Our second time in Yellowstone

Entering Yellowstone

We entered Yellowstone on the 89A, inbound from Bozeman. The North entrance is the location of the Roosevelt Arch. Although I have traversed the path last year, I did not pull the Airstream on it. The road is steep and curvy. At dusk many animals were present, we saw Pronghorn, Moose, Deer, and Bison. Although I enjoy driving at night, in areas prone to large animals Donna takes on the role of spotter. I have learned to slow down and avoid distractions. More then once Donna has called out sightings of animals which have prevented collision.

Getting to the campsite

Touring Bozeman for appointments, provisioning, lunch, and coffee had us arriving at Fishing Bridge campground around 2200. Getting setup late is not a problem for us and my newly installed frame rail flood lamps worked great. The road was narrow, site was tight and dark, I do not suggest arriving at night. We were able to get setup quickly and quietly. The site was A27.

Staying in the park

We camped at Fishing Bay bridge. The bridge has a long history. We observed at least two cutthroat trout while standing on the bridge. The cutthroat trout have been negatively impacted since the early eighties due to Lake Trout. The cutthroat are a major food source due to their swimming and spawning depths. The lake trout love to eat cutthroat spawn, they also impact the food chain by swimming and spawning much deeper.

Donna has been learning, using/exploiting the reservation system. She has learned that for multi-day reservations if you are able to reserve the same type of site, merging the reservations is easy if you talk to agents. The ability to merge like reservations is beneficial, since the campground doesn’t assign sites, they have the freedom to allot sites in bulk. The allotment of sites is good news for campers, since they can discuss their needs with a camp host and acquire sites for the duration of their stay.

Donna and I agree, the pictures online of the sites are expertly take to represent the sites as larger then they are. If you stay in National Park campgrounds, it’s important to understand the campsite size and your equipment size. In our experience the NPS does a good job of representing the site size. Don’t rely on pictures of a site to determine if your equipment will fit.

The campground has excellent recycling collection. Donna and I were happy to place our recycling into the properly labeled bins. The collection bins were grates that allowed visual inspection of the contents. I hope that visually seeing the contents prevents wishcycling.

Minny and Doowee

The dogs enjoyed walking the campground and to the visitor center/store. On more then one occasion we encountered Bison in the campground. Staying away from wild animals is on my todo list. Doowee is on a diet of boiled chicken and potatoes.

Donna and Colin

Donna and I have been cycling together, we rode all the upper basin bicycle trails, explored Firehole River and watched Lone Star Geyser erupt. The Lone Star geyser was a real treat as us and two other people were in attendance. The trail to the geyser is two and a half miles, I would consider it off the normal path. Svetlana (Donna’s gravel bike) got the opportunity to get dirty. Donna traversed dirt trails, through large puddles and mud. We had a great time exploring the upper basin and many geysers. Donna and I also went for a sunset ride up to Butte Lake lookout. Donna got to see a pack of Pronghorns running across the prairie. We also saw more Bison, Does and Bucks, snakes, and fish.

Lone Star Geyser

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