Great MisAdventures Summer 2011

Yellowstone National Park ~ Lamar Valley ~ Northeast Entrance

July 9, 2011

     Yesterday's hike has us too tired to walk, so we decide on a road trip, letting the Mighty 350 do the work. Taking the upper loop to Mammoth Hot Springs, we travel to Canyon Junction and into the Lamar Valley, home of the largest wolf pack in Yellowstone. Our goal is to find wolves and visit Cooke City, a small town just outside the northeast gate of YNP.

Our first stop today is at Sheepeater Cliffs, named for the Sheepeater Indians, a primitive band of the Shoshone tribe that had the distinction of being the only Indians to reside year-round in what is now Yellowstone Park. We see very similar lava formations that we visited along the Columbia River in Oregon on our Fall 2009 MisAdventure.      Having never adopted the horse, the Tukudeka, or Sheepeater, lived in the mountains where they hunted bighorn sheep, elk, and deer. They were renowned for their prized bows, which they fashioned from the ram's horn of the mountain sheep.      Arriving at Mammoth Hot Springs, we are greeted by elk with their young calves. These elk seem to have found it very confortable to live among the tourists, eating the NPS grass.

Mammoth 'Pet' Elk Cow and Calf.

     The native animals gave us quite a show today. In our travels this day we saw 7 black bear including a sow and her 2 cubs, 1 grizzly bear, 1 deer, 2 coyotes, hundreds of bison covering the hillsides in the Lamar Valley, numerous Sand Hill Cranes, pronghorn, and the elk at Mammoth. The following slide show has pictures of all 7 black bears seen today, although some pictures are less than perfect. What a day for seeing the wildlife!

     The Lamar Valley is east of Tower Junction and is famous for wildlife watching. We stop and using binoculars, watch a grizzly bear eat. The bear is successful keeping the coyotes away from its kill. Lots of people with spotting scopes try to locate wolves without any luck. Hundreds of bison graze and laze on the hillsides across the very high running Lamar River from the road.

West of the road in Ice Box Canyon.

     Leaving the Lamar River, we enter Ice Box Canyon. This is a beautiful canyon in the Absoroka Mountains, just on the park side of the northeast entrance station. The high runoff has Slough Creek running over its bank, the water cascading down the valley just starting its way to New Orleans.

     Cooke City, Montana is an old gold mining town now transformed to tourist trap. Typical wooden boardwalks and 1880's construction housing high priced souvenirs and restaurants.

     Backtracking back to Tower Junction, we once again cross Dunraven Pass to Canyon, then to Norris and Madison Junctions and home, a journey today of 250 miles.

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