Good morning sunshines!
PBJ crew.
A beautiful morning for breakfast outside.
First on the agenda was a trip to a spot in the river where steamy hot water bubbled into. It was amazing – the half of the river on the hot spring side was HOT – bathtub hot – 120 degrees maybe? The other half of the river was icy cold, like you’d expect a mountain river to be. It was really neat.
We walked half a mile to the swimming area.
The kids had a good time wading and swimming in the hot water, even though the air was very very cool.
We were there for awhile then went to the visitor center at Mammoth Hot Springs.
We all really enjoyed the different exhibits in the museum.
We lunched in the van as we drove to the Wraith Falls trailhead. Since Joshua’s jacket didn’t get loaded in the van and the temperature had dropped quite a bit since morning, he got to wear Jesse’s flannel shirt. Thankfully we had his new hat and mittens and the 5 pairs of gloves I had gotten earlier, so we were all plenty warm on our hike.
Wraith Falls.
The target.
Tired little tot!
Dad and I took the short walk to see these Bleached Cliffs, which are just across the canyon from Specimen Ridge, where we hiked on Tuesday.
The lookout platform was a sheer dropoff to the canyon.
The trail is very faint, but that’s probably where we waved to those on the boardwalk where this picture was taken from.
We think, but are not sure, that the little knoll is where we had our lunch that day.
A stop at Tower Falls – a short walk to a another beautiful waterfall.
Walking back to the van.
Driving back to the cabin – another bear alongside the road. This one was a black bear, according to a park ranger who was there.
Driving in the park is always interesting – especially when there is wildlife on the road…
…and right beside the road.
We enjoyed the herds too.
THEN… the kids wanted to do more rock climbing on the river, but we had trouble finding a good spot to access it. This is where we finally decided to descend.
Dad and the kids had no problem going down…
…but it took me much longer.
Halfway down, looking up.
Beautiful, but not an easy hike, that’s for sure. Actually I wasn’t sure I was going to make it down – and if I got down I wasn’t sure I could make it back up. It wasn’t the best part of the day for me, I’ll confess…but the kids loved it.
Looking for trout.
Joshua had fun throwing rocks in.
The water was so neat splashing up onto this big rock.
My shoes are NOT good for rock climbing; when a touch of drizzle made the rocks wet, I could hardly go anywhere. Thankfully Dad and the boys helped me get around a bit.
I finally made it down, and there I stayed for awhile.
And wouldn’t you know it, there were a couple of trout fishermen right upstream from us, and they soon had an avid audience. The kids said he caught about 4 in the first 5 minutes they were watching him.
We thought this was the neatest little cave until we decided it might be a nice home for snakes.
This was kind of a practice shot; I wasn’t really thinking about a portrait, but it just might be one anyway because I really like how it turned out. It really brings out the windblown sparkle of our Kate.
If you look REALLY close near the middle of the picture, you can see the fisherman that Kate was watching – one of the two upstream fisherman moved past us to a different pool.
And, with patient help from some of my boys, I finally got to a spot where I could see some fly fishing. I never did see the fisherman at all; all I could see was his pole and line which are barely visible in the picture, but I got to see him cast several times, and he even caught a small one while I watched. So now I understand a little more about fly fishing and how it’s done, but I still don’t understand why it’s so popular with everyone, especially when it’s catch-and-release only in the park. We couldn’t believe how many fishermen we saw – dozens and dozens were everywhere we went, maybe partly because there aren’t that many streams where fly fishing can be done (?). Anyway, so now I know.
We got back to the cabin and made supper, and we were just about done eating when Sarah saw a bear run across the green yard right across the river from us! Well, finished or not, the meal was over (!) because everyone immediately got bear fever again. Out we went, and watched him climb the apple tree; I don’t know where we got the idea that grizzly bears can’t climb trees because we could certainly see that indeed this bear COULD climb that tree. He went up pretty fast…
…but came down even faster when we heard two gunshots! Jesse saw a man on the porch of the house (just out of the picture) with a rifle; although it’s not hunting season and he obviously wasn’t shooting to kill, that bear raced out of the tree and into the brush remarkably fast. We followed his journey down the riverbank to the river, and then chuckled at him as he wanted to cross back to our side but couldn’t find a spot that was shallow enough. I didn’t know that bears don’t like to swim; at least this guy didn’t like to. I didn’t get the greatest picture, but the tell-tale shoulder hump of the grizzly (versus the black bear which doesn’t have it) is still evident; and again, a distant bear is still a bear, right?!
Sooo….that was the end of our second (last, I hope) close encounter with a bear in the wild. That’s enough for me.
After the bear finally ambled out of sight, everyone came in and pitched in with dishes, cleanup, preparing for tomorrow, showers, baths, Bibletime, and beds. The older kids watched a couple dvds, and Dad checked his work email; but I went straight to bed – pretty exhausted. That river rock-hop adventure did me in, I think.
That’s all.
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