Trip to Yellowstone

A few months ago I was looking to see if there were any rooms available in Yellowstone over Wendy's birthday, and I found one at the Canyon Lodge.  We decided to book it for three nights starting August 6th through the 9th.  We also found tickets to the Playmill in West Yellowstone, so we are going to see Seven Brides for Seven Brothers on Saturday as we leave to go home.  A month ago I was able make a dinner reservation for Wendy's birthday at the Old Faithful Inn restaurant.  

This morning we packed and loaded the car.  We decided to take the Altima on a road trip.  We left Jeffrey and Joyce at home with a detailed list of instructions for neighbors who will be checking in on them while we are gone.  We left about 11:00 a.m. and drove to Idaho Falls.  It was time for lunch, and Wendy found a little restaurant called Franklin's Famous Cheesesteak Company.  We had a Philly Cheesesteak sandwich and French Onion soup with a strawberry shake.  It was pretty good and filled us up for the road ahead.  We drove to Swan Valley, then up to Victor and over the pass to Jackson Hole.  It was a beautiful afternoon, and it was a scenic drive.  We parked at the Jackson Hole resort and walked through the village.  We bought tickets for the Aerial Tram and rode to the summit of Rendezvous Mountain.  We walked out on the Grand Teton Skywalk to take in the amazing views.  The wind was blowing causing the skywalk to shake a little.  The temperature was a nice 66 degrees while in the valley it was about 85 degrees.  We could smell waffles and maple syrup from the restaurant at the summit, but we were not hungry enough to try them.  We rode back down and walked around a bit before hitting the road again.

We drove from Jackson Hole and into Grand Teton National Park.  The road was two way but very narrow.  Passing oncoming cars was uncomfortable.  We took the Jenny Lake scenic loop and stopped several times to take pictures of the Tetons.  Then we drove to Yellowstone and entered through the South Gate.  The traffic was light and we made good time until we approached the Hayden Valley.  We slowed to a stop to take a picture of a beautiful Elk walking near the road, and then we were stopped by a large traffic jam of spectators watching a pack of wolves running across the valley way below us.  They were too far away to take a picture of them, and we couldn't stop the car with the amount of cars already parked along the edge of the road, so we kept going until we were clear and continued to Canyon Village.  We took the rim road to see the Lower Falls before going to the Canyon Lodge.  We arrived about 8:00 p.m. and checked into our room.  We are located at the Dunraven Lodge in room number 5413.  It is on the fourth floor and we have a nice view of the forest from our window.  We bought a pizza from the Lookout Cafe and ate in our room.  We are both pretty tired.