Fishing Bridge to Northeast Entrance and Back

Today's quest was to find wildlife and we were extremely successful. Our destination was the northeast entrance of the park, the next to last major road that we had not traveled. To get there we drove up through the Hayden Valley to Canyon Village and then over Dunraven Pass to Tower-Roosevelt before turning northeast. The road east from Tower-Roosevelt goes through the Lamar Valley which is the winter feeding ground for bison and elk in the park.  It is a wide river valley with big rolling hills dotted with many erratic glacial rocks and few trees.

Lots of Erratics

It was only forty-six degrees when we left at a quarter to ten under bright blue skies.  The first thing we saw after turning north was a huge bison beside the road. On the way to the entrance we saw seven different herds of bison, over twenty-five single bison, seventeen pronghorn, a mama and lamb bighorn sheep, and four hawks, one of which might have been a golden eagle. We had not seen much animal activity since we had been here but today was the day.

Longhorn Sheep

Pronghorn

Once we reached the northeast entrance and turned around, we stopped counting.  We sat beside a bubbling brook for a picnic and then continued back through the valley.  We stopped to view the valley with binoculars and saw a couple dozen pronghorn and some really big birds that from looking at the bird book must have been sandhill cranes. We saw hundreds more bison on the way back and had to stop four times to wait for either one or many to cross the road. It was a really fun day.

Lamar Valley and Sandhill Cranes

Only 40 Bison in Yellowstone in 1880, Now There Are 2000

When we got back, I was trying to write the blog when Ted came in to say the people next to us had invited us over for happy hour. We sat and chatted with them a couple hours and then came in for a late dinner. Ann and Tom had borrowed their daughter's RV and were really enjoying getting away from the Villages in Florida for awhile.