June 7th continued. We made our way through an about 15 minute construction delay and next stopped at the terraces of Mammoth Hot Springs. We walked most of the area starting at the top. They seem much drier than at my last visit (13 years ago).
In Mammoth there were some mother elk with some fresh babies that were basically just learning how to stand. Per the ranger, they were a few hours old at most.
We also were not able to go to our cabin due to an aggressive mother elk in the area. We headed into Gardiner and had lunch at the Yellowstone Pizza Company in Gardiner. It was very good and we even returned the next day. We also saw the Roosevelt arch.
In the evening we made a drive to Lamar Valley spotting our first black bear along the way. We saw 5-6 black bears on our trip, all between Mammoth and Tower except one just before Lamar Valley. The highlight of Lamar Valley was the baby buffalo.
June 8th We awoke to snow. A pretty decent amount of snow. My Florida girls enjoyed eating snow, throwing snowballs, and making snowmen. We also saw baby buffalo playing in the snow, Pronghorn Antelopes play fighting and another black bear.
We saw Undine Falls and hiked the Wraith Falls trail in the snow.
After lunch at the Yellowstone Pizza Company in Gardiner and a rest in the cabin we headed back out for another pass through Lamar Valley. The highlight was watching a coyote hunt. We saw another black bear on the way back to Mammoth.
June 9th Leaving Mammoth – We headed to Tower on a nice blue sky day with almost all the snow gone. We saw Calcite Springs and Tower Falls without the snow which looked quite different one day later. At Tower Fall I finally got some decent pictures of a Western Tanager.
Next we headed over a still pretty snowy Dunraven Pass. The girls got one last chance to play in some snow.
Next was Canyon and the Hayden Valley area including Lake Yellowstone
Return to Yellowstone Geyser Area or Grand Teton Days 1-3.