Can you believe no bison jam?

We woke up to pretty dense fog this morning, but decided to head to Yellowstone anyway. 

As we headed towards Madison Junction, we had a brief moment of blue skies as the sun worked to burn away the fog.

Kurt wanted to see Old Faithful, so that’s where we headed first.  The patches of blue that you see didn’t last very long, and the skies turned very cloudy.  I was really surprised at the lack of wildlife wherever we went today.  No elk anywhere around Madison.  No bison jams at all.  We did spot three individual bison, each in the distance.  A few ravens, and that was it.  I was rather disappointed. 

I couldn’t wait to show Kurt the Grand Prismatic Spring at the Midway Geyser Basin.  He was a little leery about doing the hike up to it, but I assured him it was well worth it.  Ha!  Not today.  Mother Nature provided the fog, and the winds had the steam in our faces, so none of the glorious colors showed through.  Between my bum back, and his bum hips and feet, that little hike did us in for any further hiking.  Almost made me feel like I was ready for a Hover-Round. 

By the time we made it to Old Faithful, it had started raining, so we viewed the eruption from inside the Visitors Center.  This day at one of my favorite places in the country was not going well at all.  Due to a road closure, we had to turn around and head back to Madison.

I had packed some crackers, cheese, salami, and raisins, so we stopped at a picnic area just before the Firehole Lake Drive.  As we were munching away, I spotted a gray jay in one of the pine trees.  I know I shouldn’t have, but I impulsively held up a half of a Ritz cracker.  That camp robber landed right in the palm of my hand, looked around, and snatched that cracker.  Then it came back to the picnic table to have a drink of water in one of the puddles left on top of the table by the rain.  That was probably the highlight of the day for me.

We did take the Firehole Lake Drive, and I did get a few shots, but conditions were just not ideal today.  There’s another road closure between Norris and Mammoth Hot Springs.  The rain continued as we made our way to Canyon Village, and the wildlife stayed in hiding.  We turned around there and headed back to camp.

The road closures have certainly changed my way of showing Kurt Yellowstone this year.  I think we’ll head over to Hayden Valley tomorrow in hopes of seeing more wildlife and on to Fishing Bridge.  The forecast for the next two days looks pretty good, if you can believe what you read.

Thanks for stopping by… talk to you later,  Judy