Drive to the Northeast Gate
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It continued snowing throughout the night and by morning there was a good 6 or 7 inches on the ground. So the forecasters got it right, they were just a day off. It continued flurrying throughout the morning. We figured we were going to be spending the day in the trailer wishing the roads were open.
But the lure of coffee is strong, so after watching a couple of vehicles make it up the hill of our RV park, we (well Les) decided we should go into Gardiner and get some. And then, if the road was open, head up to the park headquarters and buy a few items at the gift store and that would be the day’s excitement.
We had a friendly chat with the woman at the Yellowstone park entrance gate and urged her to open the roads. But no, only the road to Mammoth Hot Springs was open. On the way up, we saw people with long telephoto lenses pointed out into the distance. A tell-tale sign of wildlife. So we stopped to see what they were looking at. It turned out to be Pronghorn antelope. They were a ways off and because we weren’t planning to go anywhere interesting, I hadn’t brought my camera and telephoto lens. Bummer. I got a few shots with the best the phone could do and Les convinced me we should go back to the trailer and get it. I figured the antelope would be long gone by the time we got back but why not give it a shot?
15 minutes later we were at the entrance again, talking to the same woman. She said, ‘back again’? Les said since the roads were closed, we were going for quantity of entrances vs quality of visit. She (and all the park people) were very nice and friendly. Kudos to whoever is hiring the folks here.
The antelope were, of course, gone by the time we got back. But it turned out getting the camera was a good idea. But we didn’t know that yet.
We went back to the General Store where we both bought a few items to bring home. Then wandered over to the hotel because I had read they had a fancy map of the US made of wood. Which they do and it’s pretty cool. Apparently, there is one state capitol that is mislabeled but I checked most of them and couldn’t find it. Ultimately, I had to ask the Google, where we determined that some enterprising map creating person had decided that the artist who designed the map had labeled Maryland’s capital incorrectly and so he changed it from Annapolis to Baltimore. The dot is in the right place, but the label is wrong. The artist suggested perhaps Maryland could change their capital.
While we were at the hotel, a ranger (or hotel employee) announced that the road to Tower was now open. This is the road to the Northeast entrance. Well now. We hadn’t gone down that road when we were here the last time. And what else are we going to do today? So let’s go. But wait. It’s 12:30. There is nothing out there but rocks and snow. We better get me some food or things won’t end well. (As it was, I hadn’t brought along my water bottle and got a bit dehydrated by the end of the day which made me a bit grumpy.)
We’d been denied the lunch place yesterday but today we were in their limited time window for serving food, so let’s go. Our server was a grizzled veteran of working at the park named Rose. We had asked her about who lived in the nice houses we had seen. It turns out that’s for the senior park people. She and other less senior park workers live in the old army barrack/dorms behind the hotel. She comes up from Arizona for the ‘season’ and had been doing so for 17 years.
The food wasn’t anything spectacular and not cheap, but the ambiance was nice and not going hungry was especially nice.
We headed down the road around 2:00 which gave us just enough time to go the 45 miles to the end (at the Northeast Entrance) and back again before it got dark. Well, it’s not really the end but the road past there, Beartooth Pass, was closed for the season. Which well it should be since it’s almost 11,000 feet at the top and no one in their right mind should be heading over it, not that they probably could.
We weren’t sure what to expect out there. There are no thermal fields. We mostly just planned to drive to the entrance and turn around, and see whatever scenery there was to see. Well, as it turns out, it’s where the bison hang out! Or at least it was today. We got the first clue when we came across a herd of 40 or 50 milling about a field and across the road. We stopped awhile for pictures, thinking this was probably it for bison. But no. We came across probably a dozen different herds along the way to the end and back. They seemed to be everywhere. They are impressive. And since they root around eating the plants, they get snow in their ‘beards’ which looks kind of cool. We took many many pictures of bison. A few were even good.
The roads were remarkably clear considering it had been closed the day before. And until we got above about 7000 feet about 2/3 of the way there, the cloud cover was high, and you could see a long ways. The snow improved the view a lot. All the evergreen trees had white blobs on them as did the rocks in the rivers. Very pretty.
We got to Tower, which is about 1/3 of the way to the end, where Les was very disappointed to discover there is no actual tower. It must have been named for someone (Irving Tower, as my Dad would have said). Roosevelt Lodge is in Tower, which was closed for the season, but it’s apparently the place to go for horseback riding through Yellowstone and there were lots of riding trails around it. Unfortunately, the road that circled back to the south, where the Tower waterfall is, was closed. So nothing to see here.
As we headed towards the Northeast entrance the clouds got lower and there were some snow flurries and it was getting towards 4:00. I was getting nervous about getting stuck out there (the dehydration didn’t help). But there’s one thing I know and that’s if there’s an ‘end of the road’ to go to, Les is going to go to it. And generally, I’m in favor of this as well. But it kept seeming to be ‘just up the road’. There was no cell service so we couldn’t check the GPS. We stopped to ask a park ranger who was parked on the side of the road how much farther it was, and he said “oh just a mile up the road” *and* he didn’t say “what are you guys doing out here, turn back now”. So I was able to relax after that. What he did say was ‘yeah, stop into town and have a soda and bring me one’. But we didn’t.
The northeast gate was not manned since no one could come in from that direction. We got into Silver Gate where there were a couple of businesses, but none were open, except the Grizzly Lodge, which surprisingly was open, considering the only way to get there is to drive 50 miles in from the North gate, and not surprisingly had their vacancy sign up. So at least if we had gotten trapped out there, we would have had a place to stay. But we probably would have had to spend the winter there.
We headed back at a much higher rate of speed than we had headed out since Les could tell I was nervous about getting back before dark (or snow). But it was no problem. And we, in fact, had time to stop multiple times for more bison, elk and rock pictures.
On the way back, once we were in cell phone range again, we discovered that all the roads that had been closed for snow were now open. So tomorrow, if it doesn’t snow in the night, we can finally head down to see Old Faithful.
We got back just after 6 where we had chili and salad for dinner and the last of the Dove bars for dessert.
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