Day Seven: Yellowstone National Park

YELLOWSTONE. Nobody had a case of the Monday’s on this fine first day of the week. Well, almost no one, this guy had some bad traffic and forgot to shave.


But alas, his story is not our story. So let us return to our fateful travelers surrounded by the gentle hills, mounds really, of the Tetons.


Pete looks a little sleepy, doesn’t he? Well, we’ll go ahead and blame that for the tragedy that is the missing cellphone. His cellphone found his way out of his pocket and on to this very boat launch only to be missed once we had reached Yellowstone leaving us in quite a bind. Luckily the park rangers a) found the phone b) will be shipping it to us in Oregon free of charge. FREE of charge, priority mail. Your tax dollars hard at work folks. Hard. At. Work.

So Yellowstone, right:
We proceeded immediately to Artist’s Point, which overlooks the Yellowstone Grand Canyon.


The fact that it was Monday did not stop the infusion of tourists from enjoying the Point. In fact, an Artist made a show of her watercolor skills much to the delight of the GLC Senior Citizens Touring Group. For us, of course, such touristy drivel proved anathema. We set off up a trail to Sublime Point.


Whether or not we actually reached the Sublime Point is up to debate, but the growing subliminality of the views from the path was pretty certain.


Then we successfully wrassled a bear. We also witnessed Mennonites having a snowball fight by the side of the road. Sorry, no pictures of either.

Tired from wrasslin, we ate at the park cafeteria. We spent the afternoon investigating an amazing variety of geysers, some thermal rock formations, and a 50 million year old tree.
Vis:


Through all the wandering, we missed one crucial element: boiling mud pots. The Yellowstone newspaper promised that they would entertain us, but where could they be? Jason took the cause to heart and we eventually found the Fountain Paint Pots. After multiple hours of waiting, he was happy at last.


At 8:30 we took in the eruption of Old Faithful,

and then went to West Yellowstone, Montana for dinner. There we enjoyed steak and Paige, the owner’s spiteful teenage daughter who served water with impressive disdain. Things took a bizarre turn when Zach bet $5 that the restaurant’s pristine windows had been installed within the past month. Ferrett bet that they were older than that and won $5. Zach still maintains they are lying. I’d dare to say we’re ready for Vegas.

Now it is night and we are heading to Glacier International Peace Park via the Montana highways.

You should keep in mind that nothing you read here actually happened. Photoshop, folks, it’s all Photoshop.