This is the fourth in a series of posts sharing photos from a 21-day road trip I did with my big brother, this June.
The 220-mile drive from Hardin to Gardiner, Montana, took about half a day. We arrived just before Noon and, since we wouldn’t be able to check-in at the hotel until 3pm, found a place to have lunch.
Walking out of the restaurant after our burgers, there was a chill in the air and the sky was thick with clouds. We walked to the Yellowstone Forever Institute to find a couple of sweatshirts. As long as we were adding a layer for warmth, we wanted to rock the park gear!
Yellowstone is huge, more than 2 million acres or nearly 3,500 square miles in area. It’s challenging enough to drive through the park in a single day, let alone to give it a proper tour. Our itinerary included that first afternoon and the next two days in the park. Ready for round one, we entered through Roosevelt Arch and drove to Mammoth. Steve wanted to see bears, wolves and moose. So, we made a left turn and headed east toward the Lamar Valley.
Known as the North American Serengeti, Lamar Valley is home to large herds of bison and pronghorn from summer through autumn. With hundreds of mammals grazing the meadows along the Lamar River, grizzlies and wolves are drawn to the area, as well.
The first stop we made on that afternoon’s drive was not to observe any of the bucket-list animals Steve had in mind. We saw a bald eagle perched on a rock atop a hill. She stayed put for a good 30-minutes, probably scanning the area for small mammals, before launching and taking flight.
Resuming our drive along the Grand Loop Road, less than 10-minutes passed before we encountered traffic slowing to a crawl with vehicles parked along both sides of the road…obvious signs of a bear jam. We parked in the next pullout and walked back to a large group of people gathered along the roadside. A black bear was eating grass in the meadow below. Steve got to check an animal on his bucket list. This sighting was on June 15, his birthday.
The next day was devoted to further exploration of the northern part of the park where wildlife encounters with bears, wolves and other animals are more frequent. On that first morning, we returned to Lamar Valley. We’d seen bison and pronghorn the previous afternoon but not in large numbers. I was hoping an early-morning visit might prove more fruitful.
Pulling into one of the several pullouts along the road through the valley, we stepped out of the Sentra and used my binoculars to scan the valley floor and surrounding hills. Other than a few grazing bison, geese in the river and Sandhill cranes along the shoreline, not much was happening. Steve returned to the car to get warm. I kept looking.
After a few minutes, I heard a distant howl. There was a response a few seconds later and soon the air was filled with the sound of wolves calling out to each other in the morning chill. I knocked on the car door window and motioned for Steve to join me. While we didn’t see any wolves, we heard them howling that morning in Yellowstone’s Lamar Valley. Another bucket list predator off Steve’s list.
It was a good way to start the day but not the last wildlife encounter we would have. The following photos are a sampling of the animal encounters we had during our visit to Yellowstone National Park.
A bald eagle stands watch over a hill slope in Yellowstone National Park.
A bald eagle in-flight over Yellowstone National Park.
A Yellowstone black bear forages for grubs.
A Yellowstone black bear searches for a midday snack.
A Yellowstone bull moose grazes in a meadow near the northeast entrance to the park.
Bison graze the lush summer grass in Yellowstone National Park.
A bison bull emerges from the Gibbon River in Yellowstone National Park.
A Yellowstone bison bull pauses during a morning graze along the Gibbon River.
A cinnamon black bear grazes on summer grass in Yellowstone National Park.
