It was Friday when we made the 7 hour drive to Mammoth Campground near the NW entrance to Yellowstone. We got a preferred site, but there are a few better. Me and the wife quickly set up camp and relaxed till 8pm when we crashed, since it was kinda cold and blustery out side.
Here's our bear proof food box which I use as a cooking station. It makes it convenient to store the stove and cooking equipment since it must be put away before leaving camp. Everything basically has to be inside a vehicle or this box in an effort to minimize human - bear encounters.
We found these Larkspur on a little walk near camp.
This is a decent antelope buck.
Here is me and my crew at Slough Ck, one of my favorite places. We'll be back to close it down for the 3rd year in a row in mid-October. My daughter is very afraid of bears so the short hike into Slough was a challenge for her. We had spray and firearms with us.
Our daughter and her boyfriend were able to join us. I put them up at the cabins in nearby Mammoth Hot Springs. I didn't want to make them deal w camping since they only had the 3 day weekend to get there and back home.
We had a good time, not really getting up to see the major wolf activity, but we did see:
Grizzlies
Black bears including a beautiful cinnamon phase
Bison w calves aka "red dogs"
Moose
Elk some spotted 3-4 miles away w spotting scopes, elk calves
Mtn Goats (no kids seen)
Antelope
Coyote
Sandhill cranes w a baby
Deer
Young Kyle did the driving on Saturday and Sunday thankfully saving me from that ordeal. One can not believe how self-absorbed, unaware, and disrespectful of others people are until they experience the holiday weekend at YS.
Unfortunately we had to end the trip a day early since the lock on the camper broke, which we later found was known to be defective. We were unable to get in the camper which meant we had no place to sleep and no food. My wife's hearing aid charging station was inside as well. That meant driving home yesterday in some awful traffic inside the park, instead of today.
The round trip was 725 miles, 15.6 mpg, diesel averaged $5.75/gal. That was it for YS trip #2, #3 is in July for a 4 day wolf field seminar w naturalists as guides, including 3 hikes.