June 9th was Excellent!

 June 9th. What a day.

The short summary of today is that you, whoever you are, should visit Yellowstone. The long summary is...well, here goes.

We arrived at our Yellowstone campsite at about 6 p.m. on July 8th. The drive in along the Beartooth Highway was other-worldly. Absolutely breathtaking. We saw more mountains than I knew existed, plus some yellow-bellied marmots and a handful of mountain goats. 

A random spot along the Beartooth Highway

We got to the campsite and couldn't believe our eyes. We grabbed a spot no more than 10 feet from a big river that's all runoff from the mountains - which we could see from bed. Bonus, the sun set behind those mountains.

Peg + campsite on June 9th.

So we went to the park to see how far away we were and to get a small taste of what Yellowstone could offer before bed on our first night (the 8th). We saw a moose through the woods in a small town outside the entry gate, but couldn't get a good look at it. That's OK though, we thought. 

Into the park, we drove to the Lamar Valley, a notedly wonderful wildlife viewing area. We saw hundreds of bison and just marveled at the general beauty of the area. After a bit, we turned around and headed back to camp. But on the way out of the park...we saw a bear. It's unclear if it was a smallish grizzly or a brown version of a black bear (black bears can be brown out here. It's weird.) Either way, it was excellent. It was off the side of the road, just foraging in a small grassy area. 

In the end, we didn't get back until a few minutes after 10 and didn't get to sleep til closer to 11:30 or so...which was the end of a long day.

And then July 9th happened.

We were both awake by about 6:15, and as we started a morning snuggle we thought aloud "...should we just go into the park? We're awake...should we just go?"

Obviously the answer was yes.

We were on the road to the park at 6:28 a.m. Apparently the legendary wolves of the Lamar Valley are most active at sunrise and sunset, and even though sunrise is more like 5:15 a.m. here (woof), 7:00 probably wouldn't be bad. 

We took a leisurely drive into the park and didn't see much out of the ordinary...except what appeared to be the SAME bear in the SAME spot, but 10 hours later! That was cool. 

The bear which we were later told was a grizzly.

The valley itself was great, although nothing overly notable. It's a pretty majestic place, so it's cool to see in general, but aside from several hundred bison, we didn't see anything unusual. We pressed on to Slough Creek, as we'd gotten a tip that a moose and calf typically hung around there. As we got close, we saw no less than 30 cars on the main road, then another 50+ on Slough Creek road. All eyes were pointed up onto a hillside, far across Slough Creek itself.

Turns out there was a mama wolf and 2 or 3 cubs. They were far enough away that seeing them was a thrill, but not a life-changer. We could only really tell that it was a wolf because someone suggested it and then we saw it move. And even then, it was only through a viewing scope.

So OK, 9 a.m. and we'd already seen a wolf, and that meant we didn't have to wake up at 4 to do it like a lot of people.

With that in our back pocket, we took a hike at Yellowstone River Overlook trail, which was exactly as the name implies: a beautiful trail that runs alongside the Yellowstone River, looking into the valley for about 2 miles. It was gorgeous. There wasn't a lot of wildlife, though we did see a beautiful northern bluebird and took about 20 photos of it. Then we had breakfast.

The bluebird

Jenna on the overlook trail

It was a busy morning. 

From breakfast we continued toward Mammoth. There was nothing to see at Tower due to construction, and we drove past what amounted to be a bear jam near Petrified Tree. The bear jam was FAR worse going east and we were going west, so that was nice. Also the bear was not exactly visible. 

We got to Mammoth around 12:30, and it was packed. The whole intersection near the hot springs was just slammed full of cars, and a few elk were just kind of hanging around the area. The visitor centers, as it turns out, are all still observing COVID suggestions, so all exhibits were off-display, which was a bummer. However, we took the chance to just catch our breath. 

We napped in our house-van and laid around for about 90 minutes.  We did nothing. And it was wonderful. 

We rolled out of bed, snacked a lot, and used wifi at the visitor center, where we peppered a ranger (Ryan Fox!) with questions about all kinds of things. Around 3:00 we moved the van to a different part of the area and checked out the hotel lobby for water and gift-shop stuff. Around 4:00 we went to the hot springs scenic drive, which was about 1.5 miles of "...whoa. That's so weird looking."

Mammoth Hot Springs

We did the loop a second time but got out halfway and walked out on some boardwalks to see some of the more bizarre formations up-close. It was outstanding.

By 5:15 we were headed back toward camp, but the distance between camp and Mammoth was nearly 60 miles. So we drove. 

I wanted to take a side-road, a one-way street that runs parallel to the main road, but it was closed. So that stunk. But right near where it let out was that same spot from the bear jam in the morning, and wouldn't you know it? Another bear jam. Except this time it was worse going west and we were going east (not many people stay east of the park, so we weren't competing with a lot). We briefly caught sight of a mama and cub or cubs!

But with so much traffic, I felt guilty stopping, and ultimately we drove past...and then turned around and parked someplace easier.

Right as we got to a good spot to see what was going on, the mama brown bear (black bear, but brown) started ducking into the woods. But just before leaving our sight, the two cubs tried to climb a tree! So we briefly saw two cubs climbing a tree! Moments later, they were gone, and the rangers dispersed the crowd and traffic went back to normal. It was too quick to get a photo, unfortunately. 

And then we were off again.

We were planning to stop at Slough Creek again to look for the moose. Also we weirdly get cell reception there so we wanted to get the geotag for a fox den that a friend told us about. But before we could get there, a massive throng of cars presented itself. It was as crowded as the morning's wolf-sighting, so we figured it was another wolf.

We were partially right.

It was 3 wolves.

One black wolf (the animal is technically a gray wolf, but this one was black) was trotting and half-running, which is only really notably because it was very near about 50 bison. Were we about to see a hunt? What would happen? Is it great? Or horrifying? or both? I lean toward horrifying, but you never know.

In any case, we watched through binoculars as the bison chased the wolf off! Multiple times!

The wolf being chased by bison!

The two other wolves were not far off either, though they were mostly just laying down about 300 yards away. We kept wondering if the one was going to work solo and try to get a bison or if the others were going to jump in and help, but neither really happened. After a solid 30-45 minutes, we realized how exhausted we were and decided to move toward our campsite.

But then we had to stop and use a toilet and also make/eat dinner. And then we still had to find the fox den. And then drive to our campsite.

We were pretty well alone as we passed the fox den spot at 5-10 mph but we didn't see anything. By the time I got back to the 45 mph speed limit, I saw brake lights.

Sure enough, a fox crossed the road in front of the truck in front of us. I was pretty shocked. We kind of pulled alongside the little critter carefully, as I was afraid s/he would dart back into the road. Thankfully it didn't, but it did stop to eat some kind of grass right next to our car. And it looked up at us. And oh my god...I didn't know a fox could be so wonderful-looking. It had these piercing eyes that I was completely unprepared for. It was so cool.

So then we drove back to camp. Ho-hum. 

And we got there moments before sunset to see the clouds above the mountains turning a fiery red, then orange, then purple, and within about 30 seconds they were just dark and gray.

Sunset.

What a day.

Also, for the record, we started coming back to camp at 5:30 and we arrived at camp at 9:05.

We Met Some People!

Meeting people can be hard. It sounds crazy when you're younger - you think that you'll just...meet people all the time and it'll be easy. But that's not how it ends up happening as an adult. It's especially not how it happens for us because we don't like a lot of social-things: social drinks like beer, wine, coffee, or tea are all just gross to us, so we don't go to a lot of cafes or bars. Also there's been a pandemic so it's not as if we're going out to meet-up groups or anything like that. As such, we don't meet a lot of people. 

We were told that we'd meet TONS of people on this adventure, which would make sense in campgrounds. However, we're mostly doing National Forest land and dispersed camping, so we're alone more often than not. So how do we meet people? In short, we rarely do.

But it turns out that when we meet people, we really meet some good ones.

We had only really interacted with a few people before Memorial Day (about 4 days into our adventure). We went out of our way at the Badlands to go meet someone's dog and then spoke with the human (and the dog) for about 20 minutes, and that was about it. But when Memorial Day came, we were in Rapid City, South Dakota. We were finishing up a 12(ish) mile bike ride when we took a small detour in a city park to see a piece of the Berlin Wall. Neither of us were experts on the Berlin Wall, and I expected to see a small chunk of concrete with a little bit of information nearby.

What we got was a full slab of wall - it was probably 12 feet high and 8 feet wide. Why Rapid City? I don't know. But that's not the point. The point is the people.

(Berlin Wall)

I read the info-boards and Jenna asked me to summarize them as she had been reading out of order and got confused.

Midway through my recap, a 75 year old woman arrived and began talking to us through a thick Polish accent. How do I know she was 75 and it was a Polish accent? Because she literally did not stop talking to us for about 35 minutes.

She started in with how she hates Memorial Day because it, in some ways, glorifies war and she hates war. (OK. We get it. We also dislike war.) Then she got into having emigrated to the US in the 1980s. Then she got into having traveled all over the US (OK. We're with you again here). Then she got into how much she loves dogs (Hard yes from us). Then she told us how her dog's name is Ufo, like UFO but one word, because she rescued him and nobody knew where he came from. Then she told us how morally bankrupt Donald Trump is (obviously yes). Then she told us how terrible the American diet is (agree again!). Then she told us about some places she loved in Europe (she's on a roll!). Then she told us about how she hates Memorial Day again. 

Now, you might be reading this and thinking "well you guys agree on some stuff, this sounds like a nice conversation." But let me tell you something, my friends, this was not a conversation. This was a monologue. Anytime she said something that we could maybe chime in and agree with or expound on, we got maybe 2-3 words in and she was off and rolling again. 

She told us about how she knew all of the police in town, how she had apparently gotten her purse stolen and needed a new license/credit card/social security card, and how she loves Montana. She told us about her husband farting in bed and blaming it on the dog, then the dog farting in bed and blaming it on the husband. She told us about how the land doesn't belong to white people or Lakota Sioux because the animals were here millions of years before them. She told us, again, how much she hated Memorial Day and war in general.

While it was delightful and sweet and funny, it did get a bit exhausting. At about the 20 minute mark we were trying to come up with an escape plan and having no luck. Some time in that 30-35 minute range she saw a man walking about 50 feet away with a small dog and she just about lost her mind. She started shouting and waving at the dog, telling it how much she loved it, how they should be friends, how the dog should come see her, etc. 

The man was pretty confused, but reluctantly brought the dog over. It was our escape-window! 

We mounted our bikes between greetings with the dog and thought we could be on our way while she was distracted...and we ALMOST made it. She asked where we were going next, where we might have lunch, what kind of car we were driving, and more.

But with our sights set back on Pegasus, we blew kisses, she told us she loved us, and she bid us farewell.

And we exhaled.

Of course, that was only the first time we met someone noteworthy in that span of 36 hours.

The very next night we stumbled on a wild-campsite just outside of Custer State Park in South Dakota. We were in the Black Hills National Forest and happened upon this weird little camping-nook and pulled in, thrilled with how close it was to the park. Jenna hung the hammock up on a hillside and I  relaxed in the van. But then another van pulled in and parked next to us.

I was a little bothered at first. This was an area about 50 feet wide, but I assumed the people would be quiet/respectful and there would be no issue. I nodded hello as I joined Jenna on the hammock for an hour or so. As we swung and talked, I thought I heard voices speaking in German from the other van. Kinda fun.

As we returned for dinner, we greeted our neighbors, and Jenna promptly asked where they were from. Switzerland and Germany.

Switzerland and Germany! They're European! We love Europe! New best friends!

To summarize the evening, we spent about 4 hours talking with Max (German) and Karin (Swiss) about everything: van life, polite people in racist parts of the US, how fat Americans really are, how interesting it is that European culture changes over such short distances, surfing (they LOVE to surf, and judging by their Instagram pages and how often they do it, they seem to be quite good at it), and who should visit who in what country. But the most important thing was that they'd been in the US for 2 months in their campervan ("Marta" was inscribed on the side, though we didn't ask if it was pre-named or not) but had not yet had a campfire.

Done. Campfire.

While sitting around the campfire, it came out that neither of them had EVER had s'mores. 

You may recall that a moment ago I mentioned how we'd spoken about how fat and unhealthy Americans can be, so of course we had to introduce them to a dessert where you take something that's 90% sugar and heat it up, then stick on top of something that's about 90% sugar, and eat it between two things that are about 40% sugar.

Neue freunde!

Say what you want about the calorie content, it was delicious. And they both loved s'mores. In response, Karin had us slice open a banana and fill it with chocolate, then wrap it in foil and put it on the fire. The name for it was not quite the translation of "chocolate banana," but I don't know how to spell it so it'll just stay in my head. They were delicious.

AdVANtures generally mean going to bed early and getting up early, as once the sun goes down there's not much left to do in your day. This has meant prepping for bed around 9:30 (very difficult for me - I'm a late person). But we had such a nice time with Karin and Max that we didn't get in bed until almost 11. 

The next day we had a wonderful time passing each other in the park and waving like maniacs.

Anyway, the point of it all is that we met three people in two extremely different settings, and came away with two lovely memories of extremely different types. Hopefully we see two of them again, and the 3rd one...well...maybe not.