EscaPOD Adventures

Friday, the day after our grandson's 8th grade graduation, we took off headed northbound with our intended stopping point of West Yellowstone. We chose it for a couple of reasons. First is that our older daughter and family were planning to travel up on Saturday to join us. We had originally discussed them camping with us, but in the end, they made motel reservations in West Yellowstone. It took much of the day to travel from South Jordan up to West Yellowstone. Again, it was a scenic drive.

We arrived in West Yellowstone in the late afternoon and checked in at the Pony Express RV Park. This is an adjunct to the Brandin Iron Inn, which seems to have bought out the Pony Express Inn and now uses it as expansion. The RV park is across the street from the P.E. Inn and next to the B.I. Inn. The proprietors were friendly. We had a pull-through spot which was apparently sized for motorized RVs. It was no problem to pull the RP179 into the spot and get it lined up for electric, water, and sewage hookups. The only potential issue was that the post was 50A. However, the office had adapters available for use without charge. The only condition was to turn it back in before we left which we did. The spaces were partially shaded. They were close together, but that was not an issue. The rates were reasonable, and we knew that we would not be doing much more than sleeping there since our days would be taken up with touring Yellowstone NP.

I had not taken pictures of the set-up with the awning deployed. The evening before we left, the wind picked up so I stowed the awning both to protect it and to cut down on the noise of the fabric flapping against the framework.

Since it was somewhat late when we arrived, we did not go into the park Friday evening. Instead, we went over to a new restaurant that had just opened, the Firehole BBQ which featured central Texas style BBQ. The owner had underestimated demand that first day, so much was sold out when we got there. However, they did have a rack of ribs which ended up being spit between my wife and me. They were very good and the side-dishes were pretty good also.

Since our daughter and family were driving up and not expected to get to West Yellowstone until early afternoon, we went into the park (using my Access pass). It is a significant drive from West Yellowstone to the Madison campground (full) and information center. This lies at the junction of the West Entrance Road and the Grand Loop Road, Madison-Old Faithful. We decided to first head south on the GL Road. Highlights were the Firehole Canyon Drive and Fountain Paint Pot areas. This was our first view of some of the volcanic activity evidenced by geysers, boiling springs, and mud pots.

Fountain Paint Pot:

Celestine Pool:

Fountain Geyser:

Since it was getting on toward noon and we expected to meet our daughter and family in West Yellowstone for lunch, we headed back toward West Yellowstone. On the West Entrance Road, we came up on stopped traffic. It soon became apparent why the traffic was stopped.

This was an unexpected surprise and a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to be this close up to live North American Bison. It turns out this was not close enough. After the first three passed, this happened:

This one was walking directly toward the front of the truck. It turned aside just enough to clear the mirror. I could have easily reached out and touched it as it passed. I thought better of it as those horns looked like they could do a good can opener job on the truck if I got it upset. Still though, it was quite an experience!

Originally posted by StephenH There is not much to add about the next few days of driving except to comment that the roads in Illinois are among the worst that I have driven on in a long time. More about that in my next post though.

I grew up in Illinois, and I can confirm that Illinois does have some awful roads. In their defense, the soil in the state is largely made of clay, and in the earlier days, they did not do a lot of underlayment. As a result, when temperatures changed (especially freezing weather), they would develop these "frost heaves", AKA raised stripes across the road every few hundred feet. Pretty terrible to drive on.

When you get up into Wisconsin and Minnesota, the soils are more sand than clay, and even with the more extreme temperatures they get in those states, the roads are a lot smoother.