Too damn hot



This is us the day before we went into the park.

We stayed at the Gallatin Gateway Inn.

It's an old hotel built by a railroad as a starting point for early tourists.

L to R: Kim (Kate's partner), my mother Shirley, sisters Paula and Kate, and Clay



This is the north entrance to the park.

There are marvelous old photos of stage coaches entering here.

Today is just unreasonably hot and humid, really oppressive, so I'm not going outside any more than necessary.  I brought Luke indoors to take Romeo's spot, and Luke needed it because he got into a bit of scuffle with Bo the rottie this morning.  That's the end of the dog-relatedness of this posting.  I thought I'd take advantage of the opportunity to share some pics from our Yellowstone trip.  It is nice to be reminded of how cool it was there in early June. 





After a couple days we longer stopped to photograph every buffalo.



The first of many bison road blocks.

We never got tired of seeing them.







A very good picture of my sister Paula



The First Happy Hour





There are a variety of thermal features in addition to geyers.
They are all beautiful.



I was surprised at first to see buffalo among the geyers,
but the ground is warm so who can blame them?





We saw more elk in the north part of the park,
 more bison in the south



Kate and Kim on the boardwalk.
We hit nearly all of the geyer basins.





The Grand Canyon of the Yellowstone
Painted by Thomas Moran,
photographed by everyone



Mammoth Hot Springs
You really have to see it to believe it.







A distant geyser erupting while we were
 waiting for a nearby one to go off.



My sister Kate drinks red wine, but she's otherwise ok,

so we overlook it.





A rest stop on the Upper Geyser Basin trail



The coyotes were not at all shy.
The only bears we saw were too far away for pictures,
but that's a good thing





My family drinks. 
It may be no small part of why we enjoy ourselves so much when we get together.
It's not the only thing we enjoy, but it is a nice way to finish off a day.



The occasion for this trip was my mother's 80th birthday.  She had been to Yellowstone in 1936 when she was a little girl and they were still doing nightly bear feedings at the trash dumps to entertain the tourists.  Our family went when I was very young, and we have pictures of bears coming up to the cars then.  That's a thing of the past and it's good that it is.  The park is an incredible experience, but it doesn't need artificially created tourist attractions.  We had a wonderful time while we were there and enjoyed each other as much as the park itself.  Experiencing it together was unforgettable.



The two icons of the park.
Bison in front of Old Faithful, just minutes before it erupted