Anniversary trip to Yellowstone: May 2012

I decided to go through and add the trips I've gone on (if I can remember them).  The most recent trip was to Yellowstone National Park with my wife for our first anniversary.  She's never been there, and I'm glad she doesn't mind going with me to collect my counties.  We left Utah on Friday night and returned on Monday night (Memorial Day), a total of three days.  Yellowstone was beautiful but cold; a huge weather system was going through the park when we were there and we had to deal with road closures.  

We spent two days in Yellowstone, seeing the Upper and Lower Falls, the Grand Canyon of the Yellowstone, Old Faithful, and a ton of geysers, mud pots, sulphur springs, and boiling water of all sorts.  It was really neat with the snow.  Both days (because of road closures) we drove through Jackson and the Tetons, but they were only visible on the first day.

After the second day of Yellowstone, we drove out the East Entrance (which closed shortly after we exited due to snow-covered roads; I'm amazed we got out in the Corolla with balding tires) and through Cody.  We'd intended to go over the Beartooth Pass from the Northeast Entrance but unfortunately it was closed (like almost all other roads out of the park at that time).  We stayed in Billings.  The next morning we went to Battle of Little Bighorn National Monument, on the Crow Reservation in Montana, and happened upon a memorial service (it being Memorial Day) to honor both US soldiers and warriors of the Lakota and other Indian Nations.  I enjoyed seeing the topography and learning about this Indian victory over Custer. 

And then it was home over the Bighorn Mountains in Wyoming, including an amazing driving up the eastern side of the mountain, then down the Shell Creek ravine down to Shell.  Other portions of this drive were equally breathtaking, like the climb from Lander, Wyoming.  

It took us a fair amount of time to figure out what exactly was going on with South Pass.  South Pass was one of the most important passes across the Continental Divide, as the Oregon, California, and Mormon Immigrant Trails all went through here on their way west.  We finally found a barely-marked turnoff on the western side of the divide that explained the importance of South Pass.  I've become more intrigued with the early western immigrants' trek across the continent, and am interested in following portions of their trail.  

All in all, it was a beautiful and fun trip, and I added 8 new counties to my tally (total: 1137).  Driving on some of the roads we took was worth the extra few minutes' detour from the 'shortest route' home.