Day 27: Yellowstone, Wyoming

Another ‘oh dear’ day! It hadn’t been a good night and we were all suffering from lack of sleep. The temperature had dropped to 40 degrees – just above freezing – and despite layering more clothes and towels over us, none of us had managed to be warm enough to sleep. It wasn’t until the sun had come up and begun to warm the tent that we’d managed to get some shut eye. The boys were in pretty good spirits considering and more than happy to explore the camp site whilst the rest of us dozed in the sunshine. Our spirits dropped even lower when we picked up a text from the Pollards telling us they’d given up trying to get accommodation for the July 4th weekend and wouldn’t manage to get down to see us. And then we ran out of tea  Life was beginning to feel like it couldn’t get any worse! However, in true military fashion, we rallied our spirits and decided to find somewhere for lunch and then go and hike the Grand Canyon of Yellowstone.

The canyon is where two powerful waterfalls cascade into a 20-mile-long, half-a-mile-wide, 1000-foot-deep canyon of the eroding yellow stone that gives the park its name. It is incredible, even after seeing the original Grand Canyon. We hiked the rim for two miles and marvelled at the power of the water. The park had had a particularly heavy winter and consequently the snow melt was massive. This was a river you definitely didn’t want to be paddling in.

We didn’t get back to camp until sunset (another bison jam) and had the slightly unnerving trauma of cooking supper in the fading light and hoping we’d managed to clean and clear away everything thoroughly. We’d just cracked open a bottle of local ale and were wondering how we were going to endure another three nights of Yellowstone camping when the boys came running round the corner, squealing with delight, “ The Pollards are here, the Pollards are here”.

Andy and Lisa had woken up that day and decided 400miles wasn’t too far to go to squeeze into our tent, freeze their butts off and brave the Yellowstone bears. We were delighted; the kids all picked up where they left off five years ago and the grown-ups settled down round the fire with a pile of beers and tried to work out the logistics of nine people in a six man tent.