Grouse Mountain and Ice Caves. But, after waking up to a magnificent sunrise, breathing in the fresh mountain air, and spotting deer, pronghorn, and grouse during the first two hours of my hike, I’m quickly reminded why I venture into the wilderness. #thatsWY

HAPPY HIKING!

Day 248 – Yellowstone’s Grand Loop (Part 2)

I started out today visiting Old Faithful. The geyser is well known because of its consistency. It erupts every 40 to 126 minutes for a few minutes. While it doesn’t spew as high as Grand Geyser, the world’s tallest predictable geyser, it still puts on a good show. Old Faithful is located in Upper Geyser Basin along with 125 other active geysers. In fact, Yellowstone is home to 200 of the 500 active geysers found in the world!

While waiting on Old Faithful to work its magic, I wandered along the boardwalk past a variety of springs, pools, and geysers including Chromatic Pool, which I found to be the one of the prettiest as I breathed the rotten egg smell of sulphur. Chromatic Pool’s colors are created by microscopic lifeforms. Incredibly, these organisms can survive conditions that would be lethal to most other living creatures, including humans.

From the Upper Geyser Basin we headed north to the Midway Geyser Basin. Here, Excelsior Crater, which last erupted in 1985, now shoots its scalding fluids into the Yellowstone River. Next to it is Grand Prismatic Spring, Yellowstone’s largest hot spring. From afar, the steam radiating from the spring glowed a shade of blue. Up close, the brilliant blue spring more than 200 feet in diameter was ringed in bands of yellow, green, and orange algae. The water, which is heated by magma beneath the surface and seeps to the surface through fissures, has a temperature of 160 degrees. This spring pours 500 gallons of hot water each minute into the Firehole River.

After visiting the Midway Geyser, we took a one-way, three mile loop through the Lower Geyser Basin and then another two mile drive through Firehole Canyon along Firehole River. The canyon walls tower 800 feet above the river that got its name from naturally occurring Jacuzzi blasts below the surface that keep the river from freezing in the cold Wyoming winter.

Further north we found Obsidian Cliff, a 180,000 year old lava flow. The lava flow in this location cooled at a rare, high-speed which makes it look different from other formations in the park.

My final stop before exiting the north entrance of the park was at the Mammoth Hot Springs Terraces. The terraces are formed from “calcium carbonate that has been leached from limestone beneath the earth’s surface and deposited above as a white travertine.” The terraces grow, some as much as eight inches a year!

We exited the north entrance into Montana heading north through Charlie Russell Country. We quickly ran into an intense thunder storm. I had planned on making one stop at Gallatin Petrified Forest, but I didn’t see any signs for the specific location and opted out of a wild goose chase in a rainstorm. We ended the night at the Wal-Mart in Bozeman with countless other campers! ETB

Day 246 – Yellowstone’s Grand Loop

We entered Yellowstone National Park via the northeast entrance and bison peppered the valley while spectators peppered the road. I’ve seen so many bison lately, I wondered if they were waiting on a bear to run through the herd…it didn’t seem like a very spectacular event to me especially since they were generally far away. Then I saw a line of them cross the river. I guess people were waiting for them to cross the water like people wait for wildebeest to cross the river in Africa.

Soda Butte, a travertine (calcium carbonate) mound, poked up above the grassy valley. It was formed more than a century ago by a hot spring. Only small amounts of hydrothermal water and hydrogen sulfide gas flow from what once was a prolific spring.

The road followed aside beautiful Soda Butte Creek before we reached the Tower-Roosevelt Junction where we stopped nearby to see a petrified tree. The petrified tree is a redwood indistinguishable from the redwoods of California today. It’s hard to believe Yellowstone was once home to a warmer, damper climate. The tree was swallowed by volcanic eruptions and abundant silica in the volcanic flow plugged living cells before the tree could rot.

After visiting the tree, we arrived at Tower Fall a few short miles away. Tower Fall began as a low ledge at a junction of two different bedrocks. The rock at the brink of the fall is harder than the rock downstream. At one time a channel of soft rock around a streambed stood where the Tower Stream now plummets to a pool below.

We left Tower Fall and took the loop 19 miles past Mt. Washburn, through meadows and burnt forest, and by prime grizzly bear country (although I didn’t see one) to Grand Canyon of the Yellowstone where the Yellowstone River has carved a magnificent gorge. Trails along the rim lead to the brink of the Lower Falls and the Upper Falls, two intense cascades. The force of the water pouring over the ledge was dizzying. From afar, the view – breathtaking!

From the falls we cruised another 16 miles through the meadows that are supposed to be home to moose and elk (didn’t see any). A bunch of people were pulled over to see an immature bald eagle feasting on a bison carcass, though. It was so far away; however, even with a 300 zoom the bird was about a centimeter in my lens…I kept going. I moved onto LeHardy’s Rapids, spawning grounds for the cutthroat trout.

By midday, we arrived at Grant Village to find a campsite…wanted to make sure I secured one before the weekend. The campsite was right on Yellowstone Lake, the largest, highest mountain lake in North America measuring 14 by 20 miles. A lovely, groomed path follows the perimeter and it is within 100 feet of the pavement, so Petey got to enjoy the scenery too.

After Petey’s walk and dinner, we took an evening game drive in hopes to spot a moose or a bear. On the way, the bison interfered and boy was the big guy snarling…grunting at VANilla, sticking out his tongue. I started to wonder if he could tip VANilla over. I was in a precarious position surrounded by cars and bison! It started to get a bit frustrating driving the pace of a bison walk, but eventually they moved off the road, and I made a short, stinky stop due to the sulphur at Mud Volcano and Dragon’s Mouth Spring. A park visitor around 1912 named Dragon’s Mouth Spring for the water that surges from the mouth of the cave like lashing of a dragon’s tongue. The Mud Volcano blew itself apart around 1872. Now it is a pool of muddy, bubbling water.

We continued further north to the same area, Hayden Valley, known for wildlife where I finally spotted, along with 100 other visitors, a grizzly mama with two cubs across the river. They moved quickly. I sped VANilla up and squeezed in for a parking spot a handful of times, and I hardly ever got a good shot from the front. When I had the angle the sage brush or hills would be in the way. I did get a few of them in the clearing which was very exciting. I only wish it were a bit lighter outside and I was a bit closer…had to resort to Photoshop again. Regardless, I enjoyed watching them lope through the meadow. ETB

Day 244 – Cody Country (Part 2)

Day 244 of a Year Long Road Trip Along America’s Scenic Byways

Crook County Museum and Art Gallery

So I camped with the truckers last night at the Conoco…another first! By the time I got up and going, most of them had left and only the two other camper folks
remained. Before I left the tiny town for Cody Country, I stopped off at the Crook County Museum and Art Gallery to see the exhibit on the Sundance Kid.

First, this town was so small, I would have never thought it would have a museum, let alone worthy of a visit (my Reader’s Digest Scenic Drives of America helped with that). Second, I found it humorous that it took me three tries to find the place! I saw a giant sign on an old high school building mentioning the museum, but then I realized it said, “Future Home of the museum which is currently housed in the Court House”. So I proceed to drive around the three blocks looking for the Court House thinking it would be an old, ornate building from 1915 like the bank.

ON THE ROAD AGAIN!

Day 210 – Devils Tower Loop

Day 210 of a Year Long Road Trip Along America’s Scenic Byways

Devils Tower National Monument

After a slow start to the morning, VANilla, Petey, and I drove past miles of prairies and pasture lands before eventually arriving at Devils Tower National Monument. The towering rock formation stands 1,265 feet above the river level and dwarfs everything around it including ponderosa pines that surround its base.

According to scientists, the tower was formed when a mass of molten rock welled up within the earth’s crust, then cooled, and was later exposed by erosion. The mass looks as though it is made up of several columns.

ON THE ROAD AGAIN!

Day 209 – Cody Country: Shoshone National Forest and Beyond

Day 209 of a Year Long Road Trip Along America’s Scenic Byways
Grizzlies in Grand Teton National Park

For a rainy day spent mostly in VANilla, I couldn’t have wished for anything better. There had been reports of a mama grizzly bear with two cubs roaming around the Jackson Lake Lodge area. On our way to our hike yesterday, a handful of cars and rangers were camped out alongside the road, so this morning around 7:45 I ventured to the same general area along with several others. I was willing to wait up to an hour, but much to my pleasant surprise, I only had to wait about five minutes. During the next 15 minutes, I think I took 83 shots. Every now and then, I just set the camera down and watched both the bears and the spectacle of photographers.

ON THE ROAD AGAIN!

Day 208 – North to Jackson – Part 5

Day 208 of a Year Long Road Trip Along America’s Scenic Byways

Another lovely day in Grand Teton National Park! We beat the crowds to the Spring Lake Trailhead which we followed through burned forest, ferns, around a lake, and up Cascade Creek to Hidden Falls. The falls were ferocious, splashing down the rocks and spraying us from fifty yards away. With the shade and the spray, there had to be a twenty degree temperature difference from the direct sun.

ON THE ROAD AGAIN!

Day 207 – North to Jackson-Part 4

Day 207 of a Year Long Road Trip Along America’s Scenic Byways

I had a very quiet day today. I had been attempting to fight off a migraine the last two days which wasn’t working well, so I simply slept in this morning and Max took the day to go to Yellowstone. She had never been there and being so close, she wanted to swing by Old Faithful with or without me. Given I felt bad, had already been there, and plan on going again sometime next week, it seemed like a perfect solution. It sounded like her day was more eventful than mine. She saw bison, a black bear and a bull moose in velvet.

ON THE ROAD AGAIN!