Byddi Lee's Blog, page 23

Animal Road Signs Snap

The last post introduced the road signs snap we played on our road trip. Animal Road Signs Snap notches it up a level because photographing animals is generally more challenging...unless you are in Yellowstone National Park!

It's hard to tell if this cow goes with this picture,
 or this picture.
What is disconcerting is the number of road signs in the US that have bullet holes in them.

At least this one was spared.
So does this sign match up with this animal?
  Or this one?
  Either way, I was thrilled to get this little pronghorn!

Getting a picture of a bison in Yellowstone is as easy as tripping over a bump on the road.
So easy in fact, that the shot of the animal is less blurred than the inanimate sign? What's that all about?
I'm thinking I deserve extra credit of a shot that's exactly like the sign...lights, blurriness, action!
  Okay, still not as blurry as the sign...

Love this guy.
This majestic old king is simply beautiful.
 But the devil is in the detail...
And here he is with his harem!
And finally a very special one from our 2007 trip to Spitzbergen in the Arctic Ocean.
We were told that the signage convention required that the animal, regardless of its color, be in black, the background in white, with the red trim. When they did that, people kept asking, "Do you have black bears as well as polar bears?" So to avoid confusion, and since they had no black bears, they broke with convention and made these signs. I think it conveys the message very clearly, "Warning, polar bears nearby."

And indeed there were!
Sorry about the quality of the photo, but I hope you'll understand why we didn't want to get too close!
 
 Byddi Lee

Road Signs Snap

Play this on your next road trip!

Here's how it works... You take photos of road signs and then try to match them with photos you take of the real thing.

Turned out, it wasn't as easy as I thought it would be, but it was fun trying.

You end up feeling all turned around with this one!

In fairness, it's hard to get pictures of such dangerous tractors these days since they all come with cabins, or at least safety cages. But I do remember these old tractors. This one is helping with the onion harvest. It would bring a tear to your eye!
  Utah sure delivered on this promise! Some of the best scenery I've ever seen on this planet. As for this the next one...
 Should have stuck with the scenery Utah!

Now that's a bump! Utah style...

Technically these next two are a pair, because, let's face it, I can't photograph the passage of time any other way!
 

Next time I'll show you the results of my animal road signs snap - now that's ratcheting it up a notch alright!

Byddi Lee

P.S. If you contact me via the comments you can join in if you like! I won't publish the comments that are just used to connect.

Seeing the signs

No, this is not a post about the drought here in California. Though it should be!

No, I'm not going to bang on about carbon emissions and climate change. If you believe  in that sort of thing (Que sarcastic snigger.)

Nope - this is a blog post about signs...the signs we saw on our recent epic road trip. Hopefully, just something to amuse you over the weekend.

I'm still not finished sorting through all the photos we took - more than 2000. That's a frequency of taking a photo every 2 miles we traveled!

So here's just a wee snippet of those that made us raise an eyebrow, spark a smile and laugh out loud at times.

We wondered if the speed limit applied to the alien space ships too?
This might only mean something to the Irish readers but hey, it nice to know where all the muckers live. For my non-Irish readers - "Mucker" is a term of endearment. If you say someone is your mucker it means they are a really good friend of yours. Not sure where the term comes from. Perhaps one of my writing muckers will know!

This photo is a 2 for 1. Look closely at the sign below. Seems quite sinister...I wonder do the muckers help you to dispose of your boss? Seems kind of extreme...
Good job we're in a plug-in Prius hybrid! How far to the next electrical socket?
Seriously, take a closer look at the name of this Motel. It's bad when they admit it up front! (Sorry you may need to click on the photo to make out the sign.)
I don't we need to worry about passing anyone anywhere on this road! I think they put up these signs to stop the locals (or should that be the local - as in singular) from getting lonely.
Picnic benches beside tippy-over looking trees? Drunk trees? Is it a picnic bench or a weirdly fonted "A". And what on earth caused that damage to the arrow but not the rest of the sign. Apologies for the blurred image - this was a drive by - Ohhh, maybe that's what happened the sign...
Perhaps whatever did the damage to the sign is in this room?
I hope they are better at parking than they are at driving past signs!



We started a new road trip game too - match the sign with the real thing. I'm saving that post for next week. Despite how much we searched we never did find the match for the "self parking" sign ,so it didn't make the cut for the next post!

Byddi Lee

Volcanoes - Shhh! They're Sleeping....

Day 13 Bend, Oregon - Shasta, California
Mileage  342miles  States – Oregon, California

This was the last day on the open road. Tomorrow we would jump on the nearest interstate and barrel back to San Jose without time for stops or photos.

But we still had one more day and no better way to spend it that to visit volcanoes, or what's left of them after they blew their top.

Recent fire activity in the area was very apparent along the road between Bend and Crater Lake National Park.
First stop - Crater Lake, formed when a huge volcano called Mount Mazama erupted in 5700BC and then collapsed in on itself. The eruption threw up 150 time more ash than Mount St Helena's 1980 eruption. The resulting Caldera filled with water. It has no rivers that run into it and its only catchment is direct precipitation. It is the deepest lake in the USA.

It is huge. I couldn't even get the whole thing in using my panorama app on the phone (without the image getting warped.)

Can you imagine being the first person to find this? There is a place called discovery point, where the first European came across it. Of course, he was not the fist human to find it since there were people already living here - a fact conveniently glossed over far too often. Even so, I tried to imagine what it must have been like to climb up the rise and see this for the first time if you hadn't expected it to be here. It was pretty impressive even from a car and knowing there was something here.

Inside the crater, Wizard Island is the tip of a drowned volcano that rises from the lake floor. You can take a boat trip out to it, or swim!
  Phantom Ship Island is the other island in Crater Lake - wonder how it got its name?
We had a lovely lunch sitting by the log fire at the Crater Lake Lodge, Rim Village then we had to get back to the road.

Even before we left Oregon, we could see Mount Shasta peeking over the horizon as if to welcome us home.
Honestly the sign says "Welcome to California" but the windscreen was so icky that the camera could not focus on anything but smeared bug!
As we got close to Shasta City, the volcano of the same name stool sentinel on the road.
Mount Shasta is still a live volcano. It erupts, on average, every 600 years. The last eruption was 200 years ago, so I doubt I'll be around when it blows again, thank God!

With the moon tucked in on its left flank, it does present a very tranquil sight.
Shasta is close enough to where we live to consider coming back for another trip. It was a nice thought as we packed up the next morning and drove to Interstate 5 to take the last part of what has been an epic journey for us.

When we got home and checked the total mileage we discovered that our little Prius had driven 4004 miles in two weeks. What a great little adventurer!

We were home safe and sound, with a camera full of pictures, heads full of happy memories and hearts full of gratitude.

John Day Fossils and the Painted Hills

Day 12 Boise, Idaho - Bend, Oregan
Mileage  342miles  States – Idaho, Oregan

Today we had a choice - we could shoot straight for Bend, Oregan along Hwy 20 and be there in 5.5 hours or go on hwy 26, adding an extra hour to our drive but taking in the John Day Fossil Beds and The Painted Hills (no... not the Lassie movie!)- aka the John Day Nation Monument. The choice was obvious - gotta do the National Monument!

This felt really off the beaten path. Hwy 26 was just a normal two-lane road that even had bends in it as it snaked between onion fields.

We felt like explorers which was pretty apt since we were going to "John Day" an explorer from the 1800. The story goes that he and a fellow trapper/explorer while in this area were set upon by thieves who stole their clothes. John Day and his friend lived to tell the tale. Every time they passed that bend on the river, John Day pointed out where they'd been robbed, until eventually the river came to be called the John Day River. 
An attractive information stand along the road. I can just imagine John Day doing that. My father used to always point out bits of the road between Armagh and Dublin where he'd had things happen to him. Fortunately, none so bad as being robbed, but there was the place where he discovered that the cap for the gas tank on his lorry was missing - N2, Collon, Co Louth - I can see it in my minds eye even now! Or the place just north of Dublin, outside the airport, where the cyclist behind him ended up in the back of his pick-up truck! Funny though, no part of the road to Dublin is called after him... maybe you need a near death experience for anyone else to take notice, though I'm sure that cyclist might qualify! Anyways,  like my father, it seems John Day was quite the character.

Such excitement in the car when we came across this sign. Time travelers as well as explorers!
We found this little series of messages  so nice. Such good manners! Not sure if we were in Idaho or Oregan at this stage.
 Okay...Wonder why?
Oh! Thanks for letting us know! Will you be long?
Grand so, we can wait!

The driver was grinning when he pulled in off to the side and we passed him waving frantically. We were the only car on the road. The only vehicle we'd needed to pass was his!

And waiting for us around the corner - his mate with this message series flashing



 We passed this herd of cattle and wondered at the strangeness of humans who stop their cars to watch herds of bison but not their distant cousins, from who they get so much, milk, meat, even clothing. They did look pretty cool out their doing their thing, we thought. We wondered if we stopped and took pictures would other cars stop too.
We never found out. There were no other cars! In the distance, we did see a truck come out from a huge cleft in the rocks and realized with excitement that our road was taking us through it.
It was like traveling through a magical portal to a land that time forgot. The hills around us had basalt rocks that reminded us the the Giant's Causeway on the North Coast of Ireland (though not as good - obviously!)
And these green rocks...could it be huge deposits of malachite, copper carbonate deposits?
  I'd taught this in chemistry in my old life as a science teacher, back, what feels like, a hundred years ago!

At the Thomas Condon Paleontology Center (Aka the John Day Fossil Beds visitor center) I learned that the green rocks were not malachite. In fact, they were a celadonite, but the ranger said everyone asked that question and she had a nifty poster to explain. Here's the science...
  The fossils we would see here were those of ancient mammals. Oh my god, I love all this stuff - My Husband... he's kind of "meh" about it, but it feeds my imagination. I just yearn to have a time machine so I could go back and witness it for myself - but still be home in time for tea, of course!
 I though they did a great job with the art work!

I sure hope they had a good dental plan back then!
 Don't think I'd have liked to be the dentist though.
 Our next pet will be a Toy Sabre-tooth Cat. Meow! How cute would that be?
Come to think of it though My Mum's cat, Cheekyboots, might just be one! (Little monster.)


Even the insects that got smooshed on our car here were like palaeomegalithic (okay, I did just make that word up!) creatures, providing a meal for the local carnivorous wasps. By now, our car qualified as the dirtiest car in the USA. It was getting hard to see out the windows!
Next stop - the Painted Hills. Layers of iron compounds laid down as the earth's climate changed from very wet to very dry resulted in the iron ions forming different colors. Red is the rust we are most familiar with but there are greens and yellows too. The black may be manganese compounds, concentrated by manganese-fixing plants that were around at the time (apparently there are similar plant now that do this same thing.)

The only way to present the painted hills is to show you...





 And in case you were wondering, as were we, why nothing grows here...
 A long way out of our way today but so worth it! As we were still heading west we got to watch sunset through a bug-bleary windscreen as we drove.

 Byddi Lee
 

 

 

Heading West Again

Day 12 West Yellowstone - Boise, Idaho
Mileage  367 miles  States – Montana, Idaho   Technically it was "Head for home" Day, but we had many miles to go to get home and lots more National Parks to check off our list.
Cozy at it was, I was happy to leave our self catering apartment in West Yellow - the exorbitantly priced accommodation that meant we'd have to stay in two-star motels for the rest of the trip if we wanted to balance our budget!
My Husband and I must have gypsy blood in us. We felt great being back on the road again. Gentle green (well greenish - not green by Irish standards but green by Californian drought standards) pastures rolled out all the way to the hills in the distance. We weren't sure what those hills were, but they were pretty. I though this scene could have been from any good Western!
We'd adjusted our route today to take in another National Park...
The lava that produced this 750,000 acre park welled up from what is known as the Great Rift as recently ago as 2000 years. Geologist believe that future events are likely. As the Europeans pushed into this area in search of farm lands or gold, they mostly avoided this place. It's not hard to see why, in an age where life was already harsh who would seek out such extremes?
Spatter conesThey even went so far as to name an area the devils orchard. Limber Pines did eventually grow here but they became infected with dwarf mistletoe, a parasitic plant, that  caused the branches to distort into grotesque tangles called witches broom.
Early caretakers of the park mistakenly cut down all these trees thinking they were saving other trees from future infection without realizing that this was a natural and long standing relationship between the two species. Bad judgement based on what they considered unsightly!

The lava fields are bleak and foreboding yet, still hold a stark beauty all of it's own. I wish I could have stood with the Shoshone, way before the Europeans arrived, and witnessed the eruptions that sparked the stories passed down in their oral tradition that indicates they had front row seats to the event.

In saying that, it is worth mentioning that it must be a bit like watching the volcano on the Big Island of Hawaii as it oozes lava today. I wonder what explanations the Shoshone had for it.

Surprisingly at the top if this giant cinder cone there was  beautiful tree, almost magical in it's existence.  Very Roald Dahl!
It wouldn't have surprise me if a strange creature or a huge piece of fruit engaged me in conversation as I sat in it's shade. looking for miles out across Idaho.
With another park ticked off our list we headed for Boise, Idaho where we were lucky to find a great deal at the Cotton Wood Suites down by the Boise River, just in time to watch these geese at sunset.

Byddi Lee
 

Bear With Me!

Day 11 Yellowstone
Mileage  0* miles  States – Wyoming, Montana 
Today we explored the northern loop of Yellowstone's figure 8. We drove east from West Yellowstone turning left to go north at Madison, passing our local bison herd on the way. The morning sparkled with brittle Fall warmth and promised us a beautiful day. We didn't stop at Norris, the "town" at the waist of the figure 8. There is a visitors centers and a museum here, but we aren't really museum folk, so we motored on up the road, north towards Mammoth Hot Springs. This road is in the middle of improvements and as such there were delays. We were fine with that, knowing that we'd be returning along the waist of the 8 and not coming this way again.
Even thought we'd decided that yesterday we'd seen plenty of geothermal attractions to last us a lifetime we couldn't help ourselves, and before we knew it, we were marveling at more geothermal features in the upper and lower terraces area just outside Mammoth Hot Springs...Well, when in Rome etc.
We stopped in Mammoth Hot Springs for a lovely lunch at the Mammoth Hotel Dining Room, very posh setting but without costing an arm and a leg. The food was excellent - really fresh, healthy fare - a nice change from diner food.
Obviously the word of the nice food available in Mammoth Hot Springs had spread. A herd of Elk munched on the the grass in the village green. Rather than watch elk from our dining table, we headed east, following the Yellowstone River seeking out the Lamar Valley, which was, we'd been told the North American equivalent to the Serengeti. Just before we got to the Lamar Valley,we stopped off to visit the Petrified Tree - an ancient redwood tree that got buried in ash 50 millions years ago! Silica from the ash and lava plugged up the cells and turned the tree to stone. As it turned out the Lamar Valley did have herds of Bison sprinkled about it. We were thrilled to add a new animal to our list -The Pronghorn deer - technically an antelope...making the Lamer Valley only more Serengeti-like. We couldn't get him to turn around though he has a cute butt too! And then, just as we were coming out of the Lamar Valley, back onto the figure 8 it happened  - the thing we'd been hoping to see (next to wolves which we never did see!). A black bear! 

And not just a bear, a Mummy bear and her two Baby bears! How cute is this little guy?

The other one hid but after we got our photos we just watched for a while as they foraged and snuffled about the place. We felt extremely lucky and blessed to have seen these guys. Its just so special.
We were a very content couple heading south towards the Dunraven Pass when it happened again! This time a bear on his own, so we decided it must be the Daddy bear (of course!) He was a very handsome fellow! A crowd gathered to watch, and I made sure there were plenty of folk between me and him, including a selection of folk I was sure I could out-run. Well, it would mean I wouldn't have to out-run the bear should things turn ugly! It was especially cool when he seemed to sense something behind him. He stood up to take a look, drawing a collective gasp from the crowd. He ignored us, and I couldn't help what on earth had grabbed his attention in the midst of this pantomime! We watched for about another half hour and then he wandered off out of sight. We got back in the car and decided to end our last last day in Yellowstone with what we thought of as "our elk herd" that hung out near Madison. I'd made us sandwiches.We laid out a foam camping mat and just watched from a nice vantage point as the magnificent stag keep his herd of lovely ladies in line. The chill crept back into the Autumn evening as the sun settled itself behind the hills and we looked back on another beautiful and eventful day in Yellowstone.

Byddi Lee



* Technically we didn't cover any addition miles on our forward journey as we just did loops of Yellowstone Park - approximately about 100miles per day.

Blowing Off Some Steam in Yellowstone

Day 10 Yellowstone
Mileage  0* miles  States – Wyoming, Montana


We awoke to freezing fog. I can’t remember the last time I saw such a cold morning, but we were snug in our little cabin. Later, we were also happy to be tucked up in our little Prius when we came across these guys. They must have been frozen solid! Yellowstone Park’s roads make a figure 8 – two loops, a north and a south loop.  We decided to begin with the south loop. This is where you’ll find the highest concentration of geothermal activity in the park, including the world famous Old Faithful. The park was packed with people. We’d hoped that by coming in September we’d beat the rush. I’d hate to imagine what this place was like at the height of the season if it was this bad in late September.
Geysers and hot springs are created when water seeps down into rocks that are super heated by magma chambers close to the earth’s surface. The steam rises and causes the super heated water to squirt out of cracks and pipes in the rocks. Yellowstone is the site of a super volcano. Its next explosion, due sometime in the next 200, 000 years, will pretty much wipe out life as we know it in North America and drastically affect the climate in the rest of the world for a long time afterwards. But not to worry, we probably won’t be around for that! Before we got to Old Faithful we stopped at the various geyser areas on the road south from Madison as we came upon them. Parking was challenging at most of them. One we gave up on, the Prismatic Spring - third biggest in the world and biggest in Yellowstone... We'll survive not seeing it - perhaps we'll just go see the biggest one in the world, though an internet search as to where that is pulls up a few different answers - maybe just safer to visit them all! Still, we saw plenty of geysers and hot springs that day.   White dome geyser gave us a private performance! Once from a distance and also again when we were right up close and personal. Four of us attended this viewing. We felt very privileged. But that was far from the case when we got to Old Faithful. The visitor’s center lets you know when the next eruption will take place. As we waited with about 500 others, kids ran around screaming, parents halfheartedly yelled at them to behave (of course, they were on vacation too, only fair they get a break from disciplining their off spring too, right?) Beside us, a curmudgeonly old man grumbled at some young woman he’d never met before, for setting up her tripod stand in front of his seat, even though his wife kept telling him he’d be standing once the darn thing blew. The tripod stand was only two feet high. I felt like saying to him, “Calm yer jets!” But I was afraid I’d be the only one finding that funny! Further down a ranger shouted at people to stay on the board walk. Good job he hadn’t seen last night’s Bison, though he’d have been more biddable than some of these frantic tourists. Thank goodness Old Faithful’s time keeping was spot on. Even the screaming kids beside us (yes, right next to us – I’m a magnet for it!) shut up to watch the spectacle. It was good, but in fairness, White Dome had been every bit as flamboyant. All the guide books had instructed that Old Faithful was a must see. I personally, would say if you catch an eruption at any one of the other geysers consider that box ticked. Or go see Old Faithful at night perhaps? There are plenty of geothermal features to see. Biology is amazing – today I was glad I was a biologist as I took in the wonderful colors of the thermophile bacteria that turn the hot springs a rainbow of colors.   The bacteria are adapted to live in the hot waters of the spring. Other bacteria - thermoacidophiles - have also adapted to withstand the low pH of other springs, typically adapted to utilize the sulfur spewing out in some springs. Every niche is occupied here. We saw so many springs and gurgling, burbling, gushing, spewing geysers that after a few hours we had to say, “No more!”
 

    But then we’d see just one more…   By this stage we’d traveled around the southern-most road of the southern loop as it curled along the north shore of Yellowstone lake.
From here we headed north, through the Hayden Valley with my nose pressed to the window hoping to catch a glimpse of the Hayden Wolf pack. Alas, the only thing we saw here was some tourists cockerpoo or labrodoo or one of those designer mongrels you get these days. It most certainly was not equipped to bring down an elk, cute though he was.
We didn't stop much along here. It looked like a nice area to hike, though it is recommended that you hike in groups no smaller than three and bring bear spray because of  the possibility of bear attacks. Seeing as we were a person and a can of bear spray short, we decided not to bother.  
We pushed on up to Canyon Village, on the east side of the "waist" of the figure eight loop. The Yellowstone Grand Canyon is really quite pretty.   Of course, nothing close to what we saw in Utah, but gorgeous all the same (I always wonder if that is the origin of the word gorgeous - from gorge?) 
We drove along both north and south rims and chanced a couple of short, well populated hikes to good vantage points.
All that water was balm to our drought stricken souls. We tried to soak up as much as we could with our eyes.

The best view was from Artists Point.
Since we were this far over, so near prime grizzly country with the sun setting, we decided to scoot on up to Tower-Roosevelt and eat while watching for grizzly bears along the way.
The grizzlies love the transition areas between the trees and the grassland. We didn't see any. We tried not to be disappointed, but we were really bummed when we arrived at the place in Tower-Roosevelt that the map told us served food, only to discover it was closed for the season! We were 2 hrs from West Yellowstone. We wouldn't starve in two hours, but we were getting hungry and grouchy, we 'd be a good match for any grizzly! However, all we saw along the way home were these long horned sheep...
and these mule deer..
As the setting sun turned the clouds pink...
...and the moon hoisted itself over the snow capped peaks surrounding the Dunraven Pass,
  we threaded our way through the waist of the figure-8 and chatting about the highlights of the day, looking forward to our dinner.


Byddi Lee

* Technically we didn't cover any addition miles on our forward journey as we just did loops of Yellowstone Park - approximately about 100miles per day.

Bison Jam

Day 9 Teton Village - West Yellowstone
Mileage  128 miles  States – Wyoming, Montana
Breakfast in the room was lovely - and well it should it - it cost $50! Oh the joys of going posh. Outside, the sun shined, and we were itching to hit the road. Today we'd arrive in Yellowstone - the purpose of this trip, which had morphed from being a Yellowstone Park trip to a National Parks trip!
The first road we took turned nasty quickly - muddy and full of potholes. Poor Prius!   But she made it through and soon we were admiring the scenery...again.  It was so nice to see such an abundance of water, and it made the yukky weather the day before well worth it. The Tetons were still shrouded in shards of mist, as if like cotton wool balls, the clouds had become stuck on the peaks and then shredded as some celestial hand had tugged them off too hard.

The changing seasons were evident. The temperatures had plummeted below zero over night and the air stung crisp with autumn. We could only imagine how refreshing a hike here would be, but imagining was all we had time for, we had to be at our accommodation and checked in before 9.30pm. The plan was to shoot through straight to West Yellowstone and check in well in advance of sunset, then start exploring Yellowstone Park secure in the knowledge that we had somewhere to sleep (even if it were cruddy!)


Not that Grand Teton did not tempt us to stop and admire it's many attributes - such as Teton Glacier. 

Onwards and northwards - we entered Yellowstone's South Entrance and didn't bother stopping for the photo of the park sign since there was a line of people waiting to get their pictures taken with it! This was indeed a taste of things to come.But no-one seemed too interested in this sign - one that for geeks like us was of great curiosity. 
The water on one side would ultimately drain into the Pacific Ocean and the water on the other into the Atlantic - facts that boggled my mind, since we were so far from either ocean.
There were two main draws that had attracted me to Yellowstone - the hydro-thermals and the wildlife - especially the wildlife. I'd heard that Yellowstone was like being on safari in North America, with herds of Bison roaming the plains. That we wanted to see, and that we saw pretty much as soon as we entered the park! In fact, the bison were everywhere on this south western side of Yellowstone. Bison are different to Buffalo - Buffalo are only found in Africa and Asia. Bison are mostly found in North America...and mostly all over Yellowstone.
And then right beside the road, between Madison and West Yellowstone, we met this guy...a magnificent bull elk!
The picture is a bit fuzzy - a result of a drive by shooting (of the digital photography kind!) The ladies were grazing not to far away. But we hadn't time to stop! We'd been warned about "Bison Jams" and wanted to get checked in, eat and return to the park well in advance of sundown so we could relax and absorb the sights.
Our accommodation - the elusive West Yellowstone Self Catering Apartments - was in a down-in-the-heel part of the town, but despite warnings in the reviews that the place was very hard to find (one person never finding it at all!) we landed at the right place first try. The man checking us in was really nice. It turned out he was South African and had lots of great advice about where to find bears. (I've found from past experience that the South Africans know their game!) We shared safari stories about Namibia, a place we'd both been too, as he walked us to our Apartment...
It was nice! Not top class luxury, nor Snake River Lodge and Spa luxury, but cleaner than the Riverside Inn, in Moab, and much better than the Hanksville Inn - though for $170 a night it was nowhere near value for money. It was clean, and everything in it worked - It was basically one of a row of cabins (that reminded me from the outside of the slave cabins described in Roots) that had a bed, two comfy armchairs, a counter top with two high chairs, a mini kitchen with cute mini appliances and a shower room with toilet. It had everything we needed and the decor was homely. We liked it!
With that sorted, we charged through our dinner at a nearby diner and tore back into the Madison area of Yellowstone. We stopped to get our ducks in a row, as we watched the changing evening light on the Firehole River. This beautiful elk cow graced us with an appearance. South of Madison is a geyser area. 
As the sun sizzled in the snow caps tucked behind the horizon, we went to watch the steam thicken from the geysers as the air temperature dropped, tripping over more Bison on the way.
Bison can see best in a field of vision 180 degrees from the sides of their heads and not very well straight in front of them thus they lack the binocular vision that their predators need to judge distance to catch prey. Many animals that are prey have this attribute. It means they can watch for predators that may try to sneak up on them. However, it makes it hard for them to read the signs that are posted to tell you stay on the boardwalks and off the possibly super-heated hydro-thermal areas!

We two humans, possibly the only ones crazy enough to be out in such frigid temperatures - it was now below freezing- had the boardwalks to ourselves to watch steam venting, sun setting and moon rising.

  Satisfied that we'd milked enough excitement out of our first day, we headed for our apartment. Before we got too far along the road west from Madison, the traffic ground to a halt. We crawled along, chatting contentedly, not in any hurry. Obviously we weren't the only creatures feeling this way. Further up, we saw blue flashing lights and began to worry that some poor creature had come a cropper on the road. Eventually we discovered the cause of the traffic jam... A single Bison, walking straight up the road along the yellow lines, with his very own police escort!

Every so often he'd zig-zag off course as his poor eyesight revealed alien creatures with big shiny eyes! It was, for us, the funniest traffic jam ever!
And we were only at the beginning...more tomorrow...
Byddi Lee

A Cracker Day

Day 8 Vernal/Naples – Teton Village
Mileage  296 miles States – Utah, Wyoming
This morning I wondered what I’d have to blog about today since it was a straight drive through with no National Parks/Monuments to visit. Perhaps I’d find two flies crawling up a wall, who knows? The weather was awful and obscured any view we’d have of the Rockies enroute (if we were even close enough to see then - it looked like it from the map, but who knew?), but I have endeavored to make the proverbial silks purse…
We crossed into Wyoming...
And were welcomed by a beautiful rainbow that did raise our spirits.

We'd been suffering from scenery withdrawal and the grey weather didn't help, but we couldn't whine about it because perhaps this lull was just the ticket. It would serve to cleanse the palate before Yellowstone, like a scenery "cracker" between tasting two great wines.

   The fall/autumn colors were kicking in.
We stopped once for lunch at Boulder, Wyoming, population 75. There was one building at the crossroads that contained a general store, a bar and a deli cafe. We stopped for lunch, not least, because I was tickled by the bar stools made from tractor seats. It's a long time since I'd sat on a tractor seat and a first time for My Husband!

The waitress was great craic, and since we were the only ones there siting up to the bar, she told us all about life in Boulder, Wyoming. The Boys, she said, were all going hunting this weekend and the girls were trying to come up with some fun things to do. She showed us photos on her phone of beautiful hikes nearby. By the time we came to leave, we felt like we had made a new friend, and we all wondered if our paths would ever cross again.

As we drove off, we said to each other, "Imagine living here..."

"Yeah," My Husband said, "And I could go hunting with The Boys!"

That kept us laughing for the next fifty miles! Good job too because the weather got steadily worse.

As we neared the Tetons, snow covered mountains peeked out from under the cloud ceiling.
Tonight we'd inadvertently pushed the boat out accommodation-wise by booking into the cheapest place in the area, an eye-watering $250 per night room at the Snake River Lodge and Spa. The place was full of those really rich types - you could tell by the expensive clothes badly put together, like it didn't matter if their $500 jacket clashed with their $1000 leather boots and $2000 hand bag because "Honey, expensive don't need to match!" A girl in the lift with us fitted the stereotype of the ranchers daughter to tee. I wondered what head of cattle her Da had - ya can take the girl out of Armagh ....
The foul weather gave us a great excuse to hole up in our room and watch cable TV! We were well overdue the rest. We ate Chinese Take Away from the night before (no ranchers daughter here!) but vowed to order breakfast to the room the next morning, making full use of the luxury before we hit West Yellowstone and the mysterious property we'd committed to for $170 per night that had no website and only very bad reviews! 

The view from our luxury room conjured up images of pioneers heading West. How did they manage without expedia, and hotwire and Holiday Inn? 
As night fell the clouds began to lift.
Perhaps we'd been very lucky with the weather after all, having it rain on the one day we didn't need to get out of the car. Maybe (to steal a few phrases from some of my best loved movies) the sun the will come out tomorrow...because after all tomorrow is another day...

Byddi Lee