Day #4 was the day my dad and I planned to head toward the North Entrance because the hotel we booked that day would be there. In the North Entrance the main visitor attraction, is the Mammoth Hot Springs. Where, according to an article you could see geysers, animals and much more! Also nearby Mammoth, there was another valley in which we would have a higher chance of seeing animals, Lamar Valley! We planned to go there, too!

After eating breakfast at the Grey Wolf Hotel, we pushed off toward a whole new part of Yellowstone. On the way there was this stop, where a Park Ranger would let you touch different parts of animals. We decided to stop there. There, I got to touch, an Elk Antler, The Bison Fur and I could see the Skull of a Wolf and a Bear! Overall, it was worth the stop!

At the Norris Junction, instead of going straight like before, we went left, toward Mammoth. Then immediately after we turned, I spotted a big Bison, just standing there at the edge of the road. This was the first time I had been that close to a Bison. And it was one of the first times I had noticed that in the Butt, the Bison don’t have hair! When my dad slowed down I got a great picture of it!

Not too far away from when I saw the Bison, there was this small attraction called Sheepeater Cliff. We wanted a break from the car, so my dad stopped there. The cliff was just a big cliff made of a lot of rocks. A sign nearby said that some kind of Indian tribe used to live in the cliff a long time ago. Just before we were about to leave, my dad spotted something, like a squirrel, but it was part orange and it was bigger than a squirrel. When I got a better view of it I noticed that it was a Yellow Bellied Marmot! The same creature we had seen at the Grand Geyser 2 days ago!

After, our short car break, we once again started toward Mammoth. According to our plan for the day, at Mammoth we would first do the Upper Terrace drive.  So when we were officially in Mammoth, my dad turned left to the inside road for the drive. The drive was basically a drive through the forest, until we reached a clearing with a parking lot. The parking lot was for the Upper Terrace geysers. My dad parked and we started the short hike.

The hike showed multiple geysers and springs. One of the first springs we saw, had rocks shaped like a staircase. And water was going from the top of the staircase, to the bottom of it. Others were similar to the ones we had seen before. At the end of the hike there was another Staircase Spring. But this Spring was bigger than the other one, so it looked cooler. Also, my dad spotted an elk herd, next to the highway in the distance. He said, that after the drive we will be going on that highway, and could stop to see them.

After, hiking back to the parking lot, we started to finish the Upper Terrace drive. It ended shortly and once again we were back on the highway toward Central Mammoth. On the way, I spotted the same Elk herd my dad had spotted earlier! Strangely, none of the Elk had Antlers, signaling that they were all Female. There were about 7-10 Elks in the herd, and it was nice to see them all together. Also, close by to the herd there was a lonely bison, which is rare because Bison usually stay in herds.

In Central Mammoth, there was a question in the air. Should we eat lunch or should we quickly do the Lower Terrace hike, then eat lunch? It was 12:30, and we estimated that we would be done with the hike at around 1:30, and then we could eat lunch. Our decision was to do the hike first. The Lower Terrace hike included a bunch of familiar geysers and springs. It was not much different from the Upper Terrace hike. And just like our prediction, it was 1:30!

My dad drove around the area to see if there were any restaurants. There was only one called, Fountain and Grill, But the line for ordering was soooooooo long, it went all the way outside! We couldn’t be bothered to wait THAT long, so we concluded that we would eat at Gardiner, which was only 5 miles away from the area. At Gardiner, we were debating on what we should eat for lunch. Subway?? Or more Pizza?? But then on the right came a a food mall, and in the food mall, only one restaurant was open. It was a Mexican place, and we did eat lunch there.

The Restaurant had a sign next to it saying “Welcome to Montana.” and my dad took a picture of me standing in front of the sign. (By the way, at the end of the road trip, I would have had a picture of me standing in front of 2 more different state signs. You’ll find out which states they were later.) Anyway, After heading back to Mammoth, my mom and dad wanted to go to the Visitor Center, to find out what hikes we could do in Mammoth that day. The Park Ranger gave us a paper showing all the hikes in the area. Unfortunately, all of us couldn’t do any of the hikes because we didn’t have bear spray.

While walking back to the car, I spotted a Female Elk on the grass nearby, and surprisingly there was a baby underneath it drinking milk! We walked around the building to get a better look of the mother and child. It was nice to see the first Elk baby, we had seen in Yellowstone! And when we started to depart from Mammoth, I saw 3 female Elk on the right, they were all sleeping. As we had seen a lot of Elk in the Mammoth area, we didn’t stop for the sleeping Elk.

The car headed toward Lamar Valley, but on the way there we would stop at 2 falls, Undine and Wraith falls. The Undine Falls was pretty far, so it took some time, but nevertheless we reached. There was a lookout point, next to the parking lot where we got to see the falls, It was similar to the Lower and Upper falls we had seen before. The next stop was Wraith Falls, which was basically the entrance of Lamar Valley.

The Wraith Falls wasn’t a lookout point it was a 0.5 mile hike, to the falls. You may be thinking “So what if it’s a 0.5 mile hike?” The problem was that the hike led through Bear territory. And if you walk through Bear territory, keep in mind that you should have BEAR SPRAY. We didn’t. Either way we did the hike. The hike went across a thin river and then, after the river it started to go uphill. Then, after sometime we started to climb higher and higher and higher and…. Finally, we reached the end of the hike. In the distance you could see the big/huge/humongous/gigantic Wraith Falls.

After hiking back, we were on the road once more toward Lamar Valley. And just before we reached the Lamar Valley sign, there was a traffic jam. It wasn’t an actual jam. It was people slowing down because they had spotted an animal. AN ANIMAL! I checked the right while my mom checked the left, and I spotted a dog, no a Wolf, no a COYOTE! The Coyote was casually walking up the hill, when I was taking pictures. It was Amazing, Cool and Awesome to see an animal I wasn’t expecting to see at Yellowstone National Park.

After seeing the Coyote, the Jam broke apart, so my dad drove at a speed that was fast enough for the speed limit, but slow enough to spot animals. And just a few minutes in we did see a type of animal. At first we didn’t know what it was, a lot of people had stopped at the side of the road for some reason, so my dad decided to stop too, to see what it was all about.

As we looked through the trees, (Where everyone else was looking.) I had spotted a Pronghorn. My mom also had spotted another one nearby. This was the first time we had seen the Pronghorn, so my hopes of seeing a Black Bear and a Wolf shot up. Since it was a new animal I had to check my animal book for facts about it. According to my animal book, Male Pronghorns have a black patch on their neck. Both the pronghorns my mom and I had seen, didn’t have the patch, so we knew they were female. Also I found out that Pronghorns can run up to 60 MPH! That’s 2nd fastest to Cheetah Worldwide.

While we drove on, we spotted a bunch of Bison roaming the area, and I spotted some sort of Animal lying down in the distance. Turns out it was another female Pronghorn, it was weird that it was alone, because the book said that Pronghorns stay in herds, like Bison. At one point my mom told my dad to stop at a lookout point, so she could look around the land with the binoculars and see if there were any hiding animals. The park ranger we had seen earlier had said to try looking at where the trees were to spot Wolves. So we all tried to spot a Wolf pack at the tree line. But we couldn’t spot any, because 1. It was too far away and 2. I doubted there were even Wolves there.

Then we stopped at another lookout point. Luckily, in this lookout point we actually saw animals! 3 male Pronghorns in the distance and there was a something black far away. My mom first thought it was a Black Bear or a Wolf! So I was excited when it was my turn to see what it was. It looked like a big black rock. Lastly, it was my dad’s turn and he solved the case. It was a lonely Bison

As we neared the North Eastern Entrance, also known as the end of Lamar Valley, we came across a parking lot, in which a lot of cars had parked. Later I had found out that people stopped there because this guy had seen a wolf pack far away hiding in the treeline. Unluckily, our binoculars were too low quality to see that far away. So after a while we gave up. The rest of the drive, we only saw like a BILLION Bison, and 2 small, free flowing rivers.

In conclusion the drive through Lamar Valley was worth it, and the day was brilliant! The problem was that we had covered all of Yellowstone, so we didn’t know what to do the next. Maybe we would go back down to Grand Teton and see if we could spot anymore animals, such as the Black Bear!!!