Leaving Jackson – Arriving West Yellowstone

I woke this morning around 4:30 am and couldn’t go back to sleep. May have been that my sinuses were stopped up and I was breathing through my mouth. I finally got up around 6 am, showered, dressed and went down for breakfast a little before 7am.

After breakfast I returned to my room and read my devotional for Saturday and Sunday and then finished the book I had started reading last week. The book is by the late Bob Benson and is called “Come Share the Being” and is probably my favorite book outside of the Bible. Bob writes in the style of Max Lucado, but preceded him by 20 years, so maybe Max writes in the style of Bob Benson. It is based on his musings on a phrase in 2 Peter 1:4. In the New English Bible version and is translated like this:

And through these promises,

great beyond all price….

…you may come to share

in the very being of God

I first read this book in 1975 and re-read every 2-3 years and this trip was a good time to  re-read it and remember that God want us to share in all that he is and can be in us.

I left Jackson around 8:30 am headed toward West Yellowstone via the south entrance to Yellowstone National Park. I told Samantha that I wanted to go the Super 8 in West Yellowstone and the south entrance to Yellowstone Park and off we went. Things went well and she directed me right to the south entrance but then wanted me to make a u-turn and head back toward Jackson, which there is another route out of Jackson to get to West Yellowstone going back through Idaho. So I said let’s go to Old Faithful and she directed me on through the park right to Old Faithful. We arrived there around 11 am and it was exactly 100 miles since leaving Jackson.

My last view of the Teton Range

 Driving Toward Yellowstone

Driving in South Yellowstone

A visitor center is located near Old Faithful and I went in there and inquired about what areas were accessible, since driving in from the south entrance there was a lot of snow, sometimes rising 10-12 feet above the road on the sides and I feared that a lot of areas might be inaccessible. They had a lot more snow than Grand Teton, but they are at a higher elevation. The ranger said all the major areas were accessible and that the north end of the park is at a lower elevation and did not receive as much snow. After I talked with the ranger, Old Faithful was scheduled to let off some steam shortly, so I ventured outside to the viewing site about 100 yards away. Its eruption was not as dramatic as I had hoped, mostly due to the colder temps causing the steam from the eruption to condense into a cloud that obscured the main fount of the geyser, etc.

Old Faithful

After that I walked over to the historic Old Faithful Inn. It was almost noon, so I went into the restaurant and had lunch consisting of a Patty Melt with grilled onions and Swiss cheese. After lunch I went back to the car and headed toward the Super 8 again. This time Samantha seemed to want me to go in the right directed having me head north on US 191, but wanted me to go 50 miles on the north entrance road which was way out of the way since it was only 16 miles to the west entrance road leading to West Yellowstone. When I got to the west entrance road, a continuation of US191 and turned onto it, Samantha wanted me to get off of it and turn around. Twice along the way, traffic came to a halt and then moved slowly until we got past some Bison strolling on the roadway. Finally when I got to West Yellowstone, about 8 miles from the Super 8 did Samantha finally give me the right directions to get there, which I did around 2 pm. The only thing I could figure out was that the west entrance was closed until late April and Samantha got her maps updated before then and maybe didn’t know the road was now open. Who knows!

Old Faithful Inn

 A bison cow and her calf

Bison out for a Sunday stroll

I checked in the Super 8 and got my things into the room. My laptop could connect to the Wi-Fi service but not the internet. After a couple of diagnostics it apparently repaired its access to the internet and started working. However, my iPod still has the same problem and I can’t seem to get it to connect at all, but at least the laptop works, which is the more important of the two.

The view outside my room toward West Yellowstone

I will go over the information provided by the ranger and plan out my tours of the park for the next three days. I will venture back to West Yellowstone this evening and see where I can find a place to eat to get ready for tomorrow’s adventure.

See you down the road!