AaronMcCarthy.com

Greetings from West Yellowstone, Montana where the temps will be below freezing in the morning. We may get a snow shower or two also.

Since the Beartooth Pass was closed due to avalanche we spent all day in Yellowstone National Park. This is another place that you need to spend a few days there to see the entire park. We only saw about a third. Tomorrow we may go back in then leave via the north entrance so we can see a little more.

We were in and out of precipitation most of the day. Many brief rain showers and most of the time it was frozen rain. At around 8,500 ft we had a snow shower but it didn’t last too long. There is still quite a bit of snow remaining above 7,500 ft. See below.

We were able to see Old Faithful blow its lid a few minutes after the projected time of 5:08pm. It’s amazing how consistent it can be.

Some of the critters we saw today include the big horn sheep, a grizzly bear with its cub, a couple moose and many buffalo. The buffalo were stopping traffic by walking right down the center of the road. I guess that’s what they call rush hour around these parts. The grizzly was way off in the distance but I was able to get a photo. It still looks like a small spec though.

There was a lake at 7,000 ft that was still frozen. As I pulled off to take a picture of it I tried to ride up on top of what seemed like a hard stable mound. It turned out to be a soft sandy wave break or something and the bike sunk so deep I didn’t need to put the kickstand down….it stayed upright on its own! Then Hillard pulls up and says “that was smart” just as he attempted the same thing and ended with the same result. We laughed so hard trying to pull these sleds out.

I forgot to mention a few days ago that it seems like the birds are out to get me. During the ride across Nebraska there were birds flying in front of us all day. While I was leading I had two of them fly into my bike. Sorry, both were DOA.