We were up and out early for our last full day here. One last chance to see what animals we could find early this morning. Turned out to be another good one. Lamar Valley is the best place to see everything based on this trip. We were rewarded with a great sighting of another grizzly, a bison jam that just cracks me up (they just walk or stand in the road like it’s a field), a small herd of antelope, a coyote and went back to the eagle’s nest for one last look. Then we said goodbye to Lamar and came back to Canyon to grab some lunch.
We’ve pretty much checked the box on this park and have done about everything we wanted and planned to do. We still haven’t done the north rim of the canyon but had planned (damn the power just went out in the lodge – nice summer thunderstorm this evening) to do that after dinner tonight or on the way out in the morning. The thunderstorm made that decision for us. We actually had extra time on our hands this afternoon because we elected not to go to the Norris area and see more smelly geysers. So we really tried to find somewhere to just plant and soak in the view – somewhere. We drove out to Hayden valley and stopped at a couple of placed but they really weren’t conducive to hanging out. We could’ve found somewhere in Lamar but weren’t interested in driving all the way out there again today. Somewhere along the rim of the canyon would’ve been nice but we don’t have chairs and a cement or wooden bench gets hard pretty quickly – not to mention the crowds. The “lodge” really isn’t a lodge in the sense you picture in your head when you hear the word. It’s more like a hotel. The Canyon Lodge has multiple buildings with rooms, so our building doesn’t even have a lobby to chill out in. There is no view anywhere on the property. It’s just not a place that invites you to relax in. In the end, we came back to the room and took a nap. Went to dinner then came back and started packing up things to leave in the morning. (There is no closet or drawers anywhere in this room to put anything. We’ve been living out of an open suitcase for days. This place is trashed.) After doing what we could until we actually leave in the morning we crashed for the evening and read while listening to the thunder, rain and hail. Now we have no power, so this could get interesting.
Looking forward to going through Tetons one last time, hoping Signal Mountain is open so we can see that. Another day bites the dust!
It's a Wonderful Life! 