The morning of August 3, we said goodbye to the Liebermans at the little shops right outside of Glacier and then hit the road for our 8-hour drive to our campground in Yellowstone. It was a long day of driving, stopping at a fancy McDonalds for lunch where Chris became a kid again.

Right before we entered the park, we stopped in the town of West Yellowstone to check out the shops and food. It was a bustling little town and we had some delicious homemade ice cream called “wedded bliss” as we searched for a cowboy hat for Chris which he decided he must have on this trip.

However, finding a hat that Chris likes is like finding a needle in a haystack so even though there were about 85 options, we were unsuccessful in our search. As the sun was setting, we left town and headed into Yellowstone for the last hour and a half drive to get to our campground in the park. (The park is HUGE).

We listened to our audio GPSy guide (who we named George) tell us about features of the park as I drove 40mph to be sure not to hit any bison in the dark. We pulled in late to our campground (again) and hit the sack to be ready for a full day of adventures the next day!

The way we planned our itinerary, we figured we would have 2 full days in Yellowstone and then 2 full days in Grand Tetons. So, we decided this day that we would do the upper loop of Yellowstone (driving tour). We turned on George again as he took us on an auto tour of the park, telling us about the best stops and some of the park’s history as we passed certain landmarks. Our tour took us through fields of huge bison which also walked right through the parking lot:

2 bison growling and having a standoff with each other, a brief hail storm which is the second time this trip rain has actually interfered with our plans, upper and lower Yellowstone falls:

canyon village where we had another sub-par lunch in a retro cafeteria:

a petrified tree (yes, just like Harry Potter), Mammoth hot springs to see the upper and lower terraces (and lots of elk):

boiling river where we went for a swim as the hot spring emptied into the river:

and then ended the day with another rainbow over Cathedral mountain as we drove back to our campsite!

A little note on swimming in the boiling river – we decided to park and walk to the entry point right as thunder and lightning was striking in the distance. I will have everyone know that I told Chris it wasn’t the smartest decision and if we had kids with us, it wouldn’t be happening. However, he still managed to convince me to go in because YOLO I guess! And it was well worth it – so warm, not too crowded, and we got some great pictures!

However, when I wanted to walk the upper and lower terraces in the slight chance of rain, somehow this was worse to Chris than swimming the river in a thunderstorm and he was very hesitant to set out on the walk. This time it was my turn to convince him and I’m glad we did because it barely rained!

Our second day in Yellowstone, we drove the lower loop. Our first stop was Isla pond with massive lily pads and then a 2.5 mile bike trail out to lone star geyser.

When we parked our bikes, we realized that there was a crowd around the geyser and it was going to go off soon! 10 minutes waiting, and it did just that! It was a great start to the day and even though we hadn’t looked at any of the geyser times, it seemed we were off on the right track.

We hopped on our bikes and headed back to our car to continue our lower loop auto tour, feeling ready to see lots of geysers. We headed to the Upper Geyser basin to catch Old Faithful. We finally looked at the geyser times and had some time to kill while we waited for Old Faithful to blow so we went and explored the Old Faithful Inn which is probably the coolest building we’ve seen on this trip. Incredible!

We briefly toured the visitor center and then found our spot in the front row of thousands of people to watch Old Faithful. It was pretty cool I guess.

As the crowds filed out, we set off on walking the boardwalks that wind through the Upper Geyser basin area. I had told Chris we should take our bikes but he said we would be fine without them. Long story short, he admitted at the end of the day (with very sore feet and legs) that we should have rode our bikes. The best part of the Upper Geyser basin walk is how many geysers we were fortunate enough to see blow! To add to our count of Lone Star and Old Faithful, we saw Daisy (which shoots sideways),

the Grotto (which is very unpredictable),

Grotto fountain, Old Faithful a second time,

Grand (the tallest and best one),

Riverside (actually only Chris saw this one), White Dome, and then countless smaller geysers as we walked around. It was a hot day and even though we forgot water and sunscreen like the veteran travelers we are, it was a very cool and unique place to see so many geysers, hot springs, and colorful pools.

Feeling tired and sore, I was ready to move on to the next stop but Chris really wanted to see Grand geyser blow. So, the plan was originally for us to split up and I would come back and pick him up. However, I had a slight case of FOMO and decided to go sit and wait (for possibly an hour and a half) to see it go off. It was well worth it – and it even went off on the earlier side! After watching it blow for about 10 minutes, I headed back to the car and Chris ran to riverside geyser to catch that one. (It was then he returned to the car that he told me we should have rode our bikes). At this point, it was close to 6pm and we still had 75% of the lower loop left to drive. A note for future visits – you can spend all day in the Upper Geyser basin. We made a few more stops at some more geysers including Grand Prismatic Springs and then set off for Norris geyser basin.

On our way, we took a brief side road through some other geysers and springs and were pleasantly surprised to see White Dome geyser shoot off just as we were driving by.

Next up, we decided to drive the side road through Firehole Canyon to possibly catch some wildlife. We were unsuccessful with the wildlife but my eagle eye did spy some bones laying at the bank of the river below by a cave. Creepy! It was pretty dark by the time we got to Norris basin and I was only able to convince Chris to walk to Steamboat geyser. We didn’t see it go off but apparently when it does, it is incredible. It is so unpredictable it didn’t go off for 50 years and then last year it went off 48 times! Maybe a volcanic eruption is in the near future? Anyway, we took in what we could in the dark and then ran back to the car before getting eaten by a bear.

The only other stop we made on the rest of the drive was Canyon Village again for some dinner. We ate at a restaurant called M66 and it was finally a delicious meal! This night, instead of returning to our campsite in Yellowstone, we had to drive an extra 45 minutes past it to our new campground right outside of Grand Tetons. It was the latest we ever checked in to a site – 12:30am – and I had fallen asleep. Of course, this had to be the night where we had trouble checking in. I woke up to Chris confused and walking around outside, trying to find information on what site we were supposed to take. We drove around the grounds trying to find some sort of life to talk to and then we finally found the main office lodge building that has someone working the desk 24 hours. They were able to get us checked in and after passing our campsite once, we finally looped around and pulled in to go to sleep. We were never happier to have a bed to crash into.

The following morning was obviously a slower start as we were trying to catch up on some zzz’s. Actually, our alarm clock this morning was a friendly raven trying to eat our doormat.

Once we finally hit the scenic road through the Grand Tetons, it was lunch time and we set off on a mission for some food. Accompanied by George, our driving guide, we made a quick stop at Colter Bay to get some information from the visitor’s center and find food. We decided on a little lunch spot that had a caprese sandwich which we agreed we would just split to hold us over until having an early dinner. We ordered the sandwich and took our number to the table to wait for it to be served. 30 minutes go by and FINALLY our sandwich came out. I don’t think my jaw has ever dropped at the sight of food until this meal. And it wasn’t a good thing. The roll was burnt to a crisp and black around the edges and no joke, I’m pretty sure they cut 2 cherry tomatoes in half and put them on top. And that was about it – burnt bread and 2 cherry tomatoes to share. If we hadn’t already wasted so much time and weren’t so hungry, we probably would have sent it back. We also immediately regretted after we finished it in 2 minutes (not because it was good, we were just starving) that we didn’t take a picture of it to upload for a review. But whatever you do, don’t eat at Colter Bay in the Grand Tetons. We quickly got out of that place and continued on with our driving tour, stopping at overlooks along the way including Jenny Lake which was beautiful.

We were headed to the South end of the park to Jackson Hole to catch our wildlife safari experience at dusk. We quickly realized that the campground we picked was really not in a convenient location to see the park but one of the downfalls of Grand Tetons is that all of their campsites are first come, first serve – no reservations. So, we were left with no choice but to drive an hour to get anywhere within the park boundaries. Next time we visit, we would like to stay in the town of Jackson at the South end which is a much more convenient location. Right before reaching Jackson Hole, we took a small back road that was full of wildlife (and lots of potholes). Turns out, the section of the road with all the potholes was donated to the park by the Rockefeller family with the restriction that the park would never pave it as an effort to keep heavy traffic from driving through and disturbing the wildlife and natural processes. We stopped at the Lawrence Rockefeller preserve along that back road which was known to encourage solitude and connections with nature – I just thought it was all a little weird. However, we did see a mama moose and her baby along our drive and it turns out our safari truck would drive that same road as well on our tour!

Once we reached Jackson Hole, Chris made a PB&J in the back of the pilot to make up for his lack of a sandwich earlier and I got a smoothie while we waited for our tour. The “safari” was a really cool experience as we almost had a personal tour of the wildlife in the Grand Tetons. (Just us and a mom with her daughter) We drove around with high-tech binos, seeing moose, TONS of elk, pronghorn, cranes, and a few bears way up on the mountain through our guide’s scope.

She was a pro at spotting wildlife through her binos and proceeded to tell us that one of the tests the guides have to take before each season is to spot little plastic toys placed around the landscape. We also stopped at Mormon Row to take a few historical pictures of the homesteads there.

Our guide was very pleasant as was the weather and we got to see a beautiful sunset before ending up back in Jackson Hole.

Ready for some real food, we decided to eat dinner at the Mangy Moose saloon which had live music as well as a stuffed moose pulling a sleigh hanging from the ceiling!

We then took the long way home to avoid hitting wildlife on the road in the dark and pulled in to Headwaters RV park late again – around midnight. 

Ready for our last full day in the Grand Tetons and hoping to finally see a bear up close on this trip, we set off on Wednesday, August 7th to drive the other part of the Grand Teton loop with George. Again, we stopped at overlooks and took some back dirt roads along the way, learning more about the history of the park.

We went back to Mormon Row so Chris could actually take his time getting the popular barn shot with the mountains in the background.

After that, we stopped in a general store to get a few necessities, another sub-par sandwich, and of course, ice cream. We also toured a little homestead across the river where we bought some homemade huckleberry jam and root beer, and peeked in a tiny chapel that still has services to this day.

It was at this time that Chris was starting to get antsy again as he worried about timing. One big difference we’ve learned between us this trip is that Chris likes to be on time and plan out realistic timing of what we will get done in a day; I however, just make a jam-packed itinerary to see as much as possible in one day and hope for the best. So, as we stopped at another visitor center and I convinced Chris to take the 1-mile trail out to Murie ranch, I heard lots of comments about how we need to prioritize better and that this ranch isn’t worth the limited time we have, and we won’t get to everything we want to do, and blah blah blah. Meanwhile, I’m just taking in the views and the wildflowers and trying to ignore the negativity :). Now, while Chris is usually correct with his timing estimates, this time, our little hike was worth it. We were greeted by a little old man at Murie Ranch who asked if we wanted a personal tour of the main building there which we agreed to. We got to see where the Murie family once lived and learned lots of history from this nice man through his half-hour tour, even getting an “artsy” picture from him at the end.

Chris finally admitted that the hike was well worth it and that he should worry less about timing on an adventure. “The journey… not the destination.” 🙂 We returned to our car and set off for Jenny Lake to catch the boat across in order to hike to Hidden Falls and Inspiration Point. Even though it appeared a storm was brewing, we secured our spot on the boat and set off for Hidden Falls, still hopeful of seeing a bear.

Just as we started hiking, people started coming the opposite direction on the trail telling us there was a bear so naturally, we booked it up there. Sure enough, a mama bear and her cub were feeding and climbing about right next to the trail. We were able to get a few pictures right before a bird flew overhead, scaring the cub, and sending it screaming and running up a tree. Mama bear looked and quickly followed, barreling right across the path in front of a hiker who probably pooped his pants. It was a crazy experience to witness.

Once the bears were out of sight, it started to rain and hail, so we continued on towards Hidden Falls with our rain covers over our bags. But the falls were definitely worth it.

After getting our obligatory pictures, we continued on up to Inspiration Point. We were lucky enough to, AGAIN, see a mama bear and her cub climbing up along the trail. It was probably the same ones.

We saw them head up into the woods right where the trail goes so as all the other hikers were coming down, Chris and I tentatively headed towards the bears, hoping to not come between the mama and her cub on the path. We never did see them again but we did see an awesome view from Inspiration Point.

Like the crazy kid that he is, Chris was tempted to press on a few more miles (at 6pm) in order to see male moose that we were told by hikers passing by were up in the mountains. Fortunately, I was able to convince him to head back to catch the last boat with the reasons that 1. It was storming, 2. We didn’t have any warm clothes or rain gear, 3. We didn’t have flashlights, and 4. We didn’t have bear spray. You would think we would be prepared hikers by now but really, we’ve just become lazy. We quickly booked it back down the mountains to catch the last boat where we met a very nice couple from the Black Hills, SD. Since that was our next stop on our RVmoon, they gave us a few suggestions on some things to do there and we exchanged stories about our adventures. Back on land, everyone quickly headed for their cars as the skies opened up full force. On our way back to our campsite for the last night in the Tetons, we decided to stop at the Jackson Lake Lodge to eat at Blue Heron and watch the sunset. It was an amazing sunset but unfortunately, lighting had struck the outside grill, causing it to close down for the night so we were left to order beer and edamame (which was VERY good).

Not quite satisfied, we stopped at a pizzeria in Leek’s Marina near our campsite which George mentioned was great pizza. And that it was – finally some good food to end our day in the Grand Tetons.