Annual Trip to Yellowstone 2013

We decided in August that we needed to see big snow again and the trip was on!  We contacted our friends at Yellowstone Adventures, booked our flights, got several emails from United letting us know that they had better flights for us and booked the rental car.

December 31st took four long months to get here but it finally did and what a day it was!  We were passengers on a new Boeing 787 DreamLiner and those planes are NICE!  No longer do the headrests have credit card readers in them - they just have entertainment screens in them with movies and music to entertain in flight....too bad we did not get to fly in a DreamLiner from Denver to Bozeman but it was a nice CRJ 700 (Ryan said he likes this "little" plane....).

We landed in Bozeman and got the rental car and went about our way to support the local economy.  We stopped at a small art gallery/furniture shop and saw the carvings completed during the spring art festivals here....one of them was a carving of an eagle with a small heron at the base.  Amazing detail!

After spotting only three eagles (one was a golden eagle!) on the way to West Yellowstone, we entered into Yellowstone National Park and made our way to our "home away from home" - Kelly Inn.  Largest indoor pool in the area, and with a fish for a daughter, that is a good thing!

We ate at Wild West Pizza (Sitting Bull is our favorite pizza!) and it was just as good as we remembered.  Back to the hotel and after swimming for a while, we decided that even though it was only 8 o'clock, we'd been up since around 4:30 AM and it was okay to go to bed......we were awakened at midnight by fireworks by those who were in the "party" mode....

Tuesday dawned bright and clear and COLD......it was about 10 degrees outside!  Weatherman said that this is "unseasonably cold" for this area this time of year -- but that's okay!  There is a good base of snow for our snowmobile rides.

After breakfast we visited the Grizzly & Wolf Discovery Center and saw an old friend Andreina.....she was our "Keeper Kids" trainer last year.  We signed the kids up to do that again.  "Keeper Kids" is a cool program where they teach kids aged 5-12 about the programs they have at GWDC and let them go into the (empty) bear habitat and hide food for the bears.  Today Sara was our "Keeper" and they got to hide for the youngest of the bears - Grant and Roosevelt. 

After Keeper Kids it was time to visit the wolf habitats and watch them interact with different sensory items the keepers have placed within.  Wolves live for about 4 years in the wild but in captivity they can live for 14-16 years.  We watched as the keepers placed black walnut scent in various places within the habitat for the High Valley pack.  They also placed a rare treat - a full elk hide.  Watching the wolves is very interesting - you can certainly tell who the "alpha" male and female are in the pack!

Take a peek at the pics from today -- hopefully you get a snowflake on your nose like we did -- it was a great day!

http://featherstonfamilyfrolics.shutterfly.com/pictures/417

Tomorrow we're off with our friend Dan who will lead our tour to Old Faithful.  This was the first tour we took in March of 2011 that started this love of Yellowstone....we hope to see eagles, swans, elks, bison and any other wildlife we can find!

Happy New Year to you all!

The Featherstons