Day 68: A beary day
Wednesday, June 7, 2017
David and I get up early again and head toward Lamar Valley. The plan is to stop someplace for sunrise if presented and then head toward Lamar Valley.
We stop at a pull over near Tower Fall Junction for sunrise.
We move onward and as we pass the curve near Elk creek we see some people standing along the road. We ask them what they see, which is the normal question you ask anyone standing along the road. They say a black bear with two cubs. Of course we stop and head towards the spot. After taking a few pictures, I look back and the people had followed us. I think they were thinking they could out run us.
We move onward into Lamar Valley. We happen upon a car jam. Its because of a grizzly bear. We find a parking spot and begin taking pictures. All of the sudden, the bear is walking towards us. Eventually, David is asking for me to roll his window down as the bear is coming right towards him.
The bear walks right by the car. After it passes, all of the cars follow the bear. We are rather slow in moving on, which turns out to be good. The bear returns and heads off the other way.
We get in the car and follow the bear. We are caught in the traffic jam. My camera for some reason is under exposing to the point the pictures look black. It was really disappointing because of the closeness of the bear. Luckily, the pictures aren't totally black. It looks like the bear wants to cross the road and is trying to figure out how.
and heads up the hill. The camera is back to exposing correctly but I am mystified why in either case.
At this point David and I make it through the traffic jam and decide to go for a walk on Lamar River Trail. We go to the trailhead. At the restroom there are these birds (sparrows) living under the eaves.
We start hiking but then see some bison in our way:
We switch over to flowers for a while
The trailhead parking lot starts to get crowded but nobody is hiking A grizzly shows up in the river.
I did not get a picture but there is a couple of hikers just to the left in the picture. They saw the bear and walked by the buffalo David and I refused to go by.
We go back to Gardiner, have lunch with Vicki & Susan at Mammoth Hot Spring. On the way back we take a long short-cut back to Gardiner.
We stop to take pictures of an osprey.
On the way back to Lamar Valley one last time, we stop at the 45th Parallel for a quick picture. It turns out that just a few months ago we took our picture at the equator in Kenya.
At Lamar Valley there was not much interesting going on, so we take a few cloud pictures.
Back to Gardiner for dinner at Iron Horse Bar and Grill. This is where we had lunch on our first day, same waiter also.
I have been wanting to take sunset pictures from the bridge. So tonight was the last chance.
This was our last day in Yellowstone. It was a great trip. We really enjoyed spending time with David and Susan. Good luck David and Susan on your 9 month Alaska vacation.
Gardiner was a nice place to visit but is limited in eating. I think we ate at most of the restaurants there. The location of the The Bear Inn was excellent. It was just about as close as you could get to the entrance gate, shopping was within walking distance, and eating was too.
Parks visited:
photo@kristoffs.com
PaulKristoffPhotography.com
paulkristoff.blogspot.com/
David and I get up early again and head toward Lamar Valley. The plan is to stop someplace for sunrise if presented and then head toward Lamar Valley.
We stop at a pull over near Tower Fall Junction for sunrise.
We move onward and as we pass the curve near Elk creek we see some people standing along the road. We ask them what they see, which is the normal question you ask anyone standing along the road. They say a black bear with two cubs. Of course we stop and head towards the spot. After taking a few pictures, I look back and the people had followed us. I think they were thinking they could out run us.
 |
| I really like this one. |
 |
| Caught the mother with all 4 legs off the ground |
 |
| I like this one also. |
We move onward into Lamar Valley. We happen upon a car jam. Its because of a grizzly bear. We find a parking spot and begin taking pictures. All of the sudden, the bear is walking towards us. Eventually, David is asking for me to roll his window down as the bear is coming right towards him.
The bear walks right by the car. After it passes, all of the cars follow the bear. We are rather slow in moving on, which turns out to be good. The bear returns and heads off the other way.
We get in the car and follow the bear. We are caught in the traffic jam. My camera for some reason is under exposing to the point the pictures look black. It was really disappointing because of the closeness of the bear. Luckily, the pictures aren't totally black. It looks like the bear wants to cross the road and is trying to figure out how.
It makes a run for it.
and heads up the hill. The camera is back to exposing correctly but I am mystified why in either case.
At this point David and I make it through the traffic jam and decide to go for a walk on Lamar River Trail. We go to the trailhead. At the restroom there are these birds (sparrows) living under the eaves.
We start hiking but then see some bison in our way:
We switch over to flowers for a while
The trailhead parking lot starts to get crowded but nobody is hiking A grizzly shows up in the river.
I did not get a picture but there is a couple of hikers just to the left in the picture. They saw the bear and walked by the buffalo David and I refused to go by.
If we had hiked passed the bison we would have gotten real close to the bear.😀
We go back to Gardiner, have lunch with Vicki & Susan at Mammoth Hot Spring. On the way back we take a long short-cut back to Gardiner.
 |
| Our motel (Black Bear Inn) |
At Lamar Valley there was not much interesting going on, so we take a few cloud pictures.
Back to Gardiner for dinner at Iron Horse Bar and Grill. This is where we had lunch on our first day, same waiter also.
I have been wanting to take sunset pictures from the bridge. So tonight was the last chance.
This was our last day in Yellowstone. It was a great trip. We really enjoyed spending time with David and Susan. Good luck David and Susan on your 9 month Alaska vacation.
Gardiner was a nice place to visit but is limited in eating. I think we ate at most of the restaurants there. The location of the The Bear Inn was excellent. It was just about as close as you could get to the entrance gate, shopping was within walking distance, and eating was too.
Parks visited:
- Big Bend National Park
- Grand Canyon National Park
- Upper Antelope Canyon
- Horseshoe Bend
- Arches National Park
- Canyonlands National Park
- Bryce Canyon National Park
- Zion National Park
- Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument
- Utah Lake State Park
- Shoshone Falls Park
- Yellowstone National Park
photo@kristoffs.com
PaulKristoffPhotography.com
paulkristoff.blogspot.com/
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