Day Seven

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Day 7 - Yellowstone

The search for Yogi is on. No sign of him yet.
Saw some deer, and buffalo tend to wander in the middle of the road.
Finally, a bear! And she had a cub! It was really far away, but I think we have some pictures to show that it was at least a bear. Benj took out his spotting scope and we all had a look. Mandie tried to take pictures through the scope, but we’re not sure how well those turned out.
We’re driving around the lower loop of Yellowstone.
It’s strange, we’ll see cars pulled over all over the place and you know it’s something big. We pulled over to see what was going on. Apparently a bear was chasing an elk. I found the elk, but didn’t find the bear.
Stopped to see a few springs and geysers. Old Faithful is next.
On the way to Old Faithful, we stopped at the prismatic geyser. The steam was different colors. Pretty neat. It’s been a windy day and we saw a bunch of hats floating in the water. No way were the people going into that to get the hats back!
We found another group of cars. This time, we could see what was going on. Just as we pulled up (and were stuck in traffic) a ranger came over and told us to keep driving. Benj looked at her and said “Please tell that to the person in front of us. We can’t move any faster!” Next thing we knew, the ranger was headed that way. As we passed, we could see a very large critter, either moose or elk (Mandie and Mike think it was a moose. Benji said it was an elk.) It had velvet on its antlers. Pretty neat. Mandie snapped a picture, but only got the body.
We caught the tail end of Old Faithful. It was pretty cool.
We stopped at the exit/entrance to get our picture since we missed it going in. Met a very nice family from Alabama there. Some memorable quotes:
“Did ya’ll have your turn yet?”
“Do I mash this one right here?”
Just saw the greatest road sign ever. We’re headed back to take a picture.
Headed to Flagg Ranch. It was very easy to find spot and the hookups are in the perfect spot. Our campsite is right on the end of the road. We thought there could possibly be an internet connection, no such luck. Perhaps I’ll try to get one at the lodge a little later. Time to set up the camper.

Well, things were going way too smooth. We had two big oops in the last 10 minutes:
1) The awning finally broke.
2) The Great Salsa Spill of 07

Mandie cleaned up the salsa spill while Benji went to work on the awning. After some thinking, and a beer, Benj figured out how to fix the awning. He then duct taped around our shower vent, hoping that’s where the leak came from.

We then traveled down to the Tetons to get more information on white water rafting. Good thing, too. Mandie found a trip for $39 a person…and wet suits were only $6 to rent.
We stopped by a few open areas to try out the spotting scope. Saw lots of trees.
Once back at the camper, we took our showers and hit the hay.

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