From The Drat Files. Just In Case.

I've got 2 July 30ths on my calender.  Just in case I missed it yesterday, I've got anther one today.  I hope August still starts at the right time.

Buck To Wether.

This morning we took Felix the buck to our 4-H vet Kathy at her clinic to have him made a wether.  When people in the waiting room saw him they oohed and awed at the cute goat!!

8 hours later and we went to pick him up.  Kathy took care of the buck part AND shaved his one pointy horn down to the same length as the other.  Problem: ran into head.  So he got cauterized and he's now bandaged up top for 14 days.  I didn't take a picture of the nethers on purpose.  You're welcome. 

Fun Fact: Goat horns make up 1/3 of their head.  You can't just lop off a horn like you can a bovine. You run into nerves and blood vessels and brain.  Just kidding about the brain.

Yellowstone. Part Siete.

I am just not sure where the Spanish parts came in.  Just happened.  So this is the seventh and final installment of our Yellowstone vacay.  Yay. Here is a picture in front of the Yellowstone sign.  We didn't actually take it until we were leaving the park on Thursday night. 

On our travels and stops we looked at license plates.  There were only 6 state license plates we didn't see: Connecticut, Delaware, Hawaii, Vermont, West Virginia and Rhode Island. And Canada was representing.  We saw Alberta, Quebec, Ontario, British Columbia and Saskatchewan.  But no Nova Scotia. It was a fun and exciting game.  And seriously..  Hawaii?!  What's the deal?  Can't just drive over and tour Yellowstone?!

This is the last line of stopped traffic we sat in while in Yellowstone.  1 hour is just too long to sit with no bison or bears to look at. At least we had movies and the DVD player.  And snacks.

Lot's of road work.

And here's our mode of transport for the trip. We had finally gotten the parts to put the container on the Durango rather than the van.  Otherwise we wouldn't have had enough room for the kids to come. 

As we drove through Malad Idaho, Daniel yelled out, while I was asleep, "Hey, there's Abbie and Poppy!"  And there they were.  On their way home from Mount Rushmore.  We drove by them and talked on the phone for a bit.  What a fun way to end our trip.  Then when we got home and looked through the mail, there was a post card from Mount Rushmore that Abbie and Poppy sent to the kids.

We've already begun looking at the campgrounds near Mount Rushmore for our trip next year.  Thanks for a great vacation Yellowstone!

Yellowstone. Part Seis.

On Thursday we began our day eating breakfast at the Running Bear Pancake House.  Then we stayed in West Yellowstone to go to the Bear and Wolf Discovery Center.  You have to be very quiet when you go in.  Here is my brood looking at the bears.

They had little kids go in and hide bear treats while the bears were out.  When the kids got out and the bears went back in, the bears went to work finding all the hidden treats.  Can you see the giant man eating ravens?  Huge I tell you!

Looking for treats.

Then we went to see the wolves.  Here is a mass of bones from a previous meal.

And two wolves.

Ruthie standing on the Wolf Den.

This is also a sanctuary for birds who can't be released back into the wild.  There were 2 Golden Eagles, a Great Horned Owl, a Hawk and this is Iris, the Bald Eagle. 

Inside the museum we found this polar bear.  No Sam, he's not coming for ya.

Then we went to a bakery there in town and ordered yummy sandwiches for lunch.  We'd been packing our own lunch in everyday and it had gotten old.  We went back into Yellowstone and saw more cool stuff before heading out and waving goodbye.  We had dinner at the campground that night.  They do a BBQ each night.  We had burgers and grilled cheese and Daniel had a buffalo burger. Much to our great dismay and dissatisfaction, yet with great understanding, the pool was closed for 24 hours because a toddler had a big accident in the water.  Gross.  So we bought some yummy fudge from the store and I got a cool Yellowstone tote bag. Then we went back to the tent and played games and told ghost stories by a campfire. One more post should finish us up!

Yellowstone. Part Cinco.

Waterfalls. On Wednesday's continued adventures we went to the Grand Canyon.  It was confusing.  You mean we're going to the Grand Canyon??  How can we go to the Grand Canyon when we're in Wyoming?!  Anyhoo, we saw waterfalls at the Grand Canyon of Yellowstone. 

It was very pretty.

Hi Ruthie. 

Hey Sam.

What'd'ya know Ike?



Me and him.  Him and me. 

In the canyon there was a spot with a chunk of ice.  It doesn't see the sun.  That's the ice behind the branch.

I made Isaac stand by me while Ruthie took a picture.

Then I made Sam wait while Ruthie took a picture.

Then I took the camera from Ruthie and she got mad.  This is her mad face.

After the Grand Canyon of Yellowstone we headed out to go get dinner.  On our way to West Yellowstone we ran into sit and wait traffic.  This time it was road construction.  I think they chose a bad week for road construction. Back in West Yellowstone we ate dinner at the Three Bears restaurant.  It was divine.  Daniel was feeling saucy and got a great big piece of cake for dessert. That's what it was called.  It was huge but we ate the whole thing. Then back to camp to swim.

Yellowstone. Part Cuatro Y Medio.

I found the green pictures.  These are from the north end of Yellowstone.  See all the trees?

A guy pulled over by us with his binoculars and scanned the tree line.  He was looking for bears.  No bears.

And the guy's barn door was open.  I was embarrassed for him.  But I didn't tell him.  I figured his wife should be the one. 

But as he drove away I saw that he was a lone bull too.

Maybe I should feel bad that I didn't tell him.  I hope he saw a bear.

Yellowstone. Part Cuatro.

Bison. Not buffalo.  As we entered the park on Wednesday morning we ran into a long line of stopped cars.  We thought, at first, that there must be animals on the way and people were slowing to see and take pictures.  After sitting for AN HOUR! we started to move and got to this big guy.  He was just strolling along on the side of the road and a ranger in a truck was staying along side him.  Just in case all the out of towners didn't know to NOT hit the bison. 

When we got out of the line, we, and everyone and their dog, stopped at the nearest potty.  There was a line from Yellowstone to Cancun.  One lady kept going on and on about the "One stupid bison on the road" "All that for one stupid bison" "Everyone now has to use the bathroom just because of the one stupid bison" "An hour sitting there and all I got was a picture of his rear end" "One stupid bison".  We were glad to leave the bathrooms!  This is another loner bison bull.  At least he stayed and sat in one place.  Away from the side of the road. Thanks lonely bison bull.

Wednesday we went to the north of the park.  So hilly and green.  Obviously the forest part of the park.  Hey!  Canadian Geese.  I guess I did get a picture. 

On the north end, there weren't the geysers and hot pools like the south end.  Just lots of trees and rivers. We took a little side road to find a place to eat lunch and ran into this herd.  They were just standing in the road.  As I opened my door to stand out and get a picture, they started to move toward us.

The kids thought for sure they would gore our car.  They didn't want to keep the windows down.  Just in case.  But they just passed right by us.  The big bull looked at us as he passed.  He's one lucky bull to have a large harem while those other two were on their own.

Hey.  Another bull.  On his own.  Poor lonely guy. 

Yellowstone. Part Tres.

On to Old Faithful.  We got to the parking area and had to drive and drive to find a spot to park.  It is a crazy busy time in Yellowstone in July!  We got a spot and then had lunch at a picnic area.  There were ravens everywhere.  They were huge and so I told the kids to watch out cuz they would eat them.  That's why they are so big.  Sam and Ruthie believed me for a while.  By Thursday they were on to me.  After lunch we hiked around the area for about 70 minutes.  Just enough time before Old Faithful would blow again.  We sat just on the side and waited.  She finally went.

Quite spectacular. Worth walking for over an hour looking at hot pools and geysers?  Umm..

We interrupt the boring hike to bring you this spectacular Corvette.  Yellow even.  When the kids leave home and we have some money laying around, we gonna get one. 

Okay.  Back to the geyser.  This is a shot of the kids waiting.  Sorry.  It should have gone first.  But I post pictures as I feel necessary and not necessarily in the right order.

Ope.  There she goes.  Again. No not again.  Same going. 

On our way out of the park on Tuesday we met up with these guys.  Bison!  This was the first herd we saw.  Can you see the light brown calves?  They are just a few months old. 

Back to West Yellowstone for pizza and then back to camp for swimming.  And then bed.  Except the first night of camping has everyone in a tizzy.  No one got to sleep until after midnight and everyone was up super early.  Hey, at least we got the sleeping thing down by Thursday night.

Yellowstone. Part Dos.

And here is some of the wonderful scenery.  This crane was just begging for a picture.  He's the only crane we saw, too.  We did see lots of Canadian Geese, but I didn't take any pictures of them.

Our first day in, Tuesday, we went south into the park.  It was mostly flat and bland.  Mostly because of the hot spots. You can see a small geyser/hot pool ahead.

See?  Flat and blah.

Everything was hot because of the hot water.  The colors in the pools were gorgeous because of the hot water. It was so blue and clear and clean looking. 

The dry spots were just dry.  And hot.

There are downed trees everywhere.  When they fall, they stay.  New trees grew around them.  The tall burned out trees from fires years ago gave lots of new smaller trees their start.

Another geyser.  You can see the little spit up of water in the middle there.

And with all these geysers and cool hot pools to see, the kids kept asking when we were going back to camp to swim.  Sheesh!

Lots of geysers.

We eventually made it back out to the camp site to swim.  But first... on to Old Faithful!