Before I dive into my second full day at Yellowstone, one thing that I feel compelled to mention is how amazing the weather was the whole time I was out there. Normally, for a trip to Yellowstone, you expect constantly changing weather, with at least a short burst of rain or two pretty much every day (and the skies alternately cloudy and clear). Not this time, though! It was blue skies and sunshine almost the entire time I was out there. There were a few inconsequential drops of rain at some point on this day while I was on the road driving somewhere, and it did rain Wednesday evening and night (starting, predictably enough, about a minute after I’d put my kabobs on the grill over my campfire)—but that was it! The days were sunny and quite warm, but not at all humid. At night, of course, it got cold (down into the 40s), but—I’m guessing because I was there later in the summer this time than on past trips—it consistently waited until much later in the evening/night to start cooling down past the comfortable range, as compared with my previous visits. It would be cold when I would get up in the morning, but then warm up nicely well before lunchtime every day. I actually got a little sunburn on Monday, but nothing serious (and I was more diligent with the sunscreen for the remainder of the trip).
(By far the most serious rain that I experienced on the trip actually happened within the first few hours of leaving home, while I was still in MN; I drove through a torrential downpour in, I believe, the St. Cloud area, on that first day.)
So anyway, on Tuesday, my intentions included hiking and sight-seeing in and around the Grand Canyon of the Yellowstone area. I decided to leave the canyon area proper for the afternoon, though, and to devote the morning to a hike in the Hayden Valley area (which was on the way to the canyon area from my home base at Bridge Bay). I had seen shockingly few buffalo on my first day in the park, and I wanted to rectify that—and since you really can’t fail to encounter buffalo in Hayden Valley, it seemed like the place to be. However, probably due to trying to peruse my book of hiking trails by flashlight after dark on Monday night, I somehow missed most of the short and medium-length trails in the area and ended up settling for an extremely long trail (13.5 miles one way), with the theory that I’d just go out a ways and then turn back and retrace my steps. I chose a trail that starts right by where the Yellowstone River begins (flowing out of the lake, under Fishing Bridge) and follows the east bank of the river (the opposite side from the main road) all the way until just before it goes over the Upper Falls and down into the canyon. The trail was named for the Hayden Valley, but its first three miles or so (as far as I went before turning back) were pre-valley—so this turned out to be just a hike through the woods along a part of the river that isn’t even one of its more scenic stretches, and I definitely didn’t see any buffalo. Thus, it ended up not being one of the better hikes of the trip.
Anyway, I told myself that I would at least go as far as the LeHardy Rapids, just for the sake of having a destination (and hopefully a reasonably scenic one)—so that’s what I did. And there was, indeed, a nice view of the rapids, from an elevated overlook point. My sense of this as constituting a “reward” at the end of my somewhat disappointing hike, though, was undercut a bit when I noticed that on the other side of the river, there was a boardwalk with a bunch of people on it who were also checking out the rapids. So clearly, I would not have needed to spend a couple hours hiking not-my-favorite-trail to see them!
Oh, well. I turned around and hiked back to where I’d parked my car. During the hike, since the scenery hadn’t been captivating me quite the way the previous day’s had, my thoughts had wandered quite a bit, and had ended up focusing largely on Game of Thrones (I had started re-reading the book shortly before my trip, and had brought it along to continue with it during the trip). So, I decided to head on up the road toward the canyon area as planned, but to stop at a picnic area along the way for lunch and to read for a while. After all, the previous day had been very active and physically demanding; why not take today at a somewhat slower pace? Driving up the road, I soon came to a pullout by a sign that said “LeHardy Rapids” on it, and that, sure enough, provided access to the very boardwalk that I’d spotted from across the river at the point where I’d turned around on my hike. And just a very short ways further down the road, there was a picnic area that was also named for the rapids (though it was across the road from the river). Thus, I ended up eating a leisurely lunch and reading for a good while in the very pleasant LeHardy Picnic Area.
After lunch, I proceeded, as planned, to the canyon area (seeing, incidentally, still rather less of the buffalo than I would normally expect to see on my way through Hayden Valley; I saw them, but they were all off in the distance, not up close by/in the road as they often are). I crossed the Chittenden Bridge (which spans the Yellowstone just above the canyon area), parked in the Wapiti Lake Trailhead parking lot, and decided to hike the north rim trail, which (after crossing back over the bridge) goes along (get this) the north rim of the canyon, and provides access to all the spots (that you can also drive to and park at) where short (and usually steep) trails go down into the canyon to provide views of the falls and whatnot. Even though I’d been there several times before and already had tons of pictures of the sights, I naturally couldn’t help but to start taking a ton more as soon as I got there, since the area is just so unbelievably beautiful. “I’ll photo-document the entire course of the river over both falls and into the canyon!” I thought.
…so, yeah, the rest of the north rim trail turned out to be closed. Oops.
At this point, after retracing my steps back along the trail and across the bridge to my car, my options were either to drive around and onward to what would have been the next major stop along the trail—the access point to the steep descent down to Brink of the Lower Falls (one of the most spectacular spots of all)—or to remain on foot and follow the south rim trail (one of the stops along which is the even steeper Uncle Tom’s Trail down to the foot of the lower falls). I opted for the latter, which meant getting different views and angles of many of the same sights that I had just seen from the other side—often closer up, since the first stretch of the trail on the south side hugs the bank more closely than the north rim trail, from which I had been looking down on the river from higher up.
Then, what with the trail not being closed on this side and all, I finally made my way to the main attraction: the spectacular lower falls and the heart of the actual canyon. As anyone who has ever been there and gone down Uncle Tom’s Trail knows, much of it consists of steep staircases made of steel mesh, and there are signs at the top warning that it’s not recommended for people with heart conditions (etc.) and that you should wear appropriate footwear and so on. Nevertheless, believe it or not, I actually saw a woman descending the stairs wearing high-heeled shoes. It’s a wonder she didn’t kill herself!
After hauling myself back up the stairs of Uncle Tom’s Trail (no small feat), part of me wanted to keep going and check out the remaining scenic spots along the south rim trail, but another part of me reflected that every step I took also added another step to my eventual walk back to the car, and reminded the first part of me that I’d been determined to get back to my campsite earlier tonight and not be rushed through making supper before dark and stuff. So, I decided to turn back at this point—though I also decided that I’d have to come back to the canyon area the next day to get to at least some of the spots that I hadn’t made it to today (particularly the Brink of the Lower Falls, on the north side).
Unlike most of my plans throughout the course of this day (!), my plan to get back to the campsite at a reasonable hour actually worked out, leaving me time in the evening both for planning my next day’s activities and for some note-taking and journaling (including early drafts of my accounts of the first few days of the trip).