Yellowstone – Where to Stay and such

We took an amazing vacation to Yellowstone last year.  I’m in the process of trying to scrapbook the 800 pictures My Hubby and Kiddo took.  It was that amazing!!  We love to get into nature and spot critters.  Yellowstone is a fantastic place to do that!

As with most trips, your first decision is when to go, how long to stay, and where to stay.  There are lots of good options .  I’ll share what we did and what we wish we had done over the next few posts.

As a kid we went to Yellowstone in August and were caught in a blizzard on Bear Tooth Pass.  It was late August, and those stories are great now, but it was really scary at the time.  This last year we went in early August and I thought it was perfect.  We had some warm days, but overall we were really comfortable.

As for how long to stay, we made this our once in a lifetime trip, so we spent 12 days on the trip – the last day was just leaving, but we did stuff all the other days.  You of course don’t have to stay that long (it definitely gets expensive!), but we were able to do everything we wanted and were ready to come home.  Some of how long you stay has a lot to do with if you fly or drive as well.

Where to stay also depends on if you drive or fly – at least on your travel days.  We flew in to Jackson Hole and stayed at the 49er Inn.  It was not fancy, but it was clean, included breakfast and was convenient for walking to food and shopping.  And as a tip that probably applies to all the hotels in the area, don’t buy Bear Spray.  Instead, ask if you can borrow a can from the front desk.  Tons of folks before you have bought the stuff and then left it with the hotel.  Where else are you going to need the stuff?

We only stayed one night, but we were able to stock up on some snacks and to get some rest before we drove north through the Grand Tetons and into Yellowstone.

Yellowstone is HUGE!  3500 square miles huge.  If you look at a map of of the park, it is divided into 2 loops.  At each junction, they have villages with nothing in between in terms of food and lodging – well there are plenty of thermal features and critters, but you can only stay at the junctions.  Each village has an upscale place and a more moderate place to stay and a few dining options.  The food seems to be pretty similar throughout the park – especially in the diners and cafeterias.  The upscale spots have nicer dining options.

I tried to pick somewhere geographically centered and went with Lake Village.  They have really nice accommodations called Lake Hotel and Cabins.  I have friends who stayed there and thought they were very nice.  I opted for Lake Lodge Cabins.  The Lake is lovely, and we enjoyed staying there.  Much like the Lodge in Yosemite, the rooms were not at all fancy, but they were clean.  We even saw some Elk right out our window one morning!

However, if we were to do it again, I would stay at Canyon Village.  It’s right in the center of loops.  Norris is equally in the middle on the west side.  We found we had more luck critter spotting on the east side, and we drove the whole park.  If you are more interested in the thermal features, then Norris is going to be your better bet – it’s right between Mammoth Hot Springs (north) and Old Faithful (south).

It’s pretty much 30 minutes between the villages, so it really does matter where you decide to stay.

There are places to camp and RV, but I didn’t see them and I would be a little nervous about camping around Grizzly Bears.  But maybe that’s just me.