What goes up, must come down (and vice versa)

 Day 9 – Yellowstone National Park

We didn’t get back from Cody until quite late last night, so we were both pretty tired this morning.  But with a big hike planned, we wanted to get moving early so we could be done before it got too hot and before the afternoon thunderstorm, which seems to be a daily occurrence. 



The view from Inspiration Point.  The ribbon of river below is where
our hike would lead us.

Our hike for today was on the 7 Mile Hole trail, which Amy picked out for us to do.  The hike starts on the North Rim of the Grand Canyon of the Yellowstone River and makes its way down the side of the canyon to the river itself.  While called Grand Canyon, it is not at all connected to The Grand Canyon in Arizona – it’s just a big canyon.  Having already done a canyon hike earlier this year at The Grand Canyon, Amy and I felt like we knew what to expect.  We knew the going down part was the easy part, but coming up at the end would be a bear.  We realized we need to do more mountains and less canyons so we can start doing the hard part first. 

Before we started our hike, we went to Inspiration Point, which is on the North rim and overlooks where we would be hiking today.  The point gave great views of the whole canyon, the river, and both the upper and lower falls.  It was hard to imagine that in just a few hours, we would be down there.

The initial stages of the hike.  No hills, no
bears - thankfully.

The first four miles of the hike don’t actually go down at all.  The trail just follows the rim of the canyon eastward through lodge pole pine forests.  While very beautiful, we were both ridiculously guarded and cautious due to the danger of encountering a bear.  I had bear spray on me, but was in no hurry to have to use it.  Something about an aerosol spray being the last line of defense between you and a 700 lbs. grizzly can lead to a sense of unease.

Dormant geyser on the path down.

We finally got to the point where we would began our descent and man, was it steep.  To put it in comparison, when we did The Grand Canyon, we dropped 4000 feet in almost 7 miles.  Here, we dropped 1000 in just over a mile.  The trail was narrow, rocky, and there were a few points where we said that, if it got worse, we were just gonna head back.  About halfway down, the path opened up a bit more and we started to see some geysers and other bubbly/steamy things (sorry, not a geologist).  This was also about the time that the trail would just disappear for awhile and you got to make your own trail.  We met another hiker at this point and he told us he had done it before and always stuck to the right, so that’s what we did.

Amy and I at the bottom of the canyon next to
the Yellowstone River.

That strategy worked and we got to the canyon floor.  When we got there, the other hiker we had met was also there.  His name was Mark and he is a professor at Idaho Falls.  Being only about three hours away, he tries to make as many trips as possible to both Yellowstone and Teton.  We all went down by the river and then sat and had our lunches.  As we ate, we discussed our trip.  He gave us a suggestion for a hike to take in Teton that sounds amazing, so we will need to see if we can do it.  It might take some reworking of the schedule, but it sounds worth it.

A place in the shade - our lunch and rest stop on the canyon floor.

Mark took off for the trip back up while Amy and I rested up a bit more.  The water was beautiful and we would have loved to jump in, but at the speed it was moving, it would not have been safe.  So we just sat and enjoyed the scenery.  It was incredible to look up to where we had been that morning.  It is really beautiful here.  We started the trek back up and it was as bad as we thought it would be.  We lost the trail a few times, but not as bad as our Badlands adventure.  We took it slow with plenty of breaks and water and were completely beat by the time we got to the top.  Luckily the rest of the hike was pretty flat.

We made our way back through the forest, still on the lookout for bears.  But now we had a new weapon in bear deterrence (no, not our stench).  It is the “Eh, Oh!”.  We learned this from Mark.  He told us that he once hiked with a group of Canadians.  They told him that research had shown that the sounds bears hear best are long “A” and long “O”.  So in order to alert bears of your presence, you should shout “Eh, Oh!” anytime you round a corner.  Amy and I loved this, so we adopted the practice and spent the rest of the day banging our hiking sticks and shouting “Eh, Oh!”.  Must have worked cause we didn’t see any bears.

We drove back to camp, making an important stop on the way: ice cream!  A little reward to ourselves after the long hike.  After enjoying our treat, I actually managed to fix Amy’s bike tire.  We showered up and then cooked ourselves a nice dinner of hot dogs and mac & cheese.  We ended the night with s’mores over a nice campfire.  Tomorrow, some more biking and sightseeing before we say good-bye to Yellowstone.   

Making dinner at our campsite.