The "Where Next?" Cross Country Trip Report

I'm posting this trip report over in my build thread on T4R, but I figured I'll post it here for you guys also. This trip happened back in May, 2018. I graduated with my Mechanical Engineering degree, and already had a job lined up. I had everything but a definitive start date from my new workplace. I had already left my previous job, so I packed my 4Runner, and set off across the country to take advantage of the down time. No concrete plans on what I'd do or where I'd go, the only goal was to see parts of the country I'd never seen before, both on dirt and on pavement.

Day 1 – Drive to Northern Wisconsin

Friday morning, I had planned to leave early in the morning as usual. But, last minute packing got in the way. This trip had little planning leading up to it. There were a lot of things up in the air, but I knew I’d be in the clear for a little bit so I figured I’d set off. If I had to be back home for something I could always turn around wherever I was and be back fairly quickly. I had no reservations, plans, or agenda. I gave the 4Runner a bath before I left, as I always do even though it gets dirty instantly…

So Friday morning I got on the road about 8 AM. Much later than I wanted to. Today I had a destination I had to make it to. I was going to spend the weekend with a friend in Wisconsin. He was able to get a lake house through work for us for the weekend. We planned to meet in Green Bay to get dinner, and then head up to the cabin. He’s not from Wisconsin, so he consulted coworkers on a place to eat, and I consulted a friend from Green Bay on the best restaurant to eat at in Green Bay. We both got Titletown Brewing as our recommendations, so we figured it must be good. I had my GPS set, and was off.

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I made it out of Alabama quickly, and shot straight up Interstate 65 through Nashville. I made good time into Kentucky. I finally had to stop for gas in Louisville, KY. Indiana came quickly as well.

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Indiana and Illinois was a very windy ride. I stopped to get gas somewhere just outside of Chicago, and grab something to eat at the slowest fast food place ever seemingly.

From here I continued into Chicago. It was dreary and windy here as well, I know why it’s called the Windy city now. I had also been warned about all the toll roads in Chicago. They were everywhere, and all odd amounts, like $.85.

I hit traffic, which got frustrating, but finally was in a new state for me, Wisconsin. It was getting dark at this point, but it looked like it was a pretty state. Very flat in the southern portion, but very green. Around Milwaukee it started to rain, and the temperature was dropping quick. When I left Alabama that morning the high was somewhere in the 80’s, with some absurd humidity I’m sure. In Milwaukee it was raining, and the temperature was hovering just over freezing around 35*. It was mid-May…

I drove through Sheboygan, Wisconsin snickering at the name of the town.

Darkness set in fully, and I stopped to get gas one more time, and change from my shorts into jeans since it was cold up here. We met up and ate at Titletown Brewing, which was an excellent suggestion. My friend had told me that while I was in Wisconsin, I had to try fried cheese curds. So an appetizer of them was ordered, and they did not disappoint. They were delicious.

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I ordered an elk burger for dinner, which was also delicious. While we ate my friend told me about the elk farm near his house. That’s something I never even knew was a thing.

We didn’t stay too long at the restaurant, as we still had another solid 2 hours of driving. That wouldn’t be bad for my friend, but I’d been on the road for 12 hours already…

We left Green Bay and headed further north into the Wisconsin wilderness. This lake house was on a small private lake not really near any towns or villages. When I checked the weather before leaving there was something like a 50% chance of snow up there as the low was down around 30*.

Thankfully we didn’t see any snow, or wildlife as we wound our way through the North Woods of Northern Wisconsin. The landscape difference between southern and northern Wisconsin is quite stark. We pulled up to the lake house and the air was over 50* cooler than what I had been dealing with in Alabama. It was great. We brought our things into the house, and got a fire roaring in the fireplace. We sat around the fireplace BSing until the wee hours of the morning. We went to bed with the plan to get up around 9 the next morning. We had planned to go to the Upper Peninsula of Michigan tomorrow, since neither of us had ever been. My friend’s coworkers said we had to try a pasty while we were there, and that turned into another story…

 

Day 2 – Stranded at Sea

My alarm went off at 9, but I couldn’t hear my friend making any noise, so I figured he was still asleep. I went back to sleep for another hour before I decided I’d finally get myself up out of bed.

I walked all through this huge lake house and couldn’t find him. I checked out front and his Jeep was still there, so I figured he was out back fishing or something. I stepped out onto the deck blinded by the sunlight. I looked around and didn’t see him in the immediate area, and then I hear someone screaming my name. I look out onto the lake and he’s on a little dock, in the middle of the lake. No boat. Just him, a fishing pole, and a sunburnt head…

“Help me!”

“How the hell did you get out there?”

“I took a boat out here, then it floated away.”

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Ouch. I went inside to put on shoes. I get to play Coast Guard apparently... I look around at my options for boats, we’ve got single seat Kayaks, big multiperson canoes, and these double person paddle boats. I called out to him to see what he took out there, and he said one of the paddle boats. So I flipped the boat over, pushed it into the water and jumped in. Now if you’ve never tried to paddle one of these two-person paddle boats by yourself it can be interesting. I’m not the smallest person, so the boat is leaning heavily to the side I’m sitting on. I try to straddle the console between the two seats, and use one foot on each paddle, but you’d have to be 6’11” to do this comfortably. So instead I used my arms to push the paddles. The steering on these things is all left, or all right. So after some fancy boat maneuvers I crash into the dock and save my friend. Now we’re off to retrieve his boat that floated away.

It had floated into a very shallow area with lots of branches and trees, so we picked up some speed and made it to the boat with no problems. Now getting out was going to be a problem. The paddles kept getting stuck on branches and trees, so we broke off two branches and pushed our way our like we had been tour guides on the canals of Venice for years.

We made it back to the house and made breakfast, while constantly reminded him about the mornings events. He will never live that down. We got ready to leave for Michigan, and contemplated the Jeep or the 4Runner. The 4Runner won, we wanted to be able to hear each other and have a conversation.

We’re driving through the Chequamegon-Nicolet National Forest, and he’s telling me stories about how it turns into some lawless land up there in the National Forest when it snows. Snow mobiles everywhere, ATVs, trucks, anything goes. Sounds kinda fun, and kinda terrifying at the same time. He also tells me a story about how he got stuck in several feet of snow coming to this very cabin in his old “one wheel peel” Silverado, as we called it. Thankfully a snow plow pulled him out of that mess. This is the same friend who flew into Salt Lake City to go to Moab with me. He flew out of Chicago for that trip, wasn’t going to make it in said Silverado, so he stopped and bought a 4wd Jeep on the way…

While we’re driving down some back road I see this ridiculous contraption in front of someone’s house. We turn around and park on the side of the road to watch this thing. He had an old steam saw set up in his front yard. I don’t know what he was cutting the wood for, he just cut it, threw it on a pile, and then used that pile to feed the steam engine. It was very cool to watch though. We sat there watching this thing in action for several minutes. The most ironic part, he had a three-legged dog…

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We made it to the Upper Peninsula, and stopped in a little town called Menominee. We walked out on a pier through a swarm of some sort of bugs, checked out this lighthouse, and contemplated what to do next. We decided we’d try a pasty while in the Upper Peninsula, so we found a place to get this local dish at.

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We walked into the restaurant lobby and no one was at the front desk. We walked around the gift shop and no one was still there. So we walked into the restaurant and finally someone acknowledged us and got us a table. This should have been the first red flag. As we’re sitting waiting to order, we realize we are the only ones in this restaurant. Literally. It’s a big restaurant, and about 4 pm, so there should have been someone more than us.

The waitress comes up and asks what we’re having. The first thing my friend asks is “is it pronounced pay-stee, or pah-stee? We’re from Alabama and don’t know…” She looks at him like that’s the dumbest thing she’s ever heard. She replies and tells us it’s pah-stee. Then she asks what kind of salad we want “house salad, or cottage cheese coleslaw.” That’s exactly what I heard, so I figure what is cottage cheese coleslaw, might as well give that a try. Once again we get a look of “Really? Did he just say that?” Apparently, it was cottage cheese, OR coleslaw. That was awkward.

Now at this point we’re laughing uncontrollably in this restaurant that we’re literally the only customers in. We can’t stay quiet, and it just keeps getting worse. The waitress walks up with our salads, and we bust out laughing again. Things just keep getting more awkward.

We look down at these salads and they are just huge chunks of vegetables. Half a tomato, whole leaves of lettuce. What is going on…

Next, she comes up with some biscuit muffin things. We are still laughing and she’s just looking at us at this point.

We look at these muffin things, unsure of what they are. I picked one up and smelled it, and if I had to describe the smell of horse food, that’s what this muffin smelled like 100%. So we’re making fun of the horse food muffins, laughing uncontrollably, with an assortment of uncut vegetables on the table. She brings out the main course, and we realize we had no idea how to eat these things. Do we pick it up and dunk it in the gravy, cut it and eat it with a fork, pour the gravy over it? We decided fork and dipping it in gravy was the way to go. We are still the only ones in the restaurant…

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The pasty was good, we ate, paid, and left as fast as we could. What an awkward dining experience. We figured we’d had enough of Michigan and headed back to the lake house to try our hand at fishing on the lake.

On the way back we saw these contraptions. I later learned these are like lawn mowers for the lake. They’re used to cut down the weeds that grow up in the lake.

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We spent the evening fishing from a large metal canoe. It’s no surprise we didn’t catch anything, that metal canoe and oars probably sounded like the titanic sinking to the fish. We did see a muskrat swim across the lake though. My friend had been talking about all the bald eagles he sees up here, but I had yet to see one. I’d never seen a wild bald eagle.

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We fished until we got cold and ran out of drinks. Back into the house we went to get a fire going, and start on steaks for dinner. We’d step outside occasionally to take in all the stars you could see in the cold summer air.

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After a long night of sitting around the fire, and burning through all the wood that was easily accessible we decided to call it a night.

 

Day 3 – Lakes, Eagles, and an Oil Change

Sunday morning I woke up without having to play Coast Guard. We spent most of the day hanging out around the lake house, taking in the nice summer Wisconsin day. He was still going on about these bald eagles, but at this point I figured he was lying.

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We were sitting outside when he says “what’s that sitting on the log over there?” Sure enough, it was a bald eagle. We watched the eagle soar around the lake for a little while until he went off to another lake or something.

Unfortunately I couldn’t get a good picture of it.

Later that afternoon/evening we decided to head back to his place. Fortunately, his workplace had a nice shop that I was able to use to change my oil before I set off the next day on my adventure.

 

Day 4 – Minnesota

After saying our goodbyes I hit the road and he went to work. I was headed west towards Minneapolis where I was going to grab lunch with another friend before continuing my journey. Before I left Wisconsin I made sure to grab some New Glarus, which is unfortunately only sold in Wisconsin.

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Western Wisconsin and Eastern Minnesota were both very flat with few people. I stopped at the Minnesota welcome center, which is right along the Mississippi River, which is much clearer than the Mississippi River is down around Mississippi…

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I drove through lots of farm land on some back highways until I got to the small town my friend lives in near Minneapolis. We got lunch, and discussed my plans for the rest of the trip. After leaving here I planned on going up to Minneapolis, and then turning west and heading towards Fargo and North Dakota. I wanted to make it to the Western side of North Dakota, and then to Teddy Roosevelt National Park the next day.

This friend is from Minnesota, and wanted me to see more of his home state. He recommended I keep going north and check out Duluth, and Lake Superior. I told him I’d think about it while I drove towards Minneapolis.

We finished up lunch, and I got on the road heading north. Before I decided to go anywhere I wanted to stop in Minneapolis and check out the new football stadium they had just built, where my Eagles had just won the Super Bowl. I made sure to wear an Eagles shirt, just to irk any people who were still butthurt over the thrashing the Eagles gave them in the NFC championship.

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After walking around downtown a little bit I headed back to my travelling hotel, I mean 4Runner. I figured I’d give northern Minnesota a shot, and see if my Minnesota friend was right about how pretty it was. The drive from Minneapolis to Duluth is pretty uneventful. The road is very flat to start. It gets slightly hillier as you get further north, but not much. I was able to get pretty good gas mileage for this part of the trip.

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My first recommendation was to stop at Enger Tower and take in the view over Duluth. I stopped here and walked up to the top of the tower. It was a pretty neat view looking back over the forest with all the new leaves that were a various shade of green, and also looking out over the city bordering Lake Superior.

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From here I went down to the pier and checked out some of the lighthouses, and watched the boats skip across the water. I was loving the weather up here. No humidity, and much cooler than the weather I was used to in Alabama.

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Day 5 –Minnesota Forest Wheeling, off to North Dakota

I woke up what I thought was early enough to catch the sunrise. Wrong. I got up and went out to the lake. It was freezing outside, so I took a couple pictures shivering in my jacket, and went to hopefully take a hot shower at the campground bathrooms.

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After packing up camp I went over to the falls. It was maybe 6 AM at this point so I was all by myself. I parked and walked the trails around the different falls. It was nice having the entire area to myself.

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And incase anyone thought it wasn’t cold, there were still huge chunks of ice hiding in the shadows.

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Minnesota deer don’t seem to care about people.

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After walking around here for a little while I got on the road and headed north. I really wanted a hot coffee at this point, but there wasn’t much up here so I just cranked up the heat in the truck.

My next stop was Split Rock Light House. It was a neat lighthouse, perched out on a cliff. There was an extremely long staircase which I walked down to get to the beach area along the lake.

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Lake or Ocean?

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The water was really clear here.

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Unfortunately, I had to walk back up the stairs which was much harder than walking down them…

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I kept driving north, enjoying the scenic drive through the country side along the lake. I stopped at another little place, Palisade Head.

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From here I got started on the smaller state highways and headed west. I didn’t really know where I was going to stay tonight, but I wanted to make it to somewhere in North Dakota. I spent several hours making good time down some back highways through the Superior National Forest.

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I crossed into the George Washington National Forest, saw that I rolled over 250k miles and decided to turn off on one of the dirt roads to celebrate. The truck was too clean for a trip like this.

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Not far down the road I ran across a tree that had fallen, and was partially cleared. Someone had cut a path through it wide enough for an ATV, or maybe a narrow jeep. I thought I could probably fit through the gap, but I decided to cut it wider because the one side of the log was at about body panel height and I don’t want body damage. So I cut the log and went to drive through the sloppy mud there. I was in 4 Hi and went pretty easy. It bogged down and immediately slid into where that log had been that I just cut. Good call me!

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I backed up, put it in 4 Lo and powered through the Minnesota sticky mud. From here the trail kept getting narrower and with more overgrowth. I guess I got there right at spring so I was probably one of the first ones through.

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I had to stop multiple times to move large branches that were hanging down out of my way. I still took a lot of pinstripes on this trail, but it was a fun time.

I made it off the trail and onto the main dirt road. I gave the Kings their first good workout on this trip here cleaning out the mud from the tires.

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And just like that I was back on the road cruising at highway speeds an hour later. Gotta love a well-built truck that can wheel and cruise.

I hadn’t thought to bring a hat with on this trip, to keep the sun off me, and to hide my disgusting hair as I wouldn’t be able to shower every day. I found a place while getting gas and set my GPS.

I crossed into North Dakota, and stopped at Fred Meyers just to see what they were. I had seen them when I went to Moab and Colorado, but never stopped at one. From here I went to Scheels to get a hat. I needed a new Eagles hat, and Fargo, North Dakota is a surprisingly good place to get one since Carson Wentz played his college football there. I bought a can of bear spray, and an Eagles hat. I was now prepared for Wyoming and Montana.

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In Fargo North Dakota…

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I left the city and got back on the highway. The 75 MPH speed limit was impossible to maintain in 4th gear with the wind blowing as hard as it was. After a short period of time I had to stop for gas again… This time I got on the interstate and found a group of Semis who were travelling at a decent speed so I joined their convoy to try and block a little of the wind for me.

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The eastern half of North Dakota is painfully boring. So flat, and so windy. There was really nothing out here. It was hot, and I know the winters are cold. No wonder no one lives out there…

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I finally made it to Bismarck and decided to stop at a grocery store and get some food that I could cook, or eat easily since I’d be living out of the truck for many many days to come. I got my stuff, and got on the road. I was hoping to make it to my campsite by dark, but I realized that wasn’t going to happen so I stopped at a nice rest stop and commandeered a picnic table to cook dinner on. I had a pretty great view for a rest stop, these pictures don’t do it justice. The western half of the state is much more attractive, and actually has these cool things called hills.

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I cooked some concoction of beef, peppers, and teriyaki sauce. It was a lot of food so I threw the leftovers in some ziplock bags and into my cooler. It was just about dark now, but I didn’t have too much farther to go to my campsite. The extra light up this far north and west in a time zone was really nice. It was light until really late here. There was still light in the sky past 10:00 PM.

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I got off the interstate, and it wasn’t too much farther off the interstate to my campsite. A little bit of pavement, and then some windy dirt roads through the soft rolling hills. I stayed at Schnell Recreation Area. I paid my fees, and went to pick my campsite. I was the only one here, which was nice. I picked which site I would call home, and set up my bed for the night. There was a creek I could hear running not too far away, some cows mooing, and a really loud screeching sound occasionally which I think was a wind vane. Since I was all by myself in the middle of North Dakota, there were a lot of stars to be seen. I grabbed the camera and tripod, and got a couple shots.

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Some of them came out pretty good. I was tired, so I climbed into the 4Runner and went to bed. Tomorrow I would go to Theodore Roosevelt National Park, and then cross into Montana.

 

Day 6 – Theodore Roosevelt National Park & Montana

I woke up this morning and it was quite warm inside a black truck sitting in a field. I got out and took in the solitude of the campsite I had chosen. Then I cooked eggs and bacon.

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After eating and rearranging the truck, I was back on the road and headed towards Theodore Roosevelt National Park. This is a park I’d never really heard about before, but it looked like a nice stop with wildlife and the scenery of the Dakota badlands I’d never seen before.

I stopped at the Painted Canyon off the interstate and was pretty blown away by the view. The badlands are like nothing else. The colors in the dirt and the soft rounded hills are beautiful.

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After walking around this little area for awhile I noticed there was Bison poop everywhere. There were no bison here at the time, but it set my expectations high for seeing a Bison.

I got back in the truck, and just a few miles down the road I saw a heard of wild horses off the side of the interstate. I pulled off the interstate and walked up to fence of the national park to get a few pictures of the wild horses.

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From here I drove to the Southern entrance of the park, and bought a yearlong pass to all the national parks for $80. Considering most parks are $40ish to get in, this is a great deal if you plan to go to a lot of parks like I did.

The ranger told me that there had been lots of wildlife spotings, and if I’m lucky I’ll see a Bison calf.

The first stop was this prairie dog farm.

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The interstate winds along the southern end of the park, but it’s a fairly low traffic interstate which is nice.

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Then I came around a corner, and spotted a Bison standing around eating grass. This was really neat as I’d never seen one of these before other than maybe in a zoo.

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Then, around the next curve I spotted a campground and could see a couple more Bison! I drove to the campground and watched the Bison hanging out along the river.

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I got back on the main road and saw another Bison, and a little prairie dog.

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Then, further down the road I saw many more Bison. Including these two that J walked right in front of me.

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Bisons in mirror are closer than they appear.

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The next stop was Wind Canyon Trail. A short easy hike up to a nice vista point over the river and some plains where Bison herds tend to frequent apparently.

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In this picture you can see the herd of Bison in the field.

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Really does look like the wild west out here doesn’t it?

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The road then meandered down towards where the herd of Bison were at, and from here I could see that there were several Bison calves in the herd. Some walking around, some passed out taking a nap.

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Some fire damage that scarred the hills.

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More wild horses along the road.

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I had gone through most of the park now, and decided to get back on the road and head into Montana.

I made it to the state line and stopped to grab a picture with the sign. With traffic zipping past me at 80 mph I didn’t stay for long.

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I stopped at a rest stop to get some park information and maps, and the lady working there gave me one of every book seemingly. Armed with information I got back on the highway. There were super long stretches of highway out here with no service, something you definitely don’t see on the east coast.

This interesting sign was at the rest stop too.

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And they sure don’t mess around with short trucks out here…

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I made it to the next rest stop here and stopped to use the bathroom. While I was here I popped the hood and threw my leftovers on the intake manifold to warm up. It worked really well actually.

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I had been watching my CB radio antenna spin in a circle this entire trip, but with the stronger winds in North Dakota and the higher speed limits in Montana I decided I needed to do something about it. At 80 MPH I could see the antenna slapping the spare tire, it was just about reaching to the other side of the back window.

I pulled off in a nice scenic place and grabbed my 550 paracord to rig something up. I ended up tying a slip knot on both end of a 3 foot section of rope or so. I looped one end around the roof rack, and the other end got cinched tight onto the CB antenna about 6 inches from the top.

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Hopeful that my new solution would keep the antenna still, I got back on the interstate. It worked!

The weather had changed though, and now it looked like I would be driving into some ridiculous Montana thunderstorm.

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After watching the lightning strike from this storm constantly off in the distance I decided to pull off the interstate to take a few pictures of the storm front as it moved east towards me. I was fascinated with the blue sky behind me, and the black sky ahead of me.

The lightning struck non-stop to the left of this road, and to the right the sun peaked through the clouds and across the horizon. It was like scenery from a calendar or a windows background.

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I stood here, taking pictures, watching the lightning streak through the clouds, and listening to the thunder roll across the land.

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The amount of light produced when the lighting would strike was pretty neat.

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After about an hour of standing here, it was starting to get a little sketchy so I packed the camera up and got in the truck. Unfortunately, I now had to drive through this mess…

I got back on the road, and almost immediately I was in the middle of this storm. It was like being blasted with a fire hose, and the lightning was so bright and constant that I felt like I was driving during daylight.

The storm finally died off, and I made a stop in Billings. I picked up a couple things, including another SD card… When I got back to the 4Runner I had to make a decision on where to camp. After studying the weather forecasts the night before I decided that Yellowstone would be my next stop, and then I would head up towards Glacier.

It was late already, something like 11 PM, and I finally decided I’d be staying at a campsite near Cody, Wyoming. I gassed up, and got on the road. With the high speed limits even on state highways I made pretty good time to Wyoming and then Cody.

Once in Cody I stopped and packed up any open food I had, which was minimal, into an airtight plastic ammo can. Not the perfect solution, but a decent way to keep any bears away I figured.

I made my way up Cedar Mountain on Spirit Mountain Road which was a narrow shelf road with a sharp drop off on the one side.

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I made camp at an open area off the trail and enjoyed my view over the small city of Cody. I parked the truck on what seemed like a decently level area, rearranged my things to make my bed, and passed out.

 

Great trip report, looks like a fun time!

Loved this part. Litterally made me laugh out loud as I read it. Nice writing.

Nice! What's your trick to capturing the lightning?

 

Thanks man, lots more of this one to come!

That was by far the most awkward experience I've ever had at a restaurant... It just kept getting worse somehow haha

As far as the lightning, the first 4 pictures were taken using a burst mode and just holding the shutter down in the direction of the lightning. You end up with lots of pictures of the same thing, but when it does strike you get some nice ones. It's good if you don't have a tripod or are too lazy to get one out.

All of them after the first 4 were taken using a long exposure and my tripod after I stopped being lazy and got it out. I think I was using a 5 second shutter time with the lowest ISO setting on my camera, 100 I believe.

The last two were actually taken with my Samsung S8. I used a 10 second shutter and ISO of 100. It's pretty neat that you can get pictures like that now with a basic smartphone camera. The red hue in the foreground is from my taillights. I had the truck running ready to go incase it got a little to close for comfort and was using the spare tire as a tripod for my phone haha

 

Enjoying the trip report....good humor and those Montana skies were awesome!

Where's the rest of it??

 

Thanks! I should get some more posted tonight or tomorrow.

 

Great trip.


However.

Im pissed you didn't message me. You drive RIGHT by where I live haha

 

Thanks Monte, I really need to get on posting the rest of it... I thought about messaging you before hand but the whole thing was kinda on a whim. I didn't decide to go to Yellowstone before glacier until the day before. I definitely want to spend some more time in that area though, I'll message you next time for sure! You live in a beautiful place! Wyoming is severely underrated.

 

Yes it is. And I hope it stays that way!

Next time then..

 

Sorry for the lack of updates... Things got real busy, but hopefully I'll have more time here soon to finish this trip report. I'll pick up where I left off, the beautiful state of Wyoming.

 

Day 7 - Yellowstone

I woke up in the morning quite hot from the sun beating down on me again, and to the voices of some people that were walking the trail. I couldn’t tell the night before, but I had picked a pretty scenic campsite for the night.

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I packed my things, and headed back down the mountain. I decided I’d drive back into Cody to grab breakfast. I stopped at a small place called “Our Place”. They advertised 25 cent coffee, so I was sold. I was also the youngest person in here by 40 years that wasn’t with their grandparents, so it had to be good. I got the huevos rancheros and was not disappointed.

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After breakfast I went across the street and got gas. Now I was ready for Yellowstone. I hopped on highway 14 and headed west towards the park. The scenery got better the closer I got to the park.

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I made it through the gate, and started the long steep ascent up, the temperature dropping all the way. I passed by a frozen lake on the side of the road, that had attracted every tourist to stop and take pictures. I continued on and stopped at this vista point, looking over the still partially frozen Yellowstone lake. The water was so still the mirror like reflection off the water was stunning.

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I drove down the mountain to the lakes edge. A storm was starting to brew along the north side of the park.

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The frozen part of the lake started a little farther back from the edge of the water. The edge of the water was steaming. It seemed peculiar at first, then I remembered I was standing on a massive volcano.

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It’s a strange feeling to put your hand in water that’s literally got huge blocks of ice in it, and find the water scalding hot.

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The water was incredibly clear in the lake, and the green streaks in the water due to the volcanic activity are very interesting to observe.

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Back on the road, I spotted my first wildlife in the park.

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I pulled over on the side of the road and watched this massive guy eat some grass. These animals are huge…

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The storm seemed to be getting a closer and larger.

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I stopped along the Yellowstone River on my way towards the mud volcano. I took only a few pictures before a lightning strike scared me back into the 4Runner…

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I drove up to the Mud Volcano, and despite the rain that was coming down I walked around the boardwalks and observed the murky bubbling water.

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From here I drove north towards the Grand Canyon of the Yellowstone. I parked in the parking lot next to some people shoveling ice out from the cowl under their windshield. Apparently I had just missed a massive hailstorm that dumped so quick and fast everyone came to a stop in the road. The weather changes so quickly out there.

The canyon itself was beautiful, and the stones really are yellow here.

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From here I intended to head north towards the Tower-Roosevelt area, but that road was closed, so I headed west towards Norris.

From Norris I headed north, towards the mammoth hot springs. Unfortunately there was some serious road construction here, so I got stuck in traffic for awhile. I took a few pictures while I waited for the construction crews to let us pass.

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After making it through the construction, I noticed several elk out in the field, so I pulled over at a pull off to get a better look. Using my binoculars and phone’s camera I was able to get some decent zoomed in pictures of them.

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Everything here is very picturesque.

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Now I had made it to the Mammoth Hot Springs.

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I walked around the springs, while keeping an eye on the weather that was rolling in again.

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Looking over the small village here at Mammoth Hot Springs.

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The Minerva Terrace was pretty neat.

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The trees here made for an eerie landscape.

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I drove into the little town to find a heard of elk had taken over.

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It was starting to get late, so I began to head back south towards Norris and Madison. By this time the construction crews had gone home and most had left the park, so I didn’t loose much time there. I stopped at a pull off to take in another awesome view.

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I made a stop at the Norris Geyser Basin, and met a cool guy from somewhere in Texas. I don’t remember his name, but he was a music teacher in Texas. We chatted about where we had stayed last night, and where we’d stay tonight. I hadn’t fully fleshed out my plans and he hadn’t either, so at least I wasn’t the only one totally unprepared.

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This was a pretty cool area, with the steam coming from the earth all around you.

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I was now going to head towards West Yellowstone and hopefully find somewhere to stay near there so I could get back into the park early before the crowds.

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I stopped in the town and got gas, and figured out where I’d be staying. I found a couple different options not to far from the park. Some were free and on BLM land which was what I really wanted, but one sight in particular claimed to have bathrooms and showers. A shower sure did sound nice after going several days without one, so I picked that one. It wasn’t too far, but it was across the Idaho Montana border.

I set off towards the park and took note of the signs stating there had already been an absurd amount of bison strikes. That will not buff out…

I crossed across the Idaho/Montana border, Idaho being the 45th state I’d been to now.

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I made it to the park, and paid the exorbitant fees. I paid something like $7 daily entrance fee plus a $20 camping fee. A bit pricey considering I was sleeping in my truck using nothing more than a parking space, but I paid and found a spot. I set up camp and went to bed, looking forward to my shower in the morning.

 

good stuff!

Funny how you camped on Cedar mountain outside of Cody! LOL didn't think that was legal but whatevs

 

Great trip, awesome pictures, really enjoying this!

 

I didn't see anything posted saying I couldn't camp there, I found it on freecampsites.net I think. I was only there for a few hours anyway, more of a power nap than camping. Was a great view in the morning though, snow capped mountains to the west, and the city of Cody to the East.

Thanks! Lots more to come!

 

Great report! Thanks for sharing all of the pictures! Sounds like fun