Finding America

I cooked up some gingerbread pancakes for breakfast to give us fuel for the bike ride we had planned today. We packed up our bikes and gear and hopped in the Fox for a little touring before peddling around the park.

Once we entered the park we headed to the northern section of Yellowstone. This area is home to many of the terraced hot springs and is noticeably more arid than the southern rim.

We visited a few sites along the way. You can check out the video of Mammoth Hot Springs and the Artist’s Paint-pots. The paint-pots were our favorite, with their spurting, bubbling mud who wouldn’t put them near the top of the list.

The Northern section of Yellowstone looks more like the Southwest than the southern half of the park. After driving about 20 minutes without seeing any wildlife we decided to turn back and head to the south end of the park for our ride.

We had quite a backup due to bison crossing and eventually just pulled over and unpacked the bikes, figuring we could see more from the saddle than behind the wheel. The weather was perfect and the breeze kept the heat from the asphalt at bay.

We rode along the shoulder of the road passing the cars and trucks backed up along the route. When we finally came upon the bison crossing we hung to the drivers side of a passing car to keep it between us and the bison as we passed. Not too much further down the road we came to another traffic slow down and continued along the shoulder. Riding beside the stopped cars we figured we just follow a car past the crossing animals. To our surprise however they were laying down by the road side. We rode within 10 feet of one bison whose eye widened as we rode past him and looked none to pleased to have peddlers so close to his napping area. Fortunately we were moving at a good click and you can bet we peddled much faster upon seeing him.

We stopped by the river to have a snack and rest our legs before heading back towards the Fox. We found an idyllic little spot under the pines. The sound of the river and the serenading frogs added to the serenity of the place. Refuel we mounted our two wheeled steeds and began the long ride back. To our good fortune a strong wind was at our back and we veritably flew down the road. It was a lot of fun until we hit a particularly open area with a tough headwind and had to grin an bear it a few miles until the wind shifted.

All in all it was a fantastic way to see the park and the animals. Check out our video of the ride below.

Just after leaving the park we entered the parking lot of the IMAX theatre in West Yellowstone to check the movie times. An IMAX movie of the park was set to play in 5 minutes and we figured why not go now. They are big theaters and figured no one would sit close enough to smell us after our ride. The cool of the theater was nice and the movie was a great way to top off our Yellowstone adventures.

We topped the evening off with an early steak and potato meal, a bit of reading, a spot of web editing and then in the tradition of full time rv’ers we were off to bed early.