Yellowstone National Park - May 2025

 

Yellowstone is full of Rivers, Lakes and Waterfalls ...

... Mountains and Valleys ...

...and Thermal Activity.  This my 8th or 9th visit to Yellowstone, Marcia's 4th or 5th.  One can take pictures of the scenery.  Once you have seen Old Faithful shoot off a dozen times, you don't have as much enthusiasm to sit around and wait for it to go off again.  We both agree that the one thing that you can't get enough of is the wild animals.  So over the course of three different trips in the park this visit, we tried to get pictures of different animals.  Below is a pictorial of our visit.

 

BEAR

All the bears we saw were in the general area of where the turnoff to the Lamar Valley was.  Each time there were Park Rangers, once three of them, keeping the traffic moving, and keeping people inside their cars.  Rules are, you must be 100 yards away (or more) from the bears.  Looked like one of them was a Grizzly Bear (4th picture).

 

DEER

This is the only picture we got of any Deer, and I think there are four in the picture.  This was taken on the road to Lamar Valley, about 1-2 miles in from the Loop Road.  (If you have never been to Yellowstone, there are two loops which touch, forming a rough looking number "8", with five other roads connecting into the loops, two on the top loop of the "8" and three on the bottom loop of the "8".)  We "might" have seen deer three or four other times on our whole trip from Florida...what's up with that???

 

ELK  

The Elk we saw was in the Madison River Area.  You need to look close at the first Elk picture, there are three Elk in that picture, two are down in a small stream and you can barely make them out.  We did not see the herd of Elk that are typically found Mammoth Hot Springs area, but we did not go north of the Visitor Center, and they could have been up there.

 

PRONGHORN 

In the bottom picture there is a mother, and two newborns...but the mother is hovering over one of the newborns and you can't see it very well.  The other newborn is attempting to stand.  These Pronghorns were at the start of the Lamar Valley.

 

SANDHILL CRANE

I did not know that there are Sandhill Cranes in Yellowstone.  Our first sighting had the Cranes way out in the meadow...I did not get any good pictures...but later in the same area we found a few much closer.  The Cranes were the Norris area.

 

BUFFALO

  

 

Buffalo can be seen all over the park.  In May most of them are still in the "Herd" that is in Lamar Valley.  But you can also find them along the road, or out in groups of 2-5 Buffalo out in a meadow.  We saw some near Old Faithful, near Madison, near Mammoth ... but most of them were still in the Lamar Valley.  Give them another month or two and they will be clogging up the roadways, bringing traffic to a standstill.  They are a magnificent beast.

I have now been to Yellowstone in May, June, July, August and September.  Each month brings a new view of Yellowstone...as I am sure the views during the other months do too.  

We moved from West Yellowstone to the Bill Frome Memorial RV Park along the western side of Henrys Lake....$15 per night with no utilities.  It was a very peaceful place.  Today we moved to a park we found in 2020, the Juniper Campground near Idaho Falls.  We will be here through Sunday, then back to Salt Lake City, then head back to Sacramento.  

 

Newcastle Wyoming, Gateway to Black Hills via US 16, Along CanAm Highway via US 85

 

Back in 2012 we spent nearly a week in the Black Hills.  Our goal now is Theodore Roosevelt National Park, which lies in western North Dakota, but we wanted to go back through Custer and the Black Hills.  Could have driven into Custer today, but it will be in low 30's tonight, where it will be in upper 30's here tonight.  Now, we are thinking we might just skip Custer all together and head up to North Dakota...by Sunday it is suppose to be in the 70's during the day and 40's during the night, this next week maybe the best weather they have for the rest of the year.  Although it would be nice to see Mount Rushmore again, the cold would not make it enjoyable.

In the meantime...we have seen a lot of wildlife out and about, mostly Pronghorns.  A Pronghorn is known as America's Antelope, even though they are really not an Antelope, but nearly everyone calls them an Antelope.  Real natural Antelopes are found throughout Africa and parts of Asia.  Pronghorns are naturally found only in Canada, USA and Mexico.

We have seen well over a hundred Pronghorn so far just in Wyoming on this trip.

We have also seen a lot of Turkeys

And also a number of deer.

 Most of the drive today looked a lot like this until we got past Gillette...except for...

...the Powder River Country which is the Powder River Basin area.  The Powder River runs south to north and in the spring it flows VERY FAST, creating a crazy shape around the river area.

Past Gillette and the mountains start to appear in the distance.  Back in 2012 we visited that area because that is where Devils Tower is located.  

Decided to stop in Newcastle at the City owned Crystal Park Campground, which gives us options on heading north to North Dakota on US 85 (part of the CanAm Highway) or east to Custer South Dakota continuing on US 16...it all depends upon the weather.  My guess is that we will head north from here...time will tell.

Nearly a Month at Huntley Park, LOVING IT!

At Huntley Park, Gold Beach Oregon

We have been in Oregon for 40 days now, and here at Huntley Park for 4 weeks this Tuesday.  40 days, and we had rain for part of one day, overcast two days, early morning fog about 8 days (burned off by 9 am) , and we ran the A/C one day for 3 hours while at Loeb State Park.  To say the weather has been near perfect would be an understatement.

This afternoon I FINALLY got a few pictures of the Bald Eagle which has occasionally been traveling up and down the Rogue River.  Today it landed across the river from us, and I got the camera.  For the next 90 minutes it did not fly anywhere, but was keeping a sharp eye on the river, and the Osprey were keeping a sharp eye on the Eagle, although they did quiet down a bit after about an hour.  Skruffy’s alarm went off on my phone reminding me that she needed to have her diabetes test…by the time I got back out the Eagle was gone (Skruffy tested at 88, so she is doing well).  I still have 2 more weeks to try and catch it flying along the river.

So many birds along and in the water…

 

 

Of course, the Osprey are never too far away from the water…always watching, always aware, always sounding an alarm when an intruder, such as the Eagle or Buzzards fly in on their territory.  They work together, helping other Osprey.  I saw one Osprey miss a fish, getting in on a second try, and three Seagulls flew after it trying to steal some food…but other Osprey met the Seagulls head-on, and next thing I knew the Seagulls were headed back to the Ocean.  Just then the Eagle flew in…but being out numbered, it just continued along the river as the Osprey gave their shrilling cry over and over again until the Eagle was out of sight.

Inside the campground there is an abundance of Stellar Jays and Northwestern Crows…both loud, always searching out that camper who leaves food out, or fish guts which have been tossed out along the bank.  Sometimes they can descend upon your “area” and make things a bit noisy for a short while.  I have yet to have been “hit” by their "white debris" as they fly overhead…but we still have a couple more weeks...I might have to invest in a hat.

I took another short excursion along the north side of the river, found a place to turn around and low and behold, there was a young buck and a doe.  Saw the doe first, got a few pictures of her, and then I saw the buck.  Amazing how they blend in unless you really look things over.  Counting the deer we saw on the way to Agness, and on runs back into Gold Beach and back, we have seen around ten deer this year.  Others in the park have seen a few Elk, but we have not had such luck…yet.

For the past three weeks our fishing neighbors have been here in full force.  Our immediate neighbor was here for nearly two weeks, first with his wife, a daughter and two very young grandkids, but five days later the daughter and grandkids left.  A week later, the wife and husband left…but in their place three tents, relatives of some of the other fisherman, moved in for the week.  Today, they all left, all of them...but they left their RVs and their boats, and many will be back Friday. 

I close with this shot of “Libby Pond”, which is a body of water on the other side of the river from us...the north road runs along it. The Libby Pond property is up for sale, including what they call a sportsman’s hall (no sleeping, just a large hall includes a kitchen).  The entire property is 184 acres, and the asking price is just under $900K…just in case anyone is interested.