Wyoming

On the way to Yellowstone

Entering Yellowstone


Gus in Yellowstone



Yellowstone
Traffic, whats the hold up?
Max and the Buffalo
Buffalo

Hot and smelly do not touch
ol' faithful

Geysers Erupting
Gus in Yellowstone

Entering Montana

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Wall Drug was neat, sort of a commercialized old western town. They had every piece of South Dakota memorabilia one could hope for. Great homemade ice cream too! We continued on to Mount Rushmore, which was really awesome. We latched on to a tour and learned the importence and significance of each president featured on the rock: Washington, Jefferson, Roosevelt, and Lincoln. Washington nose alone was 20 feet long. We took some pictures, we walked around, and we decided we were hungry. We left the rock and headed to downtown Keystone hoping we would be able to find a camping store after dinner. We had just parked Gus when we witnessed a deer that had jumped in front of us in the parking lot get run over on the highway. It was tragic but oddly reassuring: some things don’t change even across the country. We ate good Mexican food that took to long to arrive. Sometime in the mitts of our dinner we acquired a parking ticket—but sometimes its good to be outside of NYC. We didn’t make it to the camping store, but we did make it to Lowes hoping they could help us with a makeshift window. We tried to glue it on in the parking lot, but needing more time than we thought to dry we thought it best try once we could be stationary for a significant period of time. We slept in a rest area, and continued on through Wyoming.

I thought South Dakota was pretty, well Wyoming is just beautiful mountains everywhere. Don’t get me wrong we were definitely in the middle of nowheresville but it made the driving really enjoyable. I got a little picture happy during this drive but I am still frustrated—no matter what you do pictures can never really capture it. Gus didn’t enjoy the mountains as much as we did, but every mile there was a million dollar view. We got to Cody, Wyoming where we found a legit western town. We got some knickknacks, some much needed coffee, and FINALLY made it to a camping store. Because we had just gotten our camping stove, we decided to use it, and camped at a campgrounds right outside of Yellowstone. We glued on our window with some guerrilla glue and silicone. We cooked dinner on our new stove. We did some house keeping and prepared for grisly bears—which we are told frequent the area.

On Wednesday, after a thankfully uneventful night we got up and drove to Yellowstone. It is obviously as amazing as everyone says it is. Something about northern north America in the summertime is just so mind-blowing. We drove through admiring the scenery. We had to make a stop to let two wild buffalo cross the road. Our window fell out, apparently mixing glues does not make it twice as likely to stick. We saw the geysers, and saw ol’ faithful. It was pretty gray and rain was threatening. Some of the geysers were exploding, they were steamy and smelt like sulfur. When we exited Yellowstone we were in Montana where there is NOTHING but mountains and horses :) We haven’t showered since Chicago for those of you who I know are wondering, gross I know. We are headed to either Seattle or Vancouver time permitting. We still don’t have a window—I am kind of used to the wind.