Light and color, and mood and beauty just make me happy to be alive.
I’m spending the next two nights camping at Fishing Bridge RV Park in my little travel trailer for a mini fall basecamp.
One of my main motivations for coming down and camping at Fishing Bridge RV Park is to see the bears that have been hanging out along the lake, and witness the cusp of the seasonal change from fall to winter. Staying down here also allows me to chase the light in the early mornings, like I did this morning.
When I walked out of the camper and saw the clear blue sky, and felt the freezing temperature, I knew there was gonna be some really cool atmosphere happening in Hayden Valley. So, while I might have given up my chance to see bears for the morning, I got to spend the golden hour nearly by myself in Hayden Valley taking pictures. That’s a win in my book.
Mist on the Yellowstone River at Sunrise on my way to Hayden Valley.
It's worth it to rise early...
Even if you’re not a photographer, it’s so worth being up early enough to witness the park as the sun rises. There’s a magic to the atmosphere, a time when animals and landscape features seem to shapeshift into being seemingly out of nothingness.
A moody morning along the Yellowstone in Hayden Valley.
Deep solitude at Riddle Lake
By 8 o’clock, the road starts to get busier. The sun pops over the hills, burning off the fog, and I am itching to go look for bears.
Having no luck in the bear department (despite the grizzly track right underfoot when I got out to take a photo at Sylvan Lake), I decide to meander along the lakeshore towards West Thumb, and ultimately decide to hike to Riddle Lake, which I haven’t done before.
Gray jays and a woodpecker kept me company along the delightful trail through lodgepole forest and hidden meadows. Claw marks on a couple of trees along the trail tell me grizzlies travel here from time to time.
Left image: I just had to pose with George's grizzly drawing that adorns Yellowstone trailhead signs!
Snow drapes the red mountains and I can see the tower on Mount Sheridan. Elk tracks on the black sand beach make me imagine a bull and his harem shifting in and out of hidden meadows, on trails humans never walk. It’s a comforting feeling.
The water chats gently with the shore in a low pitched murmur. I am the only human for miles.
I am struck, as I often am, by the unassuming beauty of Yellowstone’s backcountry. You don’t get the dramatic hanging peaks of Glacier National Park or even deep primeval forests like the northwest. Here things more subtle; you have to be open to finding a different kind of beauty-it won’t smack you on the head here. At least not on trails through young lodgepole forests which are plentiful in the park.
But that’s the thing about Yellowstone: it’s never what you expect. The most monotonous stand of spindly lodgepoles and tumbledown matchstick deadfall will suddenly reveal a cow and calf elk picking their way through. Or a pine marten stealthily pursuing a hare. Claw marks on a tree whispering the presence of bears. Coyote scat on the trail. It feels like a place of mystery, where animals materialize in and out of tiny meadow refuges in a sea of new growth and old burn. And of course that ever present feeling that you might turn around and see a bear any minute…or a bull bison you didn’t notice before.
Which is why sitting here on the beach I frequently glance over my shoulder.
The clouds grow thick and the temperature drops, reminding me that there aren’t too many days left to walk these trails before the landscape is an ocean of snow. I’m cold even in my lightweight puffy coat, so finish my lunch and start the return.
I love that there isn’t a trail around the lake; that I am left unrequited, looking off into meadows and mountains and forests that I’ll never walk, a wilderness of nearly impenetrable lodgepole burn regrowth where only the animals know the way through. So many possible mysteries…the unknown feels kinetic, alive, palpable. It’s humbling.
After all isn’t that the point? Part of why we protect these places? If we could walk and explore every inch what would there be left besides ennui? Anyway. I digress.
Fall colors and snow at Sylvan Lake.
Back on the search for bears again, I got out to take a picture of Sylvan Lake and found a surprise! A grizzly track. They seem to be taunting me. It's a decent sized track!!
Driving back towards the lake at dusk, the sun momentarily broke through the heavy leaden clouds, in a spectacular show of rose and gold, illuminating the standing dead trees and the surface of the Lake. A suitable farewell.
I say my goodbyes to the lake, the bears, the Absarokas rising so wild and remote above the caldera, thermal steam rising along the shore. See ya next spring, Yellowstone Lake.
Other posts about exploring the Yellowstone Lake Area you might enjoy:
Camping at Yellowstone Lake in July
Eleven Days Paddling Yellowstone Lake
Family Basecamp at Yellowstone’s Bridge Bay
Why Fishing Bridge? My preferred place to camp in the interior is Bridge Bay, but the only place open this late in the season is Fishing Bridge RV Park, which is a hard sided only campground. While I don’t love camping in a sea of RV’s, I had to say having electricity and water was super nice for a change….
Images and text by Jenny Golding
