The major goal of today was to drive to West Yellowstone to pick up John’s new Canon SLR camera. It’s an updated version of his camera that has more pixels (mean more detailed pictures), better auto focus(crisper pictures), and can record video. The great part of new camera is that all the lenses from his old camera will work on it.

We left by 8:30 am with hopes to get to West Yellowstone by 10 am. It’s approximately 55 miles to West Yellowstone and we arrived in town at 9:50 am, and we saw a 2 miles buffalo backup on the way. Fortunately, it was not in the direction we were driving. One of the workers at the campground said that in the summer the back up could 14 miles long. The great thing about leaving early is that I didn’t not have to cook breakfast because West Yellowstone has a McDonalds for breakfast. Yeah!! (Note: West Yellowstone is a city outside of Yellowstone National Park. It’s mostly a tourist trap. A large majority of the people stay in West Yellowstone. It’s one of the busiest entrances to the park.)

The store the camera was mailed to didn’t open until 10 am. At 10 am, we left and picked up the camera. John inspected the camera, and it appeared to be working. Best news was the battery was charged, so John could use the camera today.

With this being a new camera, John learned that the pictures are taken in a different format than his current digital photograph editor recognizes, so it might take longer to post the his awesome pictures. For now, I will post mine and we will add Part 2 for John’s pictures. The new camera videos are a recognized format, so those are posted in this entry. Please note: I use my phone or a 2010 Sony video camera, the photos and videos are not nearly as crisp a picture as John’s photos.

We went back into the park to Barnes Hole Road which has a trail primarily used in winter for cross country skiing and snowmobile riding. In the spring and summer it is used for mountain biking and fishing. (Individuals probably do not do both at the same time, but it might be a good Olympic sport.) It’s not on the normal park map that is handed out. We were told by a park ranger that this was one of her favorite trails to walk. The route we took was between 2 and 2 1/2 miles. The GPS batteries went dead in the middle of the hike. So, so we don’t know the exact mileage.

Video of the parking area and John taking pictures of ground squirrel for me.

This trail did not have a lot of large animals like bison, elk, etc. On our other hikes, we saw a lot of large poo drops. I can’t remember seeing any on this trail.

We did see beautiful wildflowers, squirrels, chipmunks, butterflies, insects and birds.

Selfies along the way.

John tinkered with camera settings for the entire hike. It took the entire hike and part of the drive for him to get it set up like his old camera and figure out how the video works. Due to this, there are no videos of the first hike.

Afterwards we drove back to town to have the McDonalds $5 value meal (McDouble Cheeseburger, small fries, 4 nuggest and small soda). This is a treat since this was the first time we have been close to fast food in 2 weeks. I miss my fries.

We drove back through the entrance gate to Harlequin Lake Trail. The hope was to see Harlequin Ducks. The trail is approximately 1 mile long round trip.

Right near the trailhead was a chipmunk. If offered a chance to test the video.

Shortly up the hill, what we thought was a chipmunk was sitting on a pile of logs. Amazingly, he was still there on the way back down. It turned out to be a Golden-mantled Ground Squirrel because it has no stripes at its eyes.

The first part of the trail you could see where a fire killed the pines, and they were on the ground. The new Lodgepole pines were growing between the dead timber.

Additional flowers that we found along the trail.

The lake was quite pretty with a lot of lily pads. It was too early in the season for the lilies to have blooms.

When we arrived at the lake, a black and white duck was diving, grooming, and generally making a fuss out in the lake. With 400mm of lens, we found out it was a Red-necked Grebe. (We think it has a pickup on blocks behind the lake.)

We sat on a log and mallard swam right in front of us, maybe 10 to 15 feet away. John was able to get spectacular pictures. These will be posted as a part 2.

We saw him dabbling for water vegetation. It is really cute when his little feet kick with his butt pointing up in the air.

We also had an American Coot swim near us that John took pictures of. That will also be a part 2 post. The American Coot swims like a little water train.

After the hike, we went to Madison Information Center. I mostly wanted the Cancel Stamp. Unfortunately, the visitor center is closed until June 2nd. The Madison Information center building was built along a fishing / swamp area.

We then drove back towards the campground. I wanted a pit stop to see if I could find tadpoles by Fishing Bridge. The last time we stopped we saw a slimy area with what I thought was tadpoles. This time the slimy area was a green mass. I believe the tadpoles hatched and this is all that was left.

On the hill to the side of the bridge, we saw an Elk with huge antlers. John took pictures with his new camera. See below for the elk video.

We started looking at the sand under the bridge and saw huge bird prints. I’m not sure the type of bird. I’m hoping an eagle, but will look up later.

To get the bird footprints, I had to go under the bridge. I was both amazed and a little scared after seeing the construction. Mostly because the bridge is fully made of wood.

Fishing Bridge used to be a major fishing spot. Fishing can no longer occur because it is where the Cutthroat Trout spawn. I took a video of a bunch of small fish. I’m not sure if they are cutthroat trout or not.

Finally, we went back to the trailer to make brownies 🙂