Before you visit Yellowstone, watch this Trip Planner!

hi we're matt and cheryl and we're excited to share more tips to help you enjoy the best of the west in this video so we have found that a lot of people have a hard time planning a trip to yellowstone because it's pretty big and it's kind of complicated and there's five entrances and there's a lot to know and it's kind of hard to plan out your days when you're going to yellowstone national park so we are putting this video together with quite a bit of knowledge that we've built up over the last couple of years talking to people who've traveled there and we've done plenty of studying and we've been traveling to yellowstone our whole life so we want to share with you some tips and basically give you a beginner's guide to yellowstone national park since you're going to be spending some time with us i thought i would introduce us this is matt and i'm cheryl we are utahns and we've been born and raised here and we have spent our lives visiting the national parks of the west um matt and i are getting ready to celebrate our 20th anniversary in a couple of months but our travel started well before that when we were growing up we were both from families of that enjoyed visiting the national parks and so especially yellowstone that's one that we have been to several times and enjoyed taking our family to and yellowstone is big and there's always something new to do there and that's one of our very favorite things about it plus there's no other place like in the world yellowstone was the first national park in the world actually it was created in 1872 as a national park it was set aside as what they call the public pleasuring ground so it's like a public park basically for people to enjoy what they didn't want is for it to be bought up by private people and then just kept or preserved for the rich they wanted it to be affordable for everybody it was set aside mainly because it had all these geysers so yellowstone is a super volcano it's it's actually a volcano that you're walking around and traveling around and when you're at yellowstone uh the remnants of which it exploded many millions of years ago but the remnants of which are these steaming hot pots and geysers and water shooting out of the ground and steam coming up off of the the ground as you drive through and so that was really what fascinated people about yellowstone early on nowadays today that still fascinates people but there's also so much wildlife there particularly in some of the valleys there that have wildlife like bison and wolves and bears yellowstone has become a sanctuary for wildlife and really a place that people come to from all over the world to check out the wildlife we love both we love the geyser formations and of course looking at the wildlife there so with that let's get into what there is to see and do at yellowstone and then we'll get into some of the more nuts and bolts of planning your trip okay because that is the whole point of this video is we want to help you plan your trip so grab your notebook write down things that look interesting to you and we'll tell you about how to plan those things so as matt mentioned the first thing that we think is pretty special we never go to yellowstone without seeing this is the grand canyon of the yellowstone it is amazing and beautiful and the very best spot to see that is artist point in my humble opinion but but trust me on it that's the best spot all right the next thing are geysers geysers are incredible there's actually four different kinds there's fumaroles which are actually just really hot steam coming out of the ground there's the mud pot which some people kind of poo poo but i think they're cool they look like like boiling mud then there's the typical geysers where like like the old faithful you think about that actually erupt and then there's springs which tend to be very beautiful they look like big pools of water with really interesting colors inside of them and springs don't erupt as often but they're just they're big they're really big and beautiful and grand prismatic is the most famous spring at yellowstone and so that's one of our faves to go visit also and it is interesting about seeing geysers erupt so old faithful is not the only predictable geyser in the park there's actually a few that are actually right at old faithful geyser basin and so if you time it right you can maybe even catch more than old faithful erupting but something that's kind of neat about these geyser basins is they really have thought about people wanting to view these geysers and so at old faithful you know the whole geyser basin has boardwalks throughout it so i want you to think about that that you're on boardwalks a good a good part of your day when you visit yellowstone unless you're doing some off trail hiking but for the most part the big sights you're going to are going to have the famous yellowstone boardwalk so you're going to be on flat wooden terrain so it's very friendly for if you have a walker or you know or even just if you're not accustomed to a lot of climbing it's it's pretty easy to navigate through but the other thing they do is they have benches surrounding old faithful so you know they you know goes off every 90 minutes give or take 10 or 15 and so you might be sitting around for a little bit to wait for this geyser to erupt and it's nice to have a place to sit and there is plenty of seating so don't worry about that so we've got the grand canyon of yellowstone we've got geysers the next thing that is very very special is the wildlife in yellowstone the amazing thing about visiting yellowstone is you are guaranteed to see wildlife even if you're not waking up at the crack of dawn wildlife is everywhere but there are some spots that are really really good to be wildlife so really quick some of the animals that that you'll see the first one is the iconic bison or buffalo as this westerners like to call them the the buffalo art everywhere yellowstone and honestly nothing makes me happier than seeing a buffalo even when i see a bear i still think that buffalo are pretty cool because they are so big and they're just unusual looking and well i'm gonna come right up to your car they will come yeah they're not really begging for food they're just accustomed to people and they they cross the road all the time in fact i can't even recall the time that we've been to yellowstone recently they had we haven't gotten in one of the famous buffalo jams where a herd of bison is just crossing the road and taking their sweet time or sometimes there might just only be one buffalo but they like to hang out in the middle of the road and the cars can back up for miles and that's just part of the experience so when it does just smile and then you think hey i can tell my friends i've gotten a bison jam now many people come to yellowstone specifically to see a bear yellowstone has long been known as the bear park now there are black bears all over the country but grizzly bears really in the lower 48 states are only in montana and wyoming from my understanding so glacier national park is a good area and then yellowstone and grand teton are grizzly bear country as well and there's nothing cooler than seeing a bear now grizzly bears typically are not hanging out around the road you might see them but they're kind of a ways off usually black bears are a little different they kind of tend to you tend to see them along the side of the road actually particularly on the in the northern part of the park a lot of them hang out up there you're not guaranteed to see a bear when you go to yellowstone they're not rare but they we don't see them every time we go yes exactly and yellowstone is laid out in two loops there's an upper loop and a lower loop so it's kind of a figure eight and on the lower loop there's a place called hayden valley which is really famous for its wildlife that's where a lot of the buffalo herds hang out grizzly bears i really think that you can't go to yellowstone without doing the lower loop you have to do the lower loop because the show stopper is there there's old faithful grand prismatic grand canyon of the yellowstone and hayden valley you'll get all the things that make yellowstone special if you do that lower loop although i mean i definitely think you've got to do the entire park but if you only have one day stick to that lower loop and you'll see wildlife there's also elk there are beautiful birds like pelicans and yeah we've had some really there's swans floating down the river pelicans the other place cheryl that mentioned is lamar valley which is on the upper loop and that is world famous people a lot of people just come to yellowstone really for lamar valley although we would say there's there's so much more to do there but up in lamar valley is more likely you're more likely to see wolves up there a lot of elk hang up hang out in the northern end of the park and so the wolves are there to prey on them so that's a little bit about the wildlife okay next we have mammoth hot springs that's up at the top of the top loop it's a unique formation in the park it's the only one that's like it and it's water is flowing down this interesting formation along the side of the hill and then down below is actually the city called mammoth hot springs and that's the headquarters of the park there's actually a little town there and a hotel lake mammoth hotel is there the park headquarters a big visitor's center and by the way we didn't even say the elk are just walking around the town all over the place that's what makes that place interesting are the elk i mean they're everywhere and if you really want to see some fireworks hang out there in september when the the males are showing off for the ladies just just be careful that your car isn't one of the targets of their antlers there's several videos on youtube showing cars getting ground by bities mel elk trying to show off their dominance but the the travertine terraces are really super cool but they are kind of past their heyday i think i remember when i went as a kid i used to go there and there'd be a lot of water flowing down from those but now they're pretty dried up and it is interesting yellowstone is you know an active volcano underneath and the underwater cavities shift from time to time and and right now mammoth doesn't have a whole lot of water coming out of it but it is super cool it does look like you're in a cave but you get to be outside in the fresh air instead so mammoth is the thing a place to visit for sure uh yellowstone lake is another major thing in yellowstone this is i think the largest well they called water lake or high elevation lake is what they call it i don't really know what that means exactly but uh we are yellowstone by the way up over seven thousand feet elevation seven or eight thousand feet in elevation so he also likes a massive lake oh it's huge and it is super cold um yeah not a place to swim no not at all but it's a place that people like to stay or eat along the shores of yellowstone lake so there's lake village in grant village and they both have hotels there that you can stay at as well as restaurants that you can you can eat at and really hanging out along the beach of the lake is beautiful it's just not a beach in the sense that most of us think of it as a beach it's rocky and the water is super super cold and then there's there's good fishing in yellowstone lake there's a lot of restrictions on the types of fish you can keep they're working really hard to keep um non-native species out so you have to keep anything like that that you catch and then you have to throw anything back that's a native species but i i spent many summers fishing at yellowstone as a kid on our boat so yeah people love yellowstone lake and catching the the trout i will say one of the more popular uh geyser basins is called west thumb and that is right along yellowstone lake that's pretty cool one for a lot of people because the hot springs are really deep and blue and gorgeous but you're also right next to the lake and so that's pretty popular that's right by granite village and that's that's a pretty big one it's one it's one of my favorites i think it's so cool to see and like there's geysers that are under the water you can kind of see their spouts underneath the water it's neat i like it next up on things to do are waterfalls this is something so special about yellowstone is that you get a lot of bang for your buck on the waterfalls you hardly have to walk any distance to see some pretty incredible waterfalls they're just on the side of the road and they're amazing and matt mentioned earlier about upper and lower water like upper and lower falls both of those falls you know those are the ones you see from the grand canyon of the yellowstone they both have spots where you can view them from on top and watch the water go down and it is so neat but there's several other ones that i mean i'm talking like 0.1 miles to the yeah to the waterfall off to the road park and go see the water yep asphalt trails very very accessible very easy to see but there's a whole bunch of them and so it you know you kind of want to have a plan when you go because everywhere you drive in yellowstone you're going to see science saying oh this thing's over here and this thing's over here and and yellowstone is so big and there is so much to see i mean even us that go there every year every time we go we try to do something new and we still have plenty of things that yellowstone we want to do and so if this is like your once in a lifetime trip it's super super important that you have a pr like a prioritized list of the things you really want to see and have a plan so you can see all of them yeah and we have a guide that we'll talk about a little later that addresses some of those yeah because we we we know the good ones yeah okay let's talk about 2022 updates so some of the new things that have changed with yellowstone in 2022 and the good news is really they're all good so there's a road that was under construction that goes from tower to canyon and it's been under construction the last couple years that is supposed to be open this year so that's the good news because it makes it easier to get around and navigate especially over to lamar valley a lot of the national parks are moving to ticketed entry systems or reservations that you need for hikes and things like that yellowstone's not one of those so you really don't need to worry about that at all it's so big the the reservation system for the campgrounds has been evolving as more traffic to the park has been happening but there used to be quite a few first-come first-served campsites and it was it was really turning into kind of a nightmare because you were having to get there at 5am to get a campsite and so now it's most the campsites are on a reservation system and strongly recommend getting a reservation for a campsite before you go to yellowstone because the days of just being able to go there and find a campsite are over i mean you might luck out but i would not make the trip to yellowstone without having a reservation for a campsite yes and there's two uh websites that you use to book a campsite reservation now so that's i think another recent change finally covid we have no idea really if there's going to be any sort of restrictions due to covet it's too early in the year right now we're shooting this in january so so what you want to do is visit the park website and look at the alerts section they have a little alert section on there and they're going to give you the most up-to-date information about any thing that's uh that's out of the ordinary you never know when you might run into a wildfire situation that's going on in yellowstone or just some other out of the norm situation they're functioning at a limited capacity and it's not because of covet it's because of the lack of employees all the national parks we went to several last year they were all struggling with employee shortages as you visit these national parks whether it's yellowstone or any other park be prepared for some staffing shortages we were at the grand canyon a lot of the shuttles weren't running because they didn't have drivers for them and be considerate of the workers the other thing to think about is that these are companies that are often running these restaurants and hotels and things like that but they still have federal requirements um put upon them because they're within the national park operating underneath them so they've got a lot to consider so be be kind to them one other thing fishing bridge rv park is located on the east side of the park and i forgot that that was also under construction for a while and i believe that that one is open this year as well so really we should be back to normal for for most things in yellowstone but we never know the covet or anything else really okay let's move on to some nuts and bolts stuff so we're going to talk about getting to yellowstone here this is actually a big topic for a lot of people i have noticed now again we've been doing this for a couple of years and we have talked to tons of people customers who bought our guides people on youtube and really have learned a lot from people about how they travel to yellowstone so something you need to understand there are five park entrances to yellowstone none of them are bad they're all amazing entrances actually the two most common or the two most popular entrances are west yellowstone coming in from idaho and montana the north entrance which is gardner montana those are the two most popular entrances in terms of the traffic it's just those are easier to get to so like if you fly into bozeman airport that's a pretty common thing for people from the met at the east or the midwest to do fly into bozeman you're going to come down through the north entrance in gardner montana if you're coming from like utah or california las vegas something like that or even flying into salt lake city which is an option then you'll be coming in through the west yellowstone entrance those two are not as scenic as the other entrances but they are closer to the main road within the park so we mentioned the two loops in the park technically this is kind of like one big oval loop and it's called the grand loop road then there's a connecting loop in the middle that's where all the major attractions are in yellowstone except for lamar valley which is kind of on a on a side road but to get to that grand loop road takes quite a while just from the entrances we're talking could be 45 minutes a half hour from some of the entrances so gardner and west yellowstone are the two closest entrances to the grand loop road and so that's why they're the most popular but the other ones are really beautiful to drive through so the northeast entrance comes over the beartooth highway through cook city into lamar valley now this is a stunning this is actually probably the most stunning entrance to yellowstone is the northeast entrance the only issue is it's not a place to use as a home base to go see the rest of the park so you would be driving in through cook city into lamar valley and then trying to get somewhere else to stay so you can then the east entrance comes from cody wyoming again cody is a fantastic city to visit and that entrance is also stunning in fact teddy roosevelt said that was the the prettiest canyon he's ever been in that was before the beartooth highway was built though so that comes later and that's amazing but um that is also just a stunning drive to get in but again you wouldn't want to use cody as a jumping off point or as a home base because it is about two hours away from old faithful it's just a lot of driving and then if you're coming from the south you'd be coming through grand teton national park this is literally connected to grand teton national park that you're coming through and so that's another thing is you want to consider adding grand teton national park to your itinerary as you're visiting yellowstone that's a really good one but um those are like the five entrances and kind of how like what they're like um as far as flying to yellowstone most people are gonna fly to bozeman montana and drive in through the north entrance you may also fly to jackson wyoming which is at grand teton national park again just south of yellowstone and then you would drive in to yellowstone through the south entrance of course if you're going to do that you're going to see grand teton as well and then again some people fly to salt lake city utah which is about five hours away but it's on a freeway that's kind of a straight shot into west yellowstone you might find cheaper car rentals there or cheaper flights there so you want to compare those three i even spoke to somebody who flew to seattle because the car rental was so much cheaper she flew all the way to seattle and they drove the ozone that seemed a little crazy to me but uh you want to consider your options okay so popular road trips to do in conjunction with yellowstone from people we talk to is if you're coming from the east it's real common to hit mount rushmore and the black hills on the way into yellowstone do you think a lot of people come in through the northeast entrance in that beartooth highway and see the park and then leave through the east entrance and see cody on their way out the drive across wyoming and nebraska and some of those states is long and barren for the most part that's a long old road trip but you will be rewarded when you get to the good stuff because oh man south dakota black hills so gorgeous cody wyoming amazing and the driving to get to those places once you're in the national park area yeah it's just so scenic and incredible mount rushmore is one of our favorite places that area where actually i'm working on a guide for that one right now that is just a fantastic uh place to visit and see so uh so much more there than just mount rushmore if you're coming from california i i believe it's popular to hit las vegas on the way and zion national park as you're coming up the i-15 through utah so those are some popular road trips that people take to yellowstone that we've we've talked to um and then as we mentioned a lot of people will tag team this with grand teton national park since it's just south of yellowstone and then glacier national park i believe is about four hours north of yellowstone and so a lot of people come out and hit those three parks in one big trip but all these parks are parks that i say you definitely need more than one day to do they're they're not these tiny canyon parks like you know we're in utah and we live close to like zion and bryce and we think that you need to spend a couple days in all of them but i can also see how you might just only have one day for each of those parks but these other ones you kind of need a couple days and do not miss on grand teton national park it is so close to yellowstone i mean you're looking at two hour drive between the two and you're gonna see one of the most beautiful mountain ranges in the world also plenty of wildlife there oh yes like if you want to see a moose go to grand teton i've never seen a moose in yellowstone but grand teton they're all over the place and it's just it's just a neat neat place and a different fill a whole different field than yellowstone oh yeah entirely different feel right um yes for sure yeah no geysers but lots and lots like beautiful scenery yeah and nice nice hikes wonderful hike scenery wildlife great great great okay let's talk about getting around next so this is a big question we have from people um is how to get around and how long does it take to get around so yellowstone is a big park yes this is important to know okay first you must have a vehicle yeah like there's not there is not a shuttle system in yellowstone they have a little tidy shuttle the the teddy the teddy teddy show after teddy roosevelt yes but but matt was just going to say yellowstone's as big as rhode island and delaware combined it is humongous and that little teddy it is like this driverless electric vehicle shuttle that just kind of it only goes around the canyon village yeah yeah so canyon village is the most popular place to stay by the way and so it kind of transports people around the village yeah but it's it's a pilot thing it actually would be amazing that someday if they had electric cars driving all over yeah but and this thing was very slow yeah it just tends to get up yeah so you have to have a vehicle so just be prepared um there is no cell service in yellowstone i do believe they try they're trying to get more towers in there but they have a little bit of some of the major stops but it's just not something you want to count on no not at all um the ground loop like we mentioned is actually two loops with the road connecting in between oh yes so they give you a map when you enter the park and so say hang on to the map because again no cell connection don't be planning on using your gps yeah and each loop takes about two to two and a half hours there's a lot of a lot of unknowns as you're driving on that road yellowstone always has construction it gets pretty cold and brutal in the winters and it's rough on those roads and so they're constantly having to make improvements on that i've never been yellowstone when there hasn't been some construction going on we've talked about bison jams or um or animal sightings in general if someone spots a bear from the road there will be cars backed up because everyone wants to see the bear and so if you're driving around that entire loop it can take between four and seven hours so you want to just keep in your mind that when you leave your hotel for the day you're probably going to be on the road the whole day it's not easy to head back to your hotel or campsite because the park is so big and you don't want to be you don't want to be limited on what you can stop for and see when you go out because you don't know when you might see an animal or might be really close to a geyser erupting so cheryl said it takes about two to two and a half hours to drive around the loop and that's really just driving well it's just driving time that's not stopping and seeing sides or things like that that's just driving time it takes a long time so on the upper loop there's kind of like four corners to the loop i guess it's almost like an upper square and there's four corners on the lower loop there's like five major stops and so as a general rule of thumb plan on driving about 30 minutes between major stops so on the upper loop about 30 minutes between the four corners there and on the lower loop about 30 minutes between the five points the speed limit is 45 miles per hour in the park and please go 45 miles per hour in the park there's no hunting or anything like that in yellowstone but animals still die from humans because they hit them with their cars so just be very careful and safe as you're driving well and i think also just to be especially cautious too there are many international visitors that go to yellowstone and may not be familiar with american driving laws i'm i'm hoping people show the same consideration to us when we visit europe this year i'm a little nervous about naples yes okay gas stations at each stop um gas is pricey in the park but there's gas stations all around so you know i mean it's probably a good idea to guess up before you go into the park just for the savings and to not have to worry about it but also know that there is gas available and there's also auto service stations at some of the major stops so you know if you have car problems there's mechanics at the ready um staying inside the park can reduce your driving time so remember that we said it takes a while just to drive to the grand loop road and then again if you go around the whole loop in the day that's that's a couple of hours of driving there and then uh and then you have to drive back out of the park so you could be driving easily for for three hours or more in a day so if you stay inside the park you'll reduce some driving time um although the lodging probably a little bit more expensive in the park yeah or a lot more a lot more okay we actually have done a blog post on this with a little bit more detail and so that's one thing you can see our website we're in the rockies.com for more trip planning resources for you all right let's talk about safety my safety is always number one i always teach the students at school the safety is number one so let's talk about safety at yellowstone first of all yellowstone is famous for stupid human behavior people just get all free with themselves so they go to yellowstone and there's all sorts of ways us humans can get into trouble um with geysers and wildlife you mix people in there and it gets crazy yeah yeah so you know we did a whole other video on super yellowstone behavior just for fun um people sticking their head into old faithful people peeing into old faithful uh people climbing down to the bottom of the grand canyon of the yellowstone in the middle of winter looking for treasure looking for treasure that's right people digging in fort yellowstone looking for treasure people getting out of their car yelling at the buffalo it's pretty epic now i actually have by the way i got a couple things here i have yellowstone ham lotion that smells like pine trees make you feel like you're in your it's amazing and then i have a book called death in yellowstone that is probably the most popular book out there for yellowstone and it tells all the ways that people have died in yellowstone or been injured or saved or whatever about 22 people die in hot springs by falling into the hot springs in yellowstone so keep your kids safe keep an eye on your kids so they don't go running off the boardwalks um and there's been about eight bear well i think eight bear deaths in yellowstone um there's very rare very tight yeah very rare i think that's one of the questions with the most people are very scared of the bears but the thing you need to know is is that i love so matt is just such a national park guru when he was doing his master's degree he has a degree in history and teaches adjunct classes at the local university but but one of the things he did right before he graduated was he did a big project on the national parks and he'll talk about the national parks are laid out in layers there's the roads then there's the groomed trails and then there's the wilderness well all the things that we're talking about that i think almost all of us are going to go see are the first two layers we're either going to be on the road or we're going to be on the groomed trails where there's lots of people i've never felt like i was in danger in either of those places of being hurt by a bear you know the bigger danger is actually the bison the bison are just they towards the end of their life a lot of these metals will go and they'll just kind of find a spot to sit and chill out and a lot of times their sitting spot is next to a real famous geyser and and like if you're seeing on the boardwalk you might only be 10 feet away from that bison and so you have to really use your head and make sure that you're not putting yourself in danger but but you know so generally i don't worry too much about carrying bear spray with me when i'm on the road or on those groomed trails but i do have bear spray and i do know how to use it yep she threatens i know how to use this i do well okay here's the thing is that my guess is that most people are not familiar with how to discharge bear spray and so i made a whole video about this matt and i did because you know we go into the boulders enough that we should have it bear spray and know how to use it and and so you if you are interested in knowing how to use bear spray watch that video but it's a very silly video of us yes trendy is bear spray exactly and just with the with the intention of seeing that even someone like us can safely use bear spray you don't need to be an ammo expert to carry and have it but um but you know just the general rule of safety with animals is 25 yards away from everything except for bears and wolves which is 100 yards away now i'm pretty sure this is actually a lot so you could actually get a ticket even jail time fine banned from the park things like that for getting closer than you're supposed to get so something uh this happened actually in 2021 a gal got too close to a bear somebody caught it on camera it went on instagram or all over youtube or whatever it is and she got convicted and i don't know what her penalty was but you could get vines or even bend from the park for getting too close if you're if you're doing that the next one is to stay on the boardwalks you know yellowstone big volcano some of the ground there is not very stable and as we mentioned earlier there's funerals springs geysers all those things can really badly burn you those bird rock those boardwalks keep you safe and so you want to make sure that you stay on those that you only walk on the boardwalks don't run like i did once yes and we always we always make a little joke about this the yellowstone rangers are unlike the rangers in other national parks they do not mess around and i think the reason why they're like that is because yellowstone is super dangerous like there's there's a lot of bad things that can happen at yellowstone and they've probably seen it all and on you know to the average visitor you're probably like oh man why can't you loosen up a little bit but they've probably seen all these worst case scenarios and want to keep people safe and so you know if a ranger does get on your case just smile say okay and tell them thanks for the work they do because they are working hard to take care of the visitors in the park it is a dangerous area if you're wandering off and you know breaking the rules but otherwise it's it's just fine we're not trying to scare you um we do have a playlist i want to let you know we have a playlist with tons of yellowstone videos to get you excited to go and to get you prepared to go so feel free to check that out when uh after you've watched this video and really this is we were inspired to create our channel because a couple of years ago we were planning a trip to atlanta georgia which is real far away from utah and when we were researching it we couldn't find the information we needed to like knowing how far apart things were where to stay where to eat what there was to do all of those things and and we figured that maybe people back east or that aren't westerners might have the same questions about some of these parks that we visit so often and so really the whole purpose of our channel is to help you have a really smooth trip and so we'll make a video on the best places to see wildlife or where to take pictures things like that so really check out our playlist and i guarantee you'll feel really prepared for your trip and we are constantly striving to get better at explaining it and better at understanding visitors and their questions and concerns so again this is our third one of these types of videos that we've made and every time we hope we get a little bit better for you okay let's talk about where to stay next so there are nine lodges and hotels within yellowstone national park and typically well some of the lodges you'll actually stay in the hotel or the lodge so the most famous of these is the old faithful inn which is a massive log cabin type of a building with uh with a bunch of rooms in it some of these you'll stay in little cabins near the lodge so like roosevelt lodge is just a tiny little place with over a hundred little cabins next to it these hotels are generally open late may to early october which is basically the visiting season for yellowstone it's possible to visit it a little earlier than may but not not very often do people do that because that's when the snow starts to melt or when they get it all the roads plowed as late may there are a couple of hotels that are open year round snow lodge and mammoth hotel are open in the winter so yellowstone is a place you can visit in the winter the northern road is plowed all year long so you can visit mammoth and lamar valley all year long but if you're going to go to a place like old faithful you have to take a snow coach there like snowmobile type service to get there okay these hotels you can book 13 months in advance and you need to be on top of that if you want a room in the park and they are very rustic accommodations no tv no ac a lot of times no microwaves in the rooms um you don't really usually need ac because the temperature the daytime temperatures are up around 80 in the middle of the summer so you don't usually need ac but they are rustic they are they are rustic but the the big benefit is that you are inside the park in in the middle of scenery and it will be easy to get to the places you want to go you know any of the entrances the the north entrance is the very quickest shot right into the loops in yellowstone but the you know but there can be a line at at the north entrance and at the west entrance those can be pretty long lines sometimes and then even then you have to at the west entrance you're driving for another half hour or so to get to the to the loop so that's time saved it's pretty nice to be able to be inside the park um outside the park we only recommend staying in west yellowstone or gardner montana now some people will stay beyond west yellowstone island park or hebgen lake or some places like that um people do it but it's a lot of driving we would we say west yellowstone or gardner the other place you might consider staying outside the park is cook city that's the one at the northeast entrance and i would so what we've done a few times is driven out to cook city stayed there a night and then come back into the park and that gave us lamar valley going out and lamar valley going back in and so that was that was that's a pretty good one but you wouldn't want to use it the whole time yes and and going back to what we said earlier all those entrances like the entrances we're not recommending they're beautiful they are so scenic like they are the most scenic entrances it's just that if you're pinched for time or you don't want to be spending all day driving you'd want to avoid staying at those entrances because of just the added time but they are scenic and so if you have the opportunity to drive in the park one entrance and drive out another might be might be worth doing catch some like we talked about cody catch the bear truth highway something like that so you can see some of those other places they're all equally cool i'm i'm always in awe every time i go to yellowstone and as mentioned it's so big that every time you go whether you're going for your first time watching this or if you're planning a second or third or tenth trip there's always something new to do at yellowstone just because the park is so big there's just not enough hours in the day one final note about where to stay is it's common to move around so as we mentioned the cook city thing but also some people will stay up at mammoth and then they'll go down the old faithful something like that so um that'll save you some driving time of if you're staying up in the north going all the way down south and back so all right let's talk about where to camp next okay can i talk a little bit about the campsites what to expect and amenities there yes okay because when we plan trips we think about two very different things he's like got the map out and and i'm thinking about safety access to food and water bathrooms things like that so i want to talk about amenities at the yellowstone campgrounds the um the bathrooms for the most part are flush toilets and there's running water in the bathrooms but it's cold water and then there's spigots outside for um you know filling up water what not um there are showers available at some of the campgrounds for a fee i think they're if you're staying in the campground you get two showers for free if you're if you have more than two people you have to pay if you want to just go use one of those showers at a campground you can do that anybody can do that and you'd have to pay but yeah they are they are around and they're available so it's nice that they have flushing toilets but they're but you know these aren't like the nice rv parks there's no hookups like water electrics but there are there are dump stations and water fill up stations so you can you'll have access to those things if you stay at a campground inside the park and and the the spots are not that big this is not a place to bring your giant motorhome yeah they're not they're not going to accommodate typically more than 30 feet in length and that's combined between your vehicle and your trailer 30 foot length so they're pretty national park campgrounds pretty small sites typically let's see there are 12 campgrounds in the park these are spread all over the park most of them have now moved over to a reservation only system because camping is getting so popular and all these baby boomers are buying rvs and driving all over the country and so it's uh they've moved over to reservation only now almost all of them there are two different booking websites though so half of them are managed by the national park service through recreation.gov half of them are managed by zanterra which is the concessionaire in yellowstone and they're on their own site there so you have to kind of keep that straight there are many campgrounds nearby this is you know forested country and mountainous country there so there's a lot of forest service campgrounds right around yellowstone which we've stayed a number of times and they're actually probably nicer than the ones in the park and a little more spacious they're beautiful i mean really beautiful we've stayed around hebgen lake a couple of times in west yellowstone usually a little nicer but farther away oh and as i say one other thing about the campground is that um i guess i think about this because one time matt's parents brought their dog to the to yellowstone and dogs are really not welcome um in most of the places at yellowstone they're not welcome on the boardwalks um and they aren't welcome to stay at the campsite unattended either and so i highly recommend not bringing your pet to yellowstone it you know even even if it's you know an emotional support animal the fact still remains that there are wild animals out there that are a danger to your pet and and it's really not safe to leave them at the campsite it's it's just a rough situation this is not the vacation to bring your pet on yeah they don't consider like emotionally supportive animals or whatever um a service animal a service animal service animal has to perform like a physical duty or something like that so they're pretty strict on that and then you can't take them very many places at all yeah and that's parents dog parked all day at the campground and we were we were in trouble so between that and then our two-year-old that cried all night we were not the most popular people at our campground a few years ago i i've got a lot of questions on camping so i did a ton of research on this and i put it into a blog post so i'll link that in the description for you to help you answer to help answer some more questions for you for camping in yellowstone okay let's talk about where to eat next okay you're not gonna starve in yellowstone no food everywhere all those major stops you're always close to food yes so they have they have grocery stores at you know canyon grant village all all these big things when you look at a map you'll see like the big areas they also they all have a grocery store they almost all have counter service restaurants and then a lot of them have a finer dining option it also sounds like its own little county yeah well not count it's bigger than two states yeah it's really it's like each of these is like little towns little villages you know it's really kind of interesting it does feel like you're in another world almost yeah and uh so yeah you go in there you pull into the stop there's grocery stores and restaurants and gas stations and things we mean we have post offices yeah yeah i mean so they have a counter where you can get bear spray at canyon i mean they have it's kind of a cool little it's cool like i i think it's fun like at old faithful for example when you go to old faithful you actually pull off the main highway and go over it to cross over it like a freeway almost it does feel like it's its own little world um now the general rule on food in yellowstone is people say the food is no good right and and you know since we are almost always camping we go sometimes we hotel it but we usually bring our trailer we love to pack a picnic lunch because there are so many cool places to picnic in yellowstone and it's just fun to sit outside and eat it's great but we have we have discovered that there are some nice sit-down restaurants in the park and it's really a nice treat to get out of being like a woodsman and go get a nice dinner and this last year we we spent some time up at the northern end of the park and we ate at the roosevelt lodge and and it was great i we had no complaints it was people say the food and yellow smells so good but we liked it it was super good and we got to sit on the rocking chairs on the deck while we waited our waiter was so nice and there was a really good variety of food i mean i i ordered something that like was a whole food plant-based that was delicious my my grains and my veggies was yummy and there's something for the kids so it was a great great place to eat and then matt had like the dream middle of his life the cookout yeah so for a long time there's one kind of unique uh food experience in the park and that's the roosevelt old west cookout and this is where you take a um a wagon ride out into this valley or a horse ride if you want to do that and then they feed your steak and they do a big old cookout um and that was really cool and i'll say something and it was delicious by the way and i'll just say something like all the all the hotels and restaurants in the park are run by zenterra which is the concessionaire for yellowstone but it's also the concessionaire for the grand canyon and glacier and many other national parks like these guys have their act together they know what they're doing and they do a good job so i wouldn't hesitate to eat with zanterra again we had el tavar at the grand canyon this year and that was really good so i'm not really sure where the idea is coming but it's no good but yeah we would do it again we would eat it we would need any of these anterior establishments yeah i would say with future vacation planning for us i'll be definitely trying to do a sit down dinner at every place we go at one of the lodges or something just because it is fun it's a nice experience and really i thought it wasn't too expensive either i thought it was okay the ice cream we wanted to bring up the ice cream one of the one of the real popular things to do in yellowstone is get ice cream at the roosevelt tower stop the tower fall roosevelt stop um and the ice cream we believe comes from the big dipper in missoula montana is this right yes where we live for a summer and they did have rock and ice cream they were very good we'd drive by the store and there'd be this lying clear out and around the street and we were like what is this place and then we tried it and we understood why okay let's talk about when to visit yellowstone so the main travel season is from may to october so may and october are the shoulder season and those are actually really great times to visit because you won't have nearly as many people there sharing the park with you may is a great time because the animals like the baby animals are are out and about um however both those months are possible snowstorms that you could get during those months so we went may of this year and we just barely missed the snowstorm the people that went there before us were kind of you know out of luck a little bit so and it was interesting too we we drove we were driving out to cody and we stopped at old faithful on the way there and we had the whole place to ourselves and it was right before memorial weekend like the friday before but when we drove home the park was hopping it was like overnight the park woke up and and it was it was cool may is a nice time to go there i actually i can't even think of the time i think it's bad to go to yellowstone maybe the winter well yeah well there are actually two months where you really can't visit again the northern roads always open so you can always go there but if we're talking about the rest of the park you can't basically visit in november or march those are kind of two shutdown months and literally in november they shut it down because they're actually get letting the snow build up on the roads so that they can turn it into a snowmobile park for the winter in march and april it's mostly closed because they're plowing the roads and it does take them two months to plow the roads there's over probably 200 miles of roads in yellowstone that they have to plow to get it ready to open in the spring so i have talked to a few people who said hey i have a trip planned in march you know how is it like you can't go in march it's closed you know so um yeah spring and fall are are later and earlier than in most other places and you'll hear people say that like october is their favorite month to go and and it is a really amazing time but you are running the risk of snow not only snow but snow that would shut the park down for the rest of the year so they actually shut the park down about november 1st right around there but if a snow storm hit early it could shut down early now the most popular months or the most busy months are june july and august these are gorgeous weather months they're great but you're gonna have a lot of crowds the people you know the kids are out of school um and that's you know when people most people are visiting but i love the wildflowers in june it's just so beautiful yeah we've been just about all the months you know september is often when we go because that's when you have the weather's still pretty good and the crowds are starting to decline because the school has has begun um now granted i think again with the baby boomers all being retired um a lot of them are visiting in september so i think it's still getting pretty crowded in september but it's still less than the summer and it really is a nice time like the weather's great and a lot of animal sightings in the fall too we've been the elker in their rut in mammoth and so that's where they start showing off and so that's kind of fun to see but yeah our favorite our favorite pick is september we like to go they're the the best yeah probably um okay it is open as we mentioned it's open in winter as a winter park from december to february as a snowmobile park and then you can always visit mammoth and lamar valley up in the north to even during the winter um oh and i have one little special special tip the park never closes as in you know you can go there at 3am or midnight but you can always drive through the gate and so if you're an early morning person and you want to get there to beat the crowds you can do it you don't have to wait until a.m right you know a lot of us you know we're on vacation we don't want to be waking up at the crack of dawn but if avoiding crowds is your thing then do it yeah there's no gate to get in so you can just drive right through now the ranger booths that are there to take your money or look at your pass they won't be there until probably about seven a.m i think but if you get there earlier you can just drive right in pay your money later if you if you haven't already bought your pass don't uh we're not telling you this so you can skip paying for it the national parks we definitely want to share the parks yeah support the parks okay but you can drive in there before the rangers get there that's fine that also reminds me of another question i've gotten quite a bit which is people say can i sleep in my car in yellowstone this is a common question people are wondering if they can basically just pull off to the side of the road in hayden valley and sleep there for the night the answer is no you can't do that so you can drive around the park at any time that's fine but you can't just sleep in your car on the side of the road you can get a campsite and sleep in your car in the campsite as long as you have that reserved campsite but no no just sleeping in the parking lot at old faithful you can't do that ooh let's talk about the weather so yellowstone is high altitude and we say it is high and dry um in the west the air is dry and it feels even more dry in yellowstone to me than where we live in ogden it is i whenever we go there i get super dried out like my eyes get dry my lips my face just i'm always packing around the moisturizing ocean and yeah if you're from a coastal area it'll it'll definitely be different for you yes for sure in the peak travel times may through september highs get into the 80s although those bumper months it's not going to get into the 80s no no it like plan on it being cold if you're in those bumper months but even if you're going in july plan on it being cold but yellowstone's temperatures go it can vary by 40 degrees or more every single day yeah so like at nighttime it could get into the 30s even in the summer so you wake up in the morning and it's pretty darn chilly out it's that rocky mountain air and then and it'll warm up to really nice temperatures typically during the day yeah but like the boardwalks are pretty exposed and then the heat's coming off the wood and it gets hot i mean i i always feel ridiculous but i'll start the day in a coat and then i want to be in like shorts and a tank top like by two o'clock in the afternoon it's crazy so dress in layers it could snow a good snow any time um or rain anytime now it's also very common for it to rain in the rocky mountains at night so you know if you're camping be prepared for rain at night let's talk about how many days to visit this is one of the most common questions we get how long should i spend in yellowstone so you can't see everything so let's just get that out of the way as cheryl mentioned we've been going there for so many years and we still have things we want to do and see so every time we go there we try to get to a different area of the park that we haven't been to before so assume that you'll be back that's a safe kind of assumption there rather than just trying to do everything and just kind of stressing yourself out and making yourself miserable assume that you will get back and try to enjoy the ride and the things that you do yes because yellowstone could be a really frustrating park if you are like planning an itinerary to the minute because there are so many things that can throw you off your game so you want to have a plan you want to have a plan but you need to be flexible with it i always say you have to see yellowstone on yellowstone's terms okay because you never know when you're gonna get a traffic jam or there's wildfires that throw things off there's snowstorms covet of course there's animal uh sightings that throw things off there's exerciser eruptions yes there's a lot that could um construction of cheryl mentioned so there's a lot that could go on to answer the question though we would usually say four days in yellowstone is going to get you a pretty good way of seeing the entire park or at least parts of the entire park so that's that's like two days on the lower loop and two days on the upper loop is the typical rule of thumb there now we're playing on a trip to europe right now and i was i had in my mind rome rome is this the eternal city i want to go to rome i've been wanting to go to rome forever and i'm thinking four five days in rome we want to explore everything in rome and you know then i read in a guidebook and said instead of spending a third day in rome it's better to go down south to the amalfi coast and spend a day there and so we would say the same thing about grand teton national park in yellowstone rather than spending like a fifth sixth and seventh day in yellowstone we would invite you to go down to grand teton and spend some time there because it's a different experience those tetons you're never gonna forget them and again don't worry about the wildlife you're still gonna be able to see the wildlife down there too that's that's a cool place so we we say that's better than spending forever in yellowstone okay so tours i know that like you're watching this video because you want to feel more confident when you go on your trip and i'm really hoping this has been helpful to you guys give it a like if it has been helpful we would love just for this video to spread so the more people coming out west will feel confident in their vacation and be able to relax thinking about their trip instead of stressing out about it but um so should you book a tour um we love tours love tours we but we do have poor children and tours can be super expensive and with yellowstone being being a three to four day park that you have to see a tour would be really expensive if you're doing it every day so we say no let's just figure this out you can do it on your own um plus like the wildlife tours there's a lot of famous wildlife tours we have after our research have found that i'm sure that these wildlife tours their guides have excellent information but they can't go anywhere else that that anyone else can go they have to stay on the road and so just know that if you're thinking about seeing wildlife know that that they don't have special access to areas in the park that the rest of the world doesn't we all have the same access and there's very few roads actually so they're basically going to stay on the main roads that you and i can stay on now again that was kind of a big these are questions that i've gotten from a lot of people's about the tours and the wildlife and stuff so um that is what we have done we have created a self-guided tour that is our guide where i will tell you about the park as you drive around and we're going to give you the game plan to be the most efficient to use the or to see the park in the most efficient way so that is what our guide is all about as being an affordable tour you may wonder what a typical day is like at the yellowstone national park so you know you get up you're going to want to try to get to the gate before 8 o'clock if you're staying outside the park you're going to be dressed in your layers because you want to be comfortable whether it's the morning afternoon or evening time you are going to want to bring food and water with you you'll have your tumbler cup there yes because yes and a picnic packed or at least at least snacks to get by in case you can't get to the dinner or the the restaurant at the time you want to okay and one thing that just takes your trip to a whole new level is taking a nice blanket with you this like takes a road trip to like just being a nice oh it's yellowstone and i i love this blanket it has some cute s'mores on it so i feel all camping um so you want it like that's something you have to really think about is i think a lot of times people are thinking they need to be in their rugged hiking gear for yellowstone but that's really not true unless that's the type of trip you're going on where you're hiking at mount washburn or something like that but but most of us are wanting to see old faithful and grand prismatic and to do those your normal clothes are fine and in fact um i guess we're going to talk about gear in a minute but you don't want to be in big clunky hiking boots all day that's not comfortable so you're going to want to be in some tennis shoes so you want to have your tumbler your blanket your comfy shoes your snacks okay and then you're gonna go through the entrance at the park this is just a little booth you're gonna show the ranger your park pass if you've already purchased this online this is the annual pass to enter all the parks this is 80 for an annual pass and it gets you in any park for a year um you if you don't have that pass if you haven't purchased that before you can buy it at the gate as you enter the park and then they'll give you this brochure as you enter the park um this brochure has lots of cool information but it also has your big map of the park to orient you to where you're going um so then they'll also give you a newspaper that has like current programs going on like ranger talks campfire programs just any any kind of news going on in the park and that's really handy to to know what's going on because those rangers put on some amazing programs it's really part of the fun experience of being at yellowstone that's right this is kind of a permanent almost evergreen yeah green they don't change this very often but the newspaper that they make each year has all the updated information then you'll usually spend your entire day driving and making occasional stops to go see things like waterfalls or the geysers or the wildlife so when you leave your campground or hotel just know it's it's good to assume that you're going to be gone for several hours and plan accordingly bring the bring the warm clothes or the cool clothes bring the bring the food bring the water just whatever you need to be comfortable have a good book on tape or something that you'll enjoy listening to while you're driving around so we are typically out until probably past dinner time you know maybe sometimes we get back to our campground around seven or something like that and do dinner then but it's a long day it's a long day of sightseeing and uh also just some one other thing to know is that you can finish your day off with a campfire program one of these ranger programs that cheryl was talking about you don't have to be camping there in order to go enjoy one of these programs so and those are some of my very favorite childhood memories of going to yellowstone's i love going to the campfire program with my family the ranger would have a great big fire and then they'd have that you know a white would have a big screen set up and they show you pictures of the park and talk about various subjects like maybe they'd be talking about the bison one night or another night they might be talking about the yellowstone fires um they have just great great topics great photos and great information and they they're probably like 45 minutes long but you know snuggle up bring some warm things with you because it is cold and it's a great way to end your day at yellowstone now when you get this map as you enter the park it's telling you basically all the stops there are to make it gives you picnics sites and it tells you um you know all the main attractions but it doesn't give you a game plan or tell you which ones are the most popular or which parking lots fill up early in the morning or what order to do them in things like that so that is why having a plan is so important at yellowstone because like cheryl said you'll be driving down the road there'll be a sign for an attraction another sign for a waterfall another sign for a river whatever and you're not really sure where to turn or not and it can actually be a little overwhelming as a vacation because you're like well did we stop here or not if you keep on driving remember you're driving around the loop you're not going to see that thing again you know probably the rest of the day or maybe the rest of your trip so you're not really sure if that's a place that you should stop so we have created a guide for you and we're really excited about it because well first of all last year was our first year we sold these guides and we've heard back from so many people on how it just changed their trip it allowed them to see twice as many things as they would have had they planned on their own guidebooks are great but they're just not specific on what order to do things in and like what is the best thing to do and so we've used our experience over the years of visiting yellowstone to come up with a step-by-step hour-by-hour plan for you um that's flexible too to see it on yellowstone's terms and it's laid out well in terms of doing what a certain section of the park and the order to do it in based on when the parking lots fill up and things like that and it's filled with maps so you know how long it'll take to get places and we've we've broken it into four days of activities but this guy's going to get you to lamar old faithful grand prismatic and it just really takes the burden off of you and makes the trip so easy to plan and and helps you to hit all the best spots again we've been going there for so long and we have had plenty of trips there that were actually kind of frustrating for me in terms of the game plan and all that so i've taken a lot of our mistakes that we've made and and corrected them and put them into here and another question i get from a lot of people is um hey is this going to work if i'm staying at this location or this location and the answer is yes we actually spent a lot of time trying to kind of solve that nut there of how to deal with those five different entrances and the fact that you could be staying in the park or out of the park this actually works for any of those it gives you a great game plan for seeing yellowstone in an efficient way in a way that you just follow the steps there and then as you're driving from point a to point b you'll listen to my audio guide tell you about those sites and and just different stories about the park so my audio segments are typically about 15 to 20 minutes long while you're driving remember you could be driving 30 minutes in between sites so this really complements your drive very well it's over three hours in total as an audio guide i've taught history classes at the university and i used kind of my skills there to make uh these mini lectures is what i call them and a lot of people have told me that their kids were kind of grumbling when they first put the audio guide on but by the end they were sad that the audio guide was over and they listened to multiple chapters or to chapters multiple times so um it's a great great game plan and just fun fun fun stories in it like getting lost in yellowstone is one of my faves we mentioned some of the geyser behavior that people have um the fact that in the old days you could feed the bears in yellowstone so i give a whole history of bear feeding in the park the man who was lost in yellowstone teddy roosevelt um all that stuff now the other thing is since i've been doing this for now about two years i've gotten so much feedback from people and have learned more and more about how they travel so i've created an addition to this guide like a supplement that's going to help you plan your trip as you're going to and from the park how to lay out your days depending on where you are staying and if you're flexible enough to be moving around and getting different hotels i'm telling you where to go and how what order to do the days in like this really is kind of the secret sauce for visiting yellowstone i think you'll love it and and since we are so passionate about you seeing grand teton as well we if you buy more than one guide on our website we'll discount it we have a discount for buying more than one guide so you know purchase two and you will have a plan to see two incredible national parks so we just we really really sincerely want you to have an amazing trip and that's the whole purpose of our business like that's that's our guide it's just making it simple for you to travel to these national parks and know that you have a plan and you're not going to get home and find out you missed something and everybody that's that's purchased it has told us is well well worth the money um they just really helped make their trip great and it's so fun for us to see their pictures and hear their stories so hopefully um you'll go you'll have a great time and you can share your story with us when you're done yeah but check it out it's on we're in the rockies.com we'll put a link in the description but we have a whole website with guides to other national parks too okay just a couple more things before you go we want to talk about some things to bring to yellowstone uh one of the big things you need to bring are binoculars or a scope um okay if you're looking for wildlife you're gonna need these um again a lot of times the wildlife is a little ways off of the main roads so in order to see them better you're gonna need binoculars or a scope so scopes are quite expensive usually around two thousand dollars or more binoculars you can find a good pair for about 180 to 200 dollars and we'll put a link to the ones that we like in the description here but this is um what ones that we've used uh cheryl's dad has these and we use these when we go and they're great if you're going to look for wildlife in lamar valley like wolves or grizzly bears you're typically going to need a scope and if that's too much to to purchase a scope you can rent one from a place nearby like in cook city there's the general store that you can rent from there's a place in bozeman you can rent from as you fly in and i've actually included that in some of our articles as well some of that information so that's just a heads up there on what you're going to need to see wildlife if that's your main priority oh let's see the other thing is if you wanted to record the wildlife that you see again your phone's just not going to do the job because they don't zoom in well you can buy a really inexpensive affordable camcorder i know that these are kind of like old school now with a lot of people but they're affordable and they zoom in they have like a 60 times zoom and they're great these are great if you want to see the wildlife and and you know experience your trip again this is the way to go okay next i am highly recommending bringing some good trail running shoes instead of hiking boots i like these because they're comfortable while you're driving around the car we rarely get off of paths that aren't a boardwalk paved or packed dirt the trails are all very very groomed but trail runners provide really good traction they're lightweight they're bendable they're just nice for walking around during the day as opposed to boots can be pretty awful if you're wearing them all day and driving around boots are great if you're walking through you know off the beaten path but if you're doing what most tourists do in yellowstone a good pair of troll runners is a great option and these are these are the asics gel venture i used to sell shoes in college i and i'm a runner i've been running for uh 23 years now i i always buy gels i and i've been running in adventures for years i just buy whichever new model but they're you know around 50 bucks and they're great great cushiony shoes i love them and they last forever keep in mind too the earlier in the year that you visit like may and june the trails could be muddier if you're going to untrust them yeah okay next we have bear spray now we did our whole video on this i'm gonna do a spoiler alert because we did our bear spray video for two reasons one to to just figure out how to use it ourselves but number two was to figure out which was the best kind of bear spray and we decided that the the frontiersman was the best it sprayed the longest and the farthest and the farthest so we figured that's the time that's the kind we want to have that's the third spray that we have the bear spray lasts for about four years you cannot take it on an airplane so they do sell bear spray in the park and they actually rent it in the park so if you you know i think just about any of those gas stations are going to have bear spray you can buy yeah they they do sell out from time to time like this isn't the frontiers mankind because it was sold out so i had to buy a different kind but um yes there's the bear spray and that's only if that's only if you're going off the beaten path if you're just sticking to the boardwalks like if you're if you buy our our plan and follow it you won't need bear spray right our plans for first timers to see most of the park in an efficient way we're not sending you off into long trails or anything also we mentioned layers because it's cold in the morning warm in the afternoon so you wanted to have some layers and then cheryl mentioned her blanket there this is made by a local company in utah in utah and it's kind of exploding uh in popularity here so if you're not from around here you buy this your neighbors will be envious of you i i promise it is really these are all hand made and super soft blankets really popular and they they actually gave us a code for people that watch our video it's just rocky's 45 and they'll give you 45 off your blanket and really one of my favorite things about this company too is that like i said i teach students with special needs and they they've even hired one of my students to help them package their things and so i just think that company is just about all things good and their blankets are amazing they are so soft and and so cute the company name is minky couture and yeah tons of different styles that you can choose from and use the code rocky's 45 to get a good deal on your main key and be the envy of your your neighbors uh okay and also you'd want to consider packing a poncho because as we mentioned it does rain sometimes so we were actually walking out old faithful and we were quite a ways out on the end of the trail and it started raining on us and our kids and we were kind of running back some punches would have been nice we didn't have them that day and and i mean the poncho's like weigh your priorities like i'd like to pack the cheapy throwaway ones it's not going to be waterproof but it'll keep me dryer and it will fit in my purse where you know if you really want to be prepared you can buy a higher end poncho but you're going to be carrying it around so it's really up to you weigh your options but the next one is mosquito repellent there are a lot of mosquitoes at yellowstone and then bring some snacks um yeah make sure you have snacks with you because you can be gone for an extended period of time when you head out for the day all right so what to do nearby this is the reality of yellowstone even something that's just incredible and scenic and beautiful sometimes you need a little break from sightseeing and especially if you're traveling with children or teens they especially need a break from the sightseeing and so there are a lot of activities to do that are immediately outside the park particularly in west yellowstone and so you know the first we're talking about is grand teton national park make sure to go see that that is more scenery and hiking we have a whole nother video on grand teton yeah but in west yellowstone one of our very favorite things is the grizzly and wolf discovery center this place is open 365 days a year and the whole purpose of it is to help animals that have maybe gotten into some bad habits or couldn't survive in the wild and you like said there's grizzlies there's wolves there's beavers or otters otters and it's right next to the west entrance this is really amazing i mean see these grizzlies and wolves just right up close really cool and um oh there's a rodeo in west yellowstone like oh my gosh you have to go to a small town rodeo because they're just fun the kids are out chasing the cow but you're getting a taste of the west so fun and then they do horseback rides and and the we did creekside trail rides and we really liked that company they had a very good wrangler to writer um ratio like there were like two wranglers for seven or nine writers and so they they kept good track of some of us city slickers that aren't used to riding horses yeah it's a beginner yes absolutely so if you haven't been on a horse before you would be okay um oh yeah for sure and oh there's a playhouse the playmail playhouse they do some you know it's family friendly so nothing offensive lots of singing silly things people that visit yellowstone that's like their tradition to keep going back to that plano playhouse and a place called big gun fun you can shoot guns if uh if that's your jam there's another place nearby west yellowstone about 20 or 30 minutes away called hebgen lake and next to that earthquake lake hebgen lake is a popular place to camp and uh fish and one of our viewers rented a pontoon on hebgen lake for his birthday that was kind of awesome and then next was earthquake lake which is a whole story in 1959 a big earthquake hit and the mountain collapsed and it formed another earthquake and there was people that died and people that were saved it's really quite an amazing story that is a place to visit has a visitor center there now that you can check out it's kind of eerie there's a lake and there's all these trees poking out of it because it didn't used to be a lake all the trees that used to be there are still there but they're they got buried in the water they're dead and they're buried in the water and sticking out snags everywhere it's just kind of like huh yeah we can't right on the edge of there yeah and it is an eerie place but quite a it's really an amazing story didn't you tell a story about that on your guide the audio guide has a story about the earthquake like i i've a video on that actually uh okay river rafting is another thing that's very popular in all the around all the entrances to yellowstone river rafting is is popular fishing popular in the park and out of the park a little place called ennis montana is kind of famous for the fly fishing there and then about an hour away from the west entrance so if you're coming to it from say utah salt lake area you'll be going through idaho and there's a place called bear world that is more kid friendly than the grizzly and wolf discovery center although that one's fine too but this one you actually get to drive through the park and the bears come up to your car and then they have a petting zoo for the kids and have little rides for the kids and uh that is a place we visited probably seven times or so um yeah so like our our kids are older they might like the rides there are definitely a geared at younger children but they were fun and the kids loved it and and farewelled is nicely done they have opportunities to bottle feed baby bears i mean there's there's a lot of cool things there and there's a reason why we've stopped there several times yeah if you've got your family check it out that's great bear world let's talk about the north on the north end is gardner montana and popular things too there are the yellowstone hot springs this is a developed area that you go and go soak in and also chico hot springs about 40 minutes north of there i believe um that's even more i think popular chico hot springs is a whole resort area that you can stay and they've got hot springs and they've got other activities as well that you can do chico hot springs very very well known area again river rafting and fishing popular there as well all right let's talk about cody wyoming matt's fave now this is a town that was totally built on tourism buffalo bill cody built it to built it because he knew that yellowstone was visitors were going to be coming in and out of yellowstone so that's why he he established the town here and the big thing to do there is the buffalo bill um center and this is not some podunk museum this is like smithsonian in dc quality it has four really big museums inside five five okay yes five and it takes it takes about two days to go through the entire thing and your ticket's good for two days yes and it does take two days one of the museums is buffalo bill one is on the indians one is on one is artwork one is natural history natural history and perhaps the most popular one is the guns um the fire i can't remember what it's called actually yeah the yeah the firearms museum they have the largest collection of winchester guns i believe um and some people just spend the entire day looking at the guns in the winchester museum really amazing buffalo bill center of the west is what it's called the cody rodeo is kind of legendary uh much more popular than the west yellowstone rodeo the cody rodeo is like something that people come to just to go to the cody rodeo they go every night but during the 4th of july weekend they have the the cody stampede which is where all the professionals come for that rodeo all right then they have a buffalo bill down just a cool down to look at and then the irma hotel which was built by the irma hotel which was built by buffalo bill cody and we stayed there and found out later on it was haunted named it after his daughter irma yep um so wow we've covered a lot of ground in this video we hope that it helped you prepare for your trip we have so many other videos again just feel free to watch them um check out our website too we've got a lot of of articles on there and then our guides on there yes but thanks for spending some time with us talking about one of our favorite places and we hope that you very soon will be at yellowstone national park

Channel: We're in the Rockies

Views: 183,308

Keywords: Yellowstone, Old Faithful, Norris Geyser Basin, Lamar Valley, Grand Prismatic Spring, Mammoth, National Park

Id: F-5LhG9UBsQ

Length: 80min 42sec (4842 seconds)

Published: Sun Feb 06 2022