pronghorn – Meanderings & Mind Munchies

On Wednesday, we headed to the Lamar Valley, where a lot of wildlife at Yellowstone National Park hangs out.

I don’t feel a strong need to see animals in their natural habitat, but Greg enjoys it. I was basically along for the ride and to see the scenery.

And look at the scenery!

I did not edit this photo other than to crop it. Aren’t those mountains gorgeous?

This photo is quite representative of the Lamar Valley.

Pronghorn. We saw them a couple of different times.

Since Greg was driving and my eyesight is not good enough to pick out tiny little animals far in the distance, we relied on crowds of parked cars to identify where the wildlife was.

This crowd of folks standing on a hill were looking at a herd of bison and a family of wolves.

I don’t have good pictures of the bison or the wolves because they were too far away to capture on camera. One really needed a high-powered set of binoculars to see them, which we did not have. However, some of the folks who did were kind enough to let us look through theirs.

I often have to take my photos through the windshield of the car because Greg is so focused on his driving that he doesn’t hear me express interest in pulling over to take a picture until it is too late. But I got lucky with this photo (above).

Greg had turned off the car so that he could get out and take a photo of a herd of bison across the street. Unfortunately, he left the windows open and this mother bison with her calf started wandering in my direction. At one point, she got so close I was afraid she’d stick her head in the window. I was scrunching down and trying to make myself look as invisible as possible!

Over the course of the day, we got to see black bears, pronghorn, bison, elk, and wolves.

After Lamar Valley, we headed back to Tower Roosevelt. The plan had been to eat lunch at the lodge there. Greg’s fishing captain had recommended it. Unfortunately, they were closed for the season.

The photo below is of Petrified Tree (a short detour from Tower Roosevelt). It is 50 million years old.

Next, we headed to Calcite Spring. I had been wondering why I was still smelling sulfur since I hadn’t seen any steam rising anywhere. I didn’t wonder any longer after I saw the geyserite on the walls of this gorge.

This photo was taken looking in the other direction from the photo above. Can you see the line of basalt columns near the top of the cliff on the left? Very cool.

Still at Calcite Spring, just further down the trail.

On the way back to Tower Fall, we stopped to take some photos of this basalt cliff. The size of the cars should give you some idea of how massive this thing was.

Our next stop was Tower Fall, where we had lunch and ice cream floats at the general store followed by a walk to the Tower Falls overlook.

Then we took the Tower Falls Trail down to another overlook. Greg stayed there while I followed the trail all the way down to the bottom of the gorge.

Greg (in the light blue shirt), patiently waiting for me to finish taking pictures.

Then looking in the other. Greg told me that while he was watching, this fly fisherman caught two fish.

And another photo taken from around the corner. A storm was moving in. Hence, the dark clouds.

After Tower Fall, we headed back in the direction of the campground.

We detoured to view the Virginia Cascades, but we were unable to stop and take pictures. The road was barely wide enough for the car. One side was a rock cliff, and the other was a steep drop off into the river below. It was edged with temporary cement barriers that wouldn’t have done much to keep us from tumbling over the sides into the river far below. I was terrified.

We did get to see the cascades, which were impressive, but I wasn’t willing to find a spot to pull over and take photos.

On Friday, we drove the 2 hours back, past our campground, and continued on to Jewel Cave. We took the cave Scenic Tour.

Since I doubt any of my readers are as obsessed with caves as I am, I will try to keep this short.

This cavern got its name from the calcite crystals covering its walls.

Most of the crystals aren’t as sparkly and pristine as the ones in the picture above, though. Most are covered in a dirty crust, so they look like this:

Not nearly as glamorous as the name “Jewel” Cave implies!

Jewel Cave is a “breathing cave.” The air inside changes pressure as the pressure outside changes, creating a breeze through the cave.

So far, volunteers have mapped 253 miles of Jewel Cave. Based on the pressure changes within the cave, scientists believe that only about 3% of the cave has been mapped so far.

We saw lots of different cave formations in Jewel Cave, but my favorite was probably the cave bacon:

Custer State Park — Wildlife Loop

After our tour of Jewel Cave, we headed back to the campground. I was so tired that I took a nice, long nap.

Then we headed over to Custer State Park to see if we could pick up a park pass. On impulse, we decided to do the Wildlife Loop.

Shortly after starting along the loop, we came upon this scene:

I was a little freaked out, I’m not gonna lie. And it didn’t help when Greg GOT OUT OF THE CAR to take a picture. I yelled and told him he was an idiot.

Later, we got to see some pronghorn.

And LOTS of prairie dogs.

Prairie dogs are tiny! I expected something the size of a groundhog, not a guinea pig.

Greg had really been hoping to see some elk, but it was not to be. However, we did get to see some longhorn steer as we were heading toward Custer.

To be honest, I think my favorite part of the drive was the scenery.

Since it was 7 pm by then, we decided to grab dinner in Custer rather than make dinner at the campground.