Yellowstone National Park, Day 2

As we made our way into the park today, we were in search of an eagle’s nest that the hotel clerk had assured us would be 3 miles after the park’s entrance. Approximately 6 miles in, there was an eagle management area and a nest. Sadly, we did not see the eagle.

Between Lower and Upper Falls, the animals made a new friend. His name is Cooter, and he gets to ride around on the back of a motorcycle. Cooter’s driver commented that she’d seen the animals at Grand Teton.

After the falls, we ran into a traffic jam. We asked a ranger, who told us it was a bear trying to cross the road. We searched in the trees for the bear. Only Aunt Shell saw the bear, though (poor Chad and Nancy). Unfortunately, Nancy deleted my picture of the bear from her camera, so we don't have a picture of it.

After the bear were more animals – we saw sheep, mule deer , and a dog (safely behind the door of a car). After these animals, we were very excited to spot a horned animal really close to the road. We think it was a velvet-horned elk (or so sayeth our memory of the book we looked at in the bookstore).

Next, we went to an area of the park described in our guidebook as being full of elk who harass the tourists. We came to an area full of lounging elk. Happily, they did not harass us.