Its 2020 which means vacation plans were probably canceled, postponed, something! We just got back from a fabulous trip in Wyoming to Yellowstone National Park, and the Grand Tetons. This was our "summer" vacation we had scheduled only to have canceled by what else...Covid. It wasn't until late late summer that Kelly and I started to toss around possibly rescheduling this trip for this fall. We looked at the calendar and decided to try to make it work for the kids' fall break. This would still have them missing school but less days than just taking a whole week off. We were a little concerned that we would be going to late in the season since things close down in Yellowstone but alot of things were closing the week we were there or maybe a few days later, which really worked out good for us. We finalized all the plans and booked it! Kelly had put so much time into planning this trip. He does all the research and booking so I have to give him all the credit! He did great and we had so much fun and saw so many beautiful things. I had been to Yellowstone with my family but that was 20 years ago and while that trip was awesome for me, this one was too! I highly recommend it for anyone thinking of taking their family. And we have snowmobiled in the winter into the park and that is another must do! We did not take Ellington on this trip! I do not recommend this trip for littles because you do a lot of driving, hiking is great if your kids can make it (and ours are old enough to do that). We also had some mornings we were up early to try to see animals, so you need to be able to do that too. I'm going to break down our days on the blog because I have so many pictures! And also it helps break down the park in sections as we visited it, and if anyone reading this is considering a trip to Yellowstone or has one booked, maybe this could help!
Day 1:
We left on a Friday. It was actually Bryce's birthday! He continued to tell us that his birthday would be on October 17 this year since that was going to be his birthday party but....We were at the airport bright and early! Our flight was at 7:50 but that allowed us to get into Wyoming early (time change) and gave us most of the day to get where we were going. When we landed I had a panic attack thinking I had left some pieces of my breast pump at home. Long story short we spent some time in Jackson Hole tracking down what I thought I needed (which is not easy in Jackson Hole let me tell you) only to find out it was in my suitcase all along I just couldn't see it. Whoops! I know Kelly wanted to kill me, I wanted to kill me too. We got lunch and headed to Yellowstone for our first few nights at Canyon Lodge! We were there for 2 nights and this was the last 2 nights this lodge was open for the season. ON our way we did take a few pictures at the Tetons. The view can't be beat no matter how many times you see it.
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| The birthday boy got to go in the cockpit with the pilot! |
Bryce had said over and over that he hoped he could see a real bison on his birthday. Of course he got his chance once we were in Yellowstone. The bison are everywhere! I think he never got tired of seeing them throughout the whole trip. We also saw elk on our drive into the park and even though we saw a lot more it was fun to see them right away. The kids had notebooks that Pop and Sug had given them and Bryce was eager to write down every single animal he saw. Kate was drawing pictures of them as she saw them. I know we will keep those notebooks for years to come because it was precious!
The park is really breathtaking. The scenery is just beautiful and no picture can do it justice even though I took a thousand!
After we made it to our hotel we were pretty tired. We were going on very little sleep so we decided to eat and call it a night. What is nice about changing time zones is that the next day getting up early isn't so hard because you're still 2 hours ahead on Eastern time!
DAY 2:
We were up as the sun was starting to rise on Saturday. We wanted to ride through the Hayden Valley to see if we could see any wildlife. Again the views were incredible. We saw a herd of elk and bison. In fact the bison were creating traffic jams as they headed up the road. The kids loved this and on our videos its funny to hear them talk about how close the bison are coming to us. Bryce really gets excited in them!
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| Our early morning breakfast picnic in the car-Pop Tarts for the win |
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| Traffic jam up ahead |
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After our morning drive we went back to our hotel to get ready for more sightseeing. I did manage to get a picture of the hotel for us to remember too. That afternoon we headed to the Grand Canyon of Yellowstone. I had remembered how pretty this was from my first trip and was excited for the kids to see it. We saw views of the upper and lower falls. My love for waterfalls is deep!
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| Upper Falls |
After some time at the canyons we decided to head on to Norris Geyser basin. The amount of geysers in this park is crazy when you think about it. The geysers turned out to be one of Cohen's favorite things though. I thought they might get bored after so many but they loved each one, seeing all the colors and steam and listening to all the noises they make!
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| Emerald Spring |
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| Kate would draw her book characters too in the car as we drove |
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| About to eat-it was Saturday so we were ready to get to the room to see if we could watch the Dawgs! |
That night the forecast called for 4-8 inches of snow where we were. And sure enough when we woke up there was at least 4 inches on the ground maybe more. We were in higher elevations. We did leave Canyon Lodge that morning and thankfully the roads weren't so bad. We were headed to Mammoth Hot Springs next!
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