Our Yellowstone trip part 3

We headed out of Island Park, Idaho bright and semi-early to get into Yellowstone. After entering the park we saw a moose, our first of many bison, mule deer, squirrels and chipmunks. The ranger had given Sam and Afton a sheet with pictures of all the park's animals on it and for each one you saw, you got ten points, so the kids (especially Sam) went crazy trying to see everything they could (and possibly fibbing a little) in order to get the most points. It was a blessing and a curse throughout our visit to the park. Sam would see a lot more than Afton and Afton would constantly say, "But I can't see it!"

Sam counted up his points over and over and over again.

Anyhow, our first official stop was the Midway Geyser Basin, home of the Grand Prismatic Geyser. Dan took the kids to see it while I nursed Eli in the car (this happened a lot on our trip). Afterwards, I did a quick walk-by of it and then we took an unofficial hike up a hill across the street to get a birds-eye view. Here it is from ground level.

Kind of hard to see a lot of it.

I had checked out a book from our library about Yellowstone and it proved to be well worth bringing. It recommended a few hikes that we ended up doing and it also gave us a lot of good general information about the history of the park, etc.

Here's the view from the trail:

See how small the people are? You got a much better perspective from where we were of the colors and size. The boardwalk only went by a portion of the spring.

Ethan, Matt, Luke, Noah, and Hunter.

 So neat!

 We ate lunch down by the road. Sam is continuing his cross-eyed shenanigans, as you can see.

After lunch we headed over to hike Mystic Falls. There was a sign warning that this was a popular bear area, so along with two cans of bear spray, two guns, and two walking sticks with bells on them, Matt's family would also randomly yell, "Hey, bear!" I'm pretty sure any bears in the vicinity heard us coming a mile away.

 The hike was 3.4 miles (roundtrip). By the time we got there, Eli had had it. He was hot, tired, and hungry. So I hightailed it back to the car with Sam and Dan's parents. Dan and Afton stayed a little bit longer with everyone else.

 I thought it was a beautiful hike and a prefect distance for the kids. We forgot water (duh), so that was dumb. I'd totally recommend the hike, though.

After the hike we headed over to see Old Faithful. We couldn't find a parking spot, and we knew it was going to erupt really soon, so Dan kind of idled the car in a random spot where he could see it, and Afton and I got out to watch it.

Before:

 During:

 Tapering off:

We next headed over to see Old Faithful Inn. Super cool inside. The chimney is seven stories high.

On our way out of the park that day we saw some more bison. They were all halfway done shedding their winter coats so they look mangy.

Even though some people think they are glorified cows, these guys are no joke! Before our trip I heard about two people getting attacked by bison this summer in Yellowstone. One was five feet away and turned her back to have her picture taken. The other was a man who got THREE feet away and tried to take a picture with his tablet. Come on, people. I can't imagine getting three feet away from one. I was about 15 feet away from one who was sleeping and then suddenly woke up and it freaked me out.

 We also spotted a bald eagle. You can kind of see him in the tree. He's on the top right.

After our fun filled day we stopped in the town of West Yellowstone for delicious pizza (Wild West Pizzeria), then headed back to the cabin. Matt, Amy, Dan and I also played Blokus. I didn't win.