Empty Nesters

Thursday, August 24. Grant Village, WY to Bridge Bay, WY

Today is our first day back as just a couple, the "kids" heading west toward Old Faithful and the Oregon Coast. They'll be in Florence, OR, around September 11, and then head their separate ways to San Francisco and Seattle. We're heading east, and like empty nesters who've been camping with their kids for the last 6 nights, we're stopping at the first hotel we can find.

Our destination is Lake Village, a distance of only about 20 miles. Since we have all day to get there, we stop at West Thumb for a tour of the Paint Pots. John Colter is thought to have been the first white man to visit what is now Yellowstone Park. He requested leave from the Lewis and Clark expedition to investigate the area. The local Indians took him and some trappers on the grand tour. The Indians used the colored mud found in West Thumb's fantastic thermal features as paint, and also spread the mud on dried hides to clean and soften them.

Along with the burbling, bubbling paint pots, there are conical formations that feature spouting steam and bubbling water. The Indians used these as fishing spots, and showed the white men how to use them. When Colter returned to the east to tell the Yellowstone tale, he embellished the story by claiming that one could catch a fish and then cook it on the way up through the cone. The whole Yellowstone area is so utterly fantastic, so other-worldly and so completely beyond the grasp of the average joe and jane, that there shouldn't have been any need for Colter to dress up his stories. But he did, and as a result, no one believed him. In fact, the area was known as "Colter's Hell" until other explorers confirmed the basic facts of his report.

We spent quite a bit of time at West Thumb--the boardwalk provides a terrific tour of the hot springs, mud pots and colorful micro-organisms of the Geyser Basin, while Lake Yellowstone and the Absaroka mountain range provide a magnificent backdrop. The strong smell of sulphur from the springs is just a bonus.

Back out on our bikes, the road follows Yellowstone Lake for miles until we reach Lake Village. At the Lake Hotel we found that there were no rooms at the inn--or the nearby lodge. We would spend one more night camping, this time a few miles behind us at Bridge Bay campground. Matthew took this opportunity to make reservations for the rest of our nights in Yellowstone. The park is still fairly busy, even in late August, and he was only able to get us a room at Mammoth Hot Springs and Old Faithful. We'd camp on the days in-between. I took the time to look around the hotel, which dates from 1891. The hotel had been remodeled in the 1920's, and is now fully restored to that time period. The hotel also features an artist-in-residence program, and original artwork and prints from this year's artist are available in the gift shop. Lake Hotel is one of the spots where early stagecoach travelers to the park stopped. It's right on Lake Yellowstone, and offers beautiful views of the area.

While we were at Lake Village we had lunch in the diner and then picked up some camp groceries before heading back to Bridge Bay Campground. Once again we encountered the prevailing campground policy of stuffing hiker/bikers in the most remote part of the campground, this time up a long, damn hill. The camp loop is nicely wooded, includes restrooms, service sink and conveniently located bear-proof food storage boxes. We found our site and after pushing our bikes and trailers up a short incline onto the site, began to set up camp. It was late afternoon when we arrived, and once the tent was up and furnished, and anything with a scent was stashed in the bear box, we found ourselves with time to sit and relax. You might think that since our only job is to get from here to there each day, that we have all kinds of free time. But once you stop here for a snack, there to look at the hot springs, and ohmygod is that a bison or just a big boulder?, the day is pretty well spent. Even once we get into camp there's usually laundry and showers waiting, but no such luxuries are available at Bridge Bay. Having a couple of free hours is a real treat.

As we swung through the loop on the way to our campsite we passed the group campsites. Two of the sites were peppered with small tents, and we also noticed three white, unmarked vans parked near the sites. The group sites are conveniently located next to the restrooms and service sink, of course, and on a trip to the facilities I overheard some of the young women discussing their upcoming showers, on schedule for the next day. I found out that they're from MIT, here in Yellowstone for a peer leader outing. They had been at the campground for 7 days, and were leaving in the morning. They all seemed pretty good-natured about not having showers for a week, and I was heartened not to hear any whining--although I did notice that virtually every one of them was wearing a hat of some kind.

Back at our campsite, Matthew and I were quietly reading and writing postcards when Matthew was distracted by a rustling noise in the woods nearby. He turned around and was practically able to kiss a young deer who was munching his way through the forest. Matthew was certain that the deer was really after our food (and possibly our toothpaste or lip balm), so I sneaked over to the bear box to secure the lid. The deer had crossed the road right ahead of me, but since I got to the bear box before him, he feigned disinterest and wandered off toward the group sites.

The two non-group campsites near us were occupied, though the tent-to-camper ratio was quite a bit higher than in the group sites. One of the campers wandered over and asked Matthew if we would be disturbed if she practiced her music in the area. "I just don't want to practice in front of a bunch of undergrads" was her explanation. I didn't see the instrument, but it had the quality of an ancient instrument. I'm no great judge of musical talent, but I'm glad that Matthew agreed to let her practice. It seemed to me that she needed it. Not long after that, a threesome on mountain bikes came up our loop, and we stopped to talk with them. They'd come to Yellowstone from South Dakota, and so are not as enchanted with close encounters of the buffalo kind as we are. Dad, Mom and pre-teen son been out for a few hours, looking for off-road trails in the park. They hadn't found too many in the area, but they ended up in the hinterlands of camp-dom because it looked remote enough to offer some trails. They asked about our trip, and then explained that they'd seen a traveling slide-show of a similar trip. The pair that created the show had spent a few months on a cross-country bicycle trip, and were now on the road with their slideshow and seminar. Seems that the dad of the trio owns the little theater in the little town in SD where the slideshow was presented, and I distinctly sensed an unspoken invitation for us to provide an encore presentation. Then they were off to their own campsite, and to await the evening's campfire-side ranger presentation.

As the sun went down behind the trees, our lovely wooded campsite started to get cold and colder. We slipped into our tent, cocooned up into our silk sleeping bag liners and snuggled between our unzipped sleeping bags. We spent the rest of the evening reading, and had a warm, restful sleep. The next morning we'd be heading to Canyon, where there was a room with our name on it.