Trip Two Day 8: 54 miles ~300 total.
Rolled into Yellowstone NP around 10am amid the long lines of cars and RVs, a kazillion families on vacation, sorta impatient, prob’ly wishing a lot of the other folks had gone somewhere else this year. 30 miles give or take from West Yellowstone to Old Faithful, passed a bunch of other geyser and steaming areas but I was on a mission.
The Old Faithful area is all built up; museum type place, hotel, restaurants. I had an hour to the next eruption (about every 90 minutes). The place I ate was packed, the wait was long, and the food both expensive and awful.
Waited with the crowds (next to a nice retired couple from Nebraska), seen it go off, time to move on. Except I couldn’t. Friggin’ storm cells again. Next place I needed to be was Grant’s Village on Yellowstone Lake, 17 miles away over 8,000+ ft Craig Pass. So, waiting three hours for the rain to clear I got to see Old Faithful go off twice more, and I’m glad I did, ya gotta experience the regularity of the thing to really appreciate it.
Clouds, storm cells ain’t letting up, finally late in the day, fuggit, I take my chances and head out. Getting dark by the time I make the Continental Divide at 8,000 whatever. Then it begins to rain, gets dark, lightning. First night in Yellowstone and I’m on a bicycle at night on a narrow winding road in the rain and thunder at 8,000ft.
The road takes forever, I gotta go slow ‘cause I can’t see chit. Once in a while cars pass by, I bail off the road surface, once in a while some honk their horn like I don’t know I’m on a narrow windy road at 8,000ft at night on a bicycle in the rain
At friggin’ last the road begins to head downhill, the traffic has died but I still gotta go slow because I can’t see chit, my headlight is ok but it’s only “hey-don’t-run-over-me” spec, not “don’t-hit-a-Buffalo-in-Yellowstone” floodlight.
It occurs to me that Yellowstone is famous for its bears. It also occurs to me the grizzlies are famously irritable when surprised. I guessed that one of the best ways to surprise a bear would be on a bicycle at night in the rain.
So for like the last hour I’m singing out ditties like “John Jakob Jinglehiemer-Schmidt” ( I tried it but I found “99 Bottles of Beer on the Wall” required too much concentration).
It was friggin DARK, and wet, all I got is this little tunnel of light from my bike headlight. Finally I locate the campground like 10:30, it’s all dark, and wet.
I find the campground office, the check-in walkway is sheltered and dry, plus there’s a porch light. Hikers and cyclists get cut rates and don’t need reservations. I park the bike under the light by way of explanation and lay out my cotton bedsheet on the concrete walk, inflate the pillow (those things rock😎). Until later on when the temperature got down around 40 the skeeters were bad, so I unzipped the bag Timbermaster gave me and slept under it, covering my head.
I was warm and dry but hey this was Yellowstone, I could be jumped by a griz any moment, so kept spray and (concealed) firearm close at hand. Slept well.
