Since Tim had never seen Old Faithful, that was our 2^nd stop as the plan now was to do the whole bottom loop (clockwise) and arrive back north of the South entrance at Grant Village where we will be staying.

Below was our crazy route for today.

This is where our string of good luck began over the next few days.  We parked the car walked right up to Old Faithful and within 30 seconds it erupted.  Absolutely no wait at all. Next we went to the Grand Prismatic Spring and Excelsior Geyser and walked around the boardwalk. Then onto Fountains Paintpots, and then took the Firehole Canyon loop to the Firehole Falls.  Another amazing waterfall where the photos don’t do it justice. We then hit Gibbon Falls before arriving at Artist Paintpots.  We hiked to the top of Artist paintpots and looking down, it is now clear how they were given this name.  It looks like a paintbrush slapped against a canvas, but amazing patterns forming. Since we are now going to spend more time on Sunday, we passed up the Grand Canyon of the YellowStone and continued back down the loop to Grant Village.

The challenge with these trips is always finding food, particularly inside of  YellowStone because you have to book way in advance, or places simply close early.  Since we didn’t have reservations anywhere, we went to a nice waterfront place named The LakeHouse Restaurant. They had one item on the menu – tacos.  Tim had some tacos, but I passed.  We then walked up to the Grant Village Dining Building and saw an Elk on the trail there.

Knowing we didn’t have a reservation, I owned that fact and tried to charm the 2 hostesses.  I simply said “we don’t have a reservation and if you start laughing, we will leave immediately.” The one lady (who turned out to be a Xichigan grad, responded that she laughing, but only at my OSU shirt.  After a brief discussion, my charm somehow worked and the manager made an exception and allowed us to eat there.  So many things going our way.  During dinner, we found out our waitress Ella was actually from Anderson and was out here by herself all summer working.  She was also heading back home in a few days to return to classes at UC. Too crazy…

After dinner, we went and checked in at the Deer Lodge at Grant Village – – no A/C, no TV, and no WIFI, but a huge rainfall shower.  Turned in around 10:45p. Tomorrow we are making the long drive back south to the Grand Tetons in hopes of better weather.

You will need to go back to the previous page, Grand Tetons (Saturday 8/5 – Drive back to the Grand Teton National Park from YellowStone) 

Saturday 8/5 – Drive back to YellowStone from the Grand Teton National Park

We arrived back in YellowStone around 6p and our first stop was a hike to the Grand Prismatic Spring Overlook. Halfway into our hike the thunder, lightning and rain started.  We continued and arrived at the overlook.  With the rain, it made the colors more vibrant and it was an awesome view.

Our next stop was the Old Faithful inn.  We had reservations at 8:30p but arrived closer to 7:30p. After a little discussion, we were allowed to eat at 7:30p.  Great buffet of salmon, beef tips, grilled chicken, and other great stuff.  After a nice dinner, we drove our final hour back up to Canyon Lodge where we stay tonight.   What an incredible 2 days of amazing experiences, and we still haven’t been to The Grand Canyon of YellowStone yet which is the first thing on the list tomorrow..

Red light, 30 min wait, green for us as soon as we pull around the corner.

Dinner reservation at Old faithful inn

Parking at Jenny Lake

Teton Village shortcut

Arrive at Old Faithful minutes before it went off.