Yellowstone National Park Day 3

Actually this is the last day of our trip, however we did not go back into Yellowstone this day.  We decided to get up and head toward Ashton, ID and go up to Cave Falls.  Before leaving our cabin, we got some fun photo's on the front porch.

 Now it's time to get on the road..

First, we stopped at my Great Grandpa's schoolhouse that he attended.  I always love to see this schoolhouse and can remember my Grandpa telling us stories.  You know, the stories that begin with "When I was a kid we had to walk miles through the snow and up hill...", he wasn't kidding!

We finally made it to Cave Falls nearly 45 min later, I had forgotten that a good  part of that drive was on gravel road, but certainly well worth it.  I was a kid the last time I was at Cave Falls.

LOVE this photo of Abby with her arms folded!

The Boys had so much fun throwing rocks into the river!

It has been so fun to share my childhood memories with my kids and my Hubby, it was also a lot of fun for me to take a walk down memory lane.  Austin will definitely be here with us next year!

Now time for our road trip home, 5 hours later and we were home!  The kids did great!

Yellowstone National Park Day 2

Our original plan was to do the lower loop of Yellowstone the first day and do the upper loop the second day.  We ran out of time on the first day and we didn't want to see the Grand Canyon of Yellowstone in the dark or feel rushed to do so because daylight was ending.  So Day 2 is going to be taking our time and going to see the Grand Canyon and view the upper and lower falls.  Next year we will do the upper loop.
We headed out the door around 10:30 again and it was raining and cold.  Unfortunately we did not have jackets or rain gear with us so we stopped in West Yellowstone and all found something to wear in the cooler wet weather...but of course once we got into Yellowstone it had stopped raining and felt a bit warmer.  Our first stop was a buffalo on the side of the road..

I love Abby's face in this photo!

She says "Buppawo" (buffalo)

Gabe wasn't interested in getting out of the car to see.

Next we made it to the Upper & Lower Falls.

Looking down into the Grand Canyon of Yellowstone..

And of course, he was being a pill AGAIN!

While Gabe and Daddy were taking a potty break Sebastian and Abby had another plan in mind..

We stopped and took pictures of upper falls and then went to the lower falls and I thought it would be best if I just got out of the car to check out the terrain before we took the kids.  We opted not to hike down because the trail was pretty steep and about a mile long, maybe when they are older.

By this point it was time to stop for a picnic.  Perfect time to try and get some cute pictures..

Abby loves my macaroni salad!

After our picnic we decided that we would head out of the park and go back to Big Springs to feed the fish.  My Grandpa said that the best time to see all the fish would be around sunset.  Perfect timing, by the time we get out of the park and get to Big Springs it should be close to sunset.

MAJOR BUMMER...STILL NO FISH!  Just more seagulls.  We decided that we had brought all of this bread to feed to the fish and during our trip it had sat in the hot car and got all mashed up by the kids so lets just feed it to the birds.  The kids had a great time throwing it over the bridge and watching the birds go crazy over it.

Another great day!

Yellowstone National Park Day 1

We took a trip to Yellowstone National Park.  It was just the 5 of us, Austin stayed behind at his Kenny Dad's house because he had was starting football that week and didn't want to miss his first practices.  He was missed!  After hearing about our trip and seeing our pictures he said that he definitely does not want to miss our trip next year!  Yay!  We left on Saturday the 30th and headed toward Idaho.  Funny story, we had Ashton, ID set in our GPS and were on our way.  We stopped at a rest stop a little ways before Pocatello, we had lunch, did bathroom breaks, changed diapers, we were there for a little while so we let Abby sit in the front seat of the car and play.  She was playing with our phones, the GPS, and whatever else she could find.  It was finally time to get back on the road, we hopped back on the freeway and did as the GPS was telling us to.  Before we knew it, we no longer saw signs saying Idaho Falls...so many miles, we now were seeing signs that said Twin Falls...so many miles.  Suddenly I realized this was THE WRONG WAY!!!!  Yikes, we had driven about 25 min west instead of North, argghhh!  U-TURN!  Lesson learned about not checking the GPS after children have played with it, or even just solely relying on the GPS.  OOPS!
Anyway, we arrived in Ashton, ID around 4:30 pm.  We drove around the cute little town, went and saw my Great Grandparents graveside and then headed toward Warm River to feed the fish.  However, it wasn't warm river that I was thinking of, it was Big Springs.
We stayed at Pond's Lodge in Island Park, ID which is about 30 min outside of Yellowstone National Park.  The next morning we got up and were out the door by 10:00 and off we were to Big Springs.  I was really excited to share some of my childhood memories with my Hubby and the Kiddos.  First, we walked the trail up to Johnny Sacks Cabin. (if you click on the link it will tell you all about the cabin)

When we were done looking at the cabin we went across the street to the bridge to see and feed the fish. The water in the river was so amazingly clear and beautiful!  There are springs here that come up from the ground and this is where the water begins, so it is so fresh and clean and then it heads down and eventually runs into the Snake River.  Unfortunately there were hardly any fish for us to see.  Mostly seagulls eating the fish food and bread that people were trying to throw to the fish.

Time to go to Yellowstone!

We stopped and walked around Lower, Midway, & Upper Geyser Basins.

  The kids seemed to enjoy it with the exception of Sebastian who was just being a pill!  We had to take Abby out of her stroller and let her walk so we could put the stinker in the stroller since he wasn't cooperating..

But we weren't going to let that stop us, so we just kept on going...

Next, we decided it was best to stop for a picnic and maybe Sebastian would cheer up a bit and enjoy our adventures..

He munched his sandwich and soon became playful and was happy again.  In fact, he was even posing for the camera and being quite the little ham..

Time for more exploring..

 The Midway Geyser Basin was fun and exciting.  Here Vinnie and the boys are testing the temperature of the river because the hot springs run off into the river.  It wasn't too warm but it certainly wasn't freezing.  This is where the Grand Prismatic Spring is which is the largest hot spring in the United States.  The colors of it were amazing, that is when the wind would stop blowing long enough for the steam to settle down for us to see it.  There is a big boardwalk that walks around several other hot springs before getting to the Prismatic, as you walk along the steam is coming up from all of these springs and it is so warm but when the wind would stop for a minute and the steam would settle it would suddenly feel chilly because your body would get use to the heat.  Gabe loved this and thought it was "so exciting". 

Next stop...

We had about a 45 minute wait for Old Faithful to erupt.  The kids did pretty well entertaining themselves while we waited.

Sebastian found a bug to watch...

Abby joined him, and Gabe played on his iPhone..

There she goes!

Sebastian is being a little stinker again and wanting to do his own thing...

Now we are off to the Mud Volcano..it was starting to get a bit late and the temperature was cooling off a bit so we needed to hurry up just a bit so we could get back to our cabin in time for dinner and bedtime.

Gabe got excited when he saw this tree and said "it's the letter J!" 

I love Abby's lips in the last photo...too cute!

 What a very fun day!  Can't wait for Day 2!!