Our Favorite Place to Stay In Yellowstone

We were fortunate enough to stay at this RV Park the first time we stayed in Yellowstone, and the only reason we haven't stayed here in the past is that they were full and I hadn't made reservations in advance enough.  It's a little pricey for the money, but considering that the closest park in or near Yellowstone with FHU is in Fishing Bridge, which is about as cramped and full of potholes as you can imagine.  We usually spend a few days in Teton Colter Bay (which has FHU), but the potholes are contagious because the Fishing Bridge potholes have spread to Colter Bay.  We had a spring break because of the poor road conditions, but that's another story that is still ongoing.

So, our favorite spot is still the Yellowstone RV Park. It has a simple name, but it may be confusing to find. It is in Gardiner, MT, just across the Northern Entrance to Yellowstone. This park is so convenient for us for several reasons: our favorite part of Yellowstone is the Northern Tier.

What folks forget is that the caldera (basically the southern half of the park) is much higher than the northern tier. (Right-click this photo to open it in another tab or page because it's really big. Left-click it to purchase this map.)

This shows how much lower (and warmer) the Northern Tier (Lamar Valley) is compared to Yellowstone Lake.  Dunraven Pass and the southern entrance to Yellowstone are often closed till just before Memorial Day.  The Northern Tier stays open all year round cause it's lower and warmer.  The Northern Tier (including Lamar Valley) enters Sprin before Hayden Valley, and there's more action longer.  In addition, the Northern Tier has hardly any geological activity like the southern half of the park, which is full of boiling water pots, goo pots (what I call steaming thingies with a lot of minerals), and geysers like Old Faithful.  Those are interesting, but the animals on the upper tier are much more interesting.  

This means we spend most of our time on the Northern Tier, and there's no better entrance than Gardiner, particularly when you can camp right on the banks of the Yellowstone and see the Osprey fish just outside your window.  Besides that, the park is run well, with very nice accommodations:  the wifi is fast and convenient for the whole park, the showers are nice and clean, the laundry isn't fancy, but also clean, and the people who are the hosts and work in the office are delightful.  This year, I knew we were coming way far in advance and got a special rate on the Black Friday discount after Thanksgiving.  

I always like to request a back in so that we get a great view of the action on the river, white water rafters, osprey fighting off ravens (who this year seem to be more active), and an occasional Chamber-of-Commerce Elk.  These elk are so tame that they will eat out of your hand, but they are not afraid of humans.  They come to feed on the grass or anything leafing out, and look at humans as oddities that appear from time to time!  One year, I was shopping for a scope in a store, and the clerk wanted to show me how powerful it was, so he focused on an Elk across the road into the park, and I accused him of rounding up elk so that customers would be more interested in purchasing the scope!  From then on, they were known as the Chamber of Commerce elk!  This is just one of the pluses about being around nature at this magnificent park.  

You can see how really beautiful this is.  We got here early.  As Memorial Day gets closer, the park will fill up and be a madhouse all summer long.  

We really love this RV park as much as we love Yellowstone. We've tried staying in other locations, whether RV parks in Gardiner or in Yellowstone, and by far, this is the best. We paid a premium price to park on the river, but it was so worth it. More people have shown up the closer to Memorial Day, and then Yellowstone becomes very crowded for the summer.  Things like this trip make wonderful memories that no one can take away.  

First Photos in Yellowstone

 Now, this time of year is all about babies and rain.  It rains out of pure air for no reason, but the benefit is seeing tons of new babies.  The babies are small right now, but as the days and weeks pass, they will grow and make their way out.  One of our favorites is foxes.  I swear they learned to walk from the Wilhemina modeling school!  

See that one foot crossing the other - that's typical runway walking!

And this just looked downright playful.  You can see why these animals would be so attractive to humans.  We provide them with some leftovers, and they provide us with love and protection.  This little fellow just walked around a group of photogs like we were his long-lost friends.  No one, fortunately, in the group tried to get too close, cause we all realized that an animal that accepts food from humans has a short life span.  

Then there's the typical teenage horsing around.

Bison do not look that interested in humans, but then, just as you think everything's safe, they charge at you as if you had given them the evil eye.  So the wise person stays a reasonable distance away.  In this group, the golden babies are arriving every day.  Lamar Valley is called the Serengeti of North America, and when you travel through the valley, you can see why with herds of Bison wandering as if there's no care in the world, unless your teenage brother comes after you with his horns.  

This is the ladies' salon, where everyone knows their correct pronoun, and no males are allowed. Some just need a quiet rest while they wait for the hair dryer, and others need some work on their behinds. Good luck with that!

And this is one of our favorite places in the Tetons. That's the famous Snake River in front of the major part of the Teton Range, where the view is about as spectacular as you can imagine. The Snake River gets a little slough-like as it "snakes" around the Tetons, creating this beautiful area with a gorgeous view of the Tetons and the reflection an artist might create, only this is really no fussing, just a straight shot of the mountains.  

This time of year, when the new green shoots are just popping up, it's all about food, so that a Griz and her yearling are eating like crazy.  This mom looks fresh out of hibernation, almost emaciated, but her year-old cub looks in good shape.  The cub will soon wander off or be pushed off by a boar wanting to mate with this sow.  This is a particularly light-colored Grizzly whose coat will turn darker the older it gets.  

We will travel to a lot of our favorite past spots.  The wolves' den on Slough Creek seems active as the Golden Eagle's nest closes.  Both should be interesting, but it's all about getting them at that great time when they appear to be playing or having fun.  The nice thing about Yellowstone is that once you know where these animals hang out, most return to the same spot for future families.  

Traveling To One of Our Favs

 Yellowstone National Park does not disappoint, particularly for animal photography. Sometimes, it's come and go, but almost always, there's a great shot to be had. Our favorite times are spring and fall. Spring is full of babies, and fall is alive with color. Spring is full of rain and sometimes a blizzard, while fall is full of light and promises of hibernation.  

It's been a while, as life changes, since we've been to Yellowstone.  We had purchased a new (to us) RV.  We had wanted an Arctic Fox for a long time, and were looking at a fifth wheel, but small enough to get in state parks, as they are usually the most uniquely beautiful. In December 2019, we found one.  In January, we purchased it, brought it home, thinking we would go to Yellowstone in the spring of 2020.  Yeah, right!  That didn't work out, so we decided to return in 2022.  That didn't work out either.  

In the spring of 2022, Gardiner, MT, and upper Yellowstone (our favorite part) experienced one of those once-in-every-500-year floods. The water washed out the road from the North Entrance into Mammoth Hot Springs.  Here's a little of what that looked like.

Really scary.  Today, the park service has replaced it with the "Upper Gardiner Road," which Walt and I had taken many times.  It was barely a two-lane road, and at best a different road, but the park didn't need to keep it up, and probably was rarely used, except to see a few elk or possibly other animals that might trek through that area.  There are many roads like this in Yellowstone, and they are not in the best shape, but with a high truck and 4-wheel drive, they can be traveled.  The purpose is to see wildlife that wouldn't be on the busier roads through the park's northern tier.  In no one's imagination could they become something regularly traveled, especially when pulling an RV.  

The upper Gardiner Road, as it is now, the replacement for the easier path from Mammoth Hot Springs to the Northern Entrance, is not really a road for an RV, especially for tourists who may not have much expertise on a winding road with many inclines and declines.  (You don't usually use your brakes for a heavier load.  You use your gears, which saves your brakes.  This isn't widespread knowledge for the normal driver on the road.)  The part I miss the most is the occasional sighting of the mountain goats along the old path adjacent to the Gardiner River.  It was a particular favorite for moms and their new kids. 

Here's what that path looks like now.  Granted, speeded up a little, but it's much more treacherous and has had many mishaps along the way.  If you're traveling to Yellowstone, I recommend either coming in through Livingston on I-90 as a much easier trip, especially for untraveled or novice RVers. 

It's easy to understand that there were many problems at the Northern Entrance, and the park has dealt with them very well.  The Roosevelt Arch is no longer traveled, but remains a significant landmark at the entrance to Yellowstone. However, it's now used chiefly for photographs and as a marker of the history of Yellowstone.  The national park system has figured out how to make the YNP visitor and traffic patterns work together for more modern transportation, like RVs.  Hopefully, the National Park system will do the same for the road from Mammoth to the Northern Entrance.  

Unless the National Parks want to start providing all the commercial services (groceries, drug stores, zip-line adventures, white-water rafting, and other services), they need to be more accommodating to the communities that have catered to the tourists of National Parks.  Gardiner is the main entrance to the Northern Tier of the park, which remains accessible for tourists year-round.  If the road to the Northern Tier through Gardiner becomes more difficult instead of easier, the tourist won't visit as often, the town will suffer, and the park will suffer.    

The whole concept of the National Parks is to provide a way for the American public to enjoy the beauty and awe of nature.  Yellowstone is the granddaddy of the National Park system, and every effort should be made to make it as easy as possible for the public to enjoy and help preserve these parks.  

In the meantime, Walt and I will travel out of Gardiner through Livingston this year and not take our RV back through Yellowstone on the current road.  If we come to Yellowstone again, it will be through I-90.  

Traveling Is A Challenge

Traveling is challenging; sometimes, it takes rolling with the punches and keeping going.  Walt and I had planned about a month away during December and January as we hadn't been out in a while, but Claire's doing mostly.  So we were looking forward to getting out.  We've been to Arizona before during this time of year, and it's relatively dry and pleasant.  That means the lows are in the 40's, and the highs are in the 70's.  That's a nice drop in temperature, but this is the dry desert.  

Our first day was to visit family in Dallas, share some Christmas time, catch I-20 out of Dallas, and be on our way. We decided to make West Texas, Midland, or Odessa for the first day. Unfortunately, the traffic didn't have the same time schedule we did. Even getting into the metro area is challenging with Gainesville all blocked off, but getting out was another definition of a traffic jam. Walt's son just shook his head when he heard our route.  I should have paid more attention to that.

Notice the big yellow road before you get to the circle of our destination.  That took us about 3 hours to get through that part of the DFW area. 

The traffic from the Geo. Bush to junction up to I20 was a nightmare.  It took us 3 hours to get out of Dallas.  This is the worst part about being in an RV when you get stuck in these spaghetti-highway metros and have to navigate all the junctions and exit/entrance ramps, but the traffic.  

But we made it until we had to back up the trailer because we missed a turn and discovered one of our tires had blown. Most likely, we hit something on the road because the tire was perfectly sound and had a ridiculous depth on the tread. We were next to a Pilot parking lot, almost full of truckers who were getting a little shut-eye. It had lovely bright lights and looked pretty safe to me.

From the guy who can do anything, after driving eight hours, gets out the jack and starts jacking up the RV and changing to the spare under the rear of the RV.  I am continually amazed at the things that aren't so daunting for him.  But the other side of the coin is that if a sleeve is way too big, put on a colossal shoulder, that's no problem cause I know exactly how to fix that.  

But one lugnut got the better of us. After being tightened up by a garage shop's air compressor, the torque on that puppy was so tight that it stripped the hex grip on the lugnut. We could not remove it without a professional clamp or digging into the lugnut.  

So, there was no changing the tire tonight. We settled into the RV for our first night of boondocking, even though the Pilot station was open 24/7 and provided a nice facility, goodies, water, and just about anything else we needed—except an air compressor lugnut remover! So we just slept in our comfy RV.

The following day, we called the West Texas Flat Service, and he came by with an air compressor and a gripper to grab that lugnut and get it off and got the spare on in about 30 minutes.  The right equipment makes all the difference in the world.  We were off to a local shop the West Texas Flat Service guy recommended, and again, it was like another friendly face.  This is a part of the world where trucks, trailers, and truck beds carry large, heavy oil-field equipment.  This shop had its fair share of this kind of tire, so we equipped the RV with the best heavy-weight tires an RV could ask for.  

A personal note from Claire:  Men love to talk about engines, wheels, tires, heavy equipment, and all sorts of heavy mechanical things.  Walt was in heaven with his own kind!  Me, I was bored!  For me, tires are tires:  Are they good?  Are they going to last?  Are they the right size?  Fine, put them on, and I'm out of here.  Not men.  Not only do we have to have these excellent tires, but we also have to have special lugnuts that won't strip the grip by some over-zealous air-compressor lugnut tightener!  

We're back on the road, this time with a decent time schedule, from West Texas to Las Cruces, NM.  By the time you get to West Texas, you're halfway through New Mexico, so going for Las Cruces, which is practically on the border, and less than an hour from El Paso, which is on the border, it's not that hard.  Unfortunately, our first time boondocking (without sewer, water or electricity), showed us how inexperienced we are at this. 

Who wouldn't be absolutely charmed by this sunset?  It was truly gorgeous.  There's only one problem.  After the sun sets, the only light you have is man-made.  And since we hadn't given the RV any juice in 48 hours, the battery went down.  Well, OK, I forgot to turn off the lights and other things, which drew down the battery charge.  The truck wasn't set up to fully charge the RV, and our trailer lights were not working in the dark.  We crept through El Paso and then Las Cruces, and the minute we plugged the RV into the socket in Las Cruces, I was practically blinded by the lights on the RV.  I was secretly worried that the rubber on the blown tire had flapped against something electrical in the RV, and it would have to be totally rewired.  Whew!  So glad the lights came on.  

Our following day was uneventful and an easy 3-hour drive into our RV Park.  

But the RV Park is a whole other story.  Just enjoy the beautiful sunset and that we are making progress!