Day 5 was a long, exciting day – so long and exciting that we actually got complaints from the peanut gallery. We woke ourselves up with a steep, slippery, nerve-wracking 325-stair descent to get up close and personal with the beautiful Lower Falls. Then we moved on to Norris Basin, where ominous storm clouds and thunder threatened to drench us at any moment. Then we witnessed a pack of wolves feasting on coyote cubs after chasing away the parents. And THEN we drove out to Cody, WY to watch the Cody Nite Rodeo, which was pretty fun to see overall, but man, the icing on the cake was their borderline-bigoted-misogynistic-homophobic MC to REALLY make us feel we were in the Wild West.
But let's start from the beginning!
Grand Canyon of Yellowstone: Lower Falls
As you might remember, our first attempt to see the Grand Canyon of Yellowstone was mostly foiled by the fog. Our second attempt was much more rewarding. We drove to the South Rim and hiked down 3/4s of the way down to the bottom of Lower Falls. The stairs were slick because of rain and little waterfalls splashing across the path.
I've always been afraid of heights, and being able to see through the metal grate stairs was not comforting. Even more disturbing was the number of dented or bent stairs, which made us think, hm, maybe we should have eaten less for breakfast... Mom stayed behind, but the rest of us helped each other down.
Even my cousins' Ama made it, and she's almost 80!
Finally, here's the view at the bottom.
Grand Canyon of Yellowstone: Artist's Point
After huffing and puffing our way back up (no really, it's the altitude, I'm in better shape than that, honest!), we drove out to Artist's Point, where we were treated to a rare but perfectly-timed beam of sunshine.
Norris Geyser Basin
The Norris Geyser Basin is supposed to be the most volcanically active area in Yellowstone, and as such, we read that the landscape is constantly changing. We didn't see any of the big geysers go off, though we did see little Whirligig Geyser send up a nice tall plume for a few seconds. Otherwise, we just took pictures of all the fascinating colors, while hustling along to finish before the threatening thunderstorm.
This one below was called Pearl Geyser, which I thought was a cool name.
And there was a monster sighting at Green Dragon Spring!
Wolves in Hayden Valley
As the trip progressed, we improved at spotting interesting wildlife, not by spotting wildlife itself, but by gauging the number of cars parked by the road and the number of people with fancy tripod-mounted cameras.
Lots of traffic => "This is MAJOR!"
This is how we spotted the wolves. They were far away on the crest of a hill, so I don't understand how anyone could see them without knowing what to look for! This is probably my best picture, pardon my sad 3x zoom again. If you squint you can see the silhouette of a black wolf right in the center of the picture.
When we got out of our vans, we saw a black wolf and a grey wolf, chasing what we thought was another light-colored wolf down the hill. Turns out the light-colored one was a coyote, which the ranger said had been trying to misdirect the wolves from its den since 10 a.m. Other visitors mentioned that the wolves had been digging for some time, and the ranger confirmed that they were hunting for the coyotes' den and cubs.
Kally, with her macho 7x zoom, even got a picture of the black wolf with something hanging from its mouth, so awesome! Isn't it almost cannibalistic for wolves to be eating coyote babies though?
Cody Nite Rodeo
All of this unplanned wolf-watching made us somewhat behind-schedule to make the two-hour drive to Cody, WY. We considered postponing the trip, but were told that it would snow the next day and the roads might be closed. Plus, my uncle and parents had heard from a friend that there was *gasp* Chinese food in Cody, so we decided to head out! Haha, so cute.
We played "I Spy" in our van, but got stuck on Z. I think Tommy said "zygote" (we had a six-character minimum rule), and we were like, um, I certainly HOPE you don't spy a zygote. (And also "I spy with my little eye" implies little *unassisted* eye. That was also a rule.)
Ultimately, we didn't have quite enough time for Chinese food. Here was the sad conversation we had when we got to the stadium:
Chris: "Don't worry, it looks like they have food here."
Mom: "You mean, like...hot dogs?" (Looking sad, kind of queasy.)
Employee: "Oh yeah! Hot dogs, and barbecue too! The food here is really great. And at a good price too!"
(Employee sees the look on Mom's face, getting sadder and more queasy-looking.)
Employee: "At least, *I* think so..."
Poor Chinese parents. But actually, the food was yummy. They had kosher hot dogs, and I liked the barbecue better than the Cowboy restaurant in Gardiner, MT (less vinegary).
The events were also fun: bucking horses, bucking bulls, individual calf roping, pair calf roping, barrel racing, and junior versions of most of the above too.
My first inkling that something was weird was when the MC made the comment before one of the women's events that this was the "most dangerous event in rodeo" (or something like that) because "it's all women driving". Yeah okay. Ha. Ha. Joke. Fine. Then before the ladies' calf roping event, he asked, "why do the ladies only need to rope the calf, but not tie it down?" And then proceeded to sort of taunt the event, going "yeah ladies, what happened to equal rights?" I was like...hm. And THEN there was that awful intermission act which culminated in the MC sticking his head between this woman's legs (an actor I'm sure, but still), and making fun of her big butt. Yeeecch.
Oh right, and then there was the part where the MC welcomed visitors from various countries (France, UK, Belgium, etc.). Then he asked the Californians to cheer, and said "Welcome to the real America!". Totally lame. Chris and I both shouted loud boos. I think I was most appalled because he was saying this to my family, a bunch of minorities sitting in the front row, and it reminded me of the George Allen "macaca" thing in Virginia a few years back. But then I realized he probably couldn't see us, and figured okay, just another bad joke, ha ha.
I don't think I'll even go into the comments he made about gays or Obama. But I will close with one last awful snippet of the show, which was that they had a straw man propped up in the center of the arena during the bull riding event. Those bulls are BIG, STRONG animals. One pissed-off bull, after bucking his rider, charged the straw man, and just sort of...blew through him like it was...well a straw man. It was a little horrifying because it was such a vivid illustration of what might happen if someone didn't dodge fast enough.
What DIDN'T need to happen, was the MC insisting that it was Bill Clinton getting what he deserved. And then kicking it around some more. In the nuts. Sigh.
I must say I was shocked that these comments were being made in public, but I guess Wyoming is really a different part of the country!
Cutest part of the rodeo:
This is how we spotted the wolves. They were far away on the crest of a hill, so I don't understand how anyone could see them without knowing what to look for! This is probably my best picture, pardon my sad 3x zoom again. If you squint you can see the silhouette of a black wolf right in the center of the picture.
When we got out of our vans, we saw a black wolf and a grey wolf, chasing what we thought was another light-colored wolf down the hill. Turns out the light-colored one was a coyote, which the ranger said had been trying to misdirect the wolves from its den since 10 a.m. Other visitors mentioned that the wolves had been digging for some time, and the ranger confirmed that they were hunting for the coyotes' den and cubs.
Kally, with her macho 7x zoom, even got a picture of the black wolf with something hanging from its mouth, so awesome! Isn't it almost cannibalistic for wolves to be eating coyote babies though?
Cody Nite Rodeo
All of this unplanned wolf-watching made us somewhat behind-schedule to make the two-hour drive to Cody, WY. We considered postponing the trip, but were told that it would snow the next day and the roads might be closed. Plus, my uncle and parents had heard from a friend that there was *gasp* Chinese food in Cody, so we decided to head out! Haha, so cute.
We played "I Spy" in our van, but got stuck on Z. I think Tommy said "zygote" (we had a six-character minimum rule), and we were like, um, I certainly HOPE you don't spy a zygote. (And also "I spy with my little eye" implies little *unassisted* eye. That was also a rule.)
Ultimately, we didn't have quite enough time for Chinese food. Here was the sad conversation we had when we got to the stadium:
Chris: "Don't worry, it looks like they have food here."
Mom: "You mean, like...hot dogs?" (Looking sad, kind of queasy.)
Employee: "Oh yeah! Hot dogs, and barbecue too! The food here is really great. And at a good price too!"
(Employee sees the look on Mom's face, getting sadder and more queasy-looking.)
Employee: "At least, *I* think so..."
Poor Chinese parents. But actually, the food was yummy. They had kosher hot dogs, and I liked the barbecue better than the Cowboy restaurant in Gardiner, MT (less vinegary).
The events were also fun: bucking horses, bucking bulls, individual calf roping, pair calf roping, barrel racing, and junior versions of most of the above too.
My first inkling that something was weird was when the MC made the comment before one of the women's events that this was the "most dangerous event in rodeo" (or something like that) because "it's all women driving". Yeah okay. Ha. Ha. Joke. Fine. Then before the ladies' calf roping event, he asked, "why do the ladies only need to rope the calf, but not tie it down?" And then proceeded to sort of taunt the event, going "yeah ladies, what happened to equal rights?" I was like...hm. And THEN there was that awful intermission act which culminated in the MC sticking his head between this woman's legs (an actor I'm sure, but still), and making fun of her big butt. Yeeecch.
Oh right, and then there was the part where the MC welcomed visitors from various countries (France, UK, Belgium, etc.). Then he asked the Californians to cheer, and said "Welcome to the real America!". Totally lame. Chris and I both shouted loud boos. I think I was most appalled because he was saying this to my family, a bunch of minorities sitting in the front row, and it reminded me of the George Allen "macaca" thing in Virginia a few years back. But then I realized he probably couldn't see us, and figured okay, just another bad joke, ha ha.
I don't think I'll even go into the comments he made about gays or Obama. But I will close with one last awful snippet of the show, which was that they had a straw man propped up in the center of the arena during the bull riding event. Those bulls are BIG, STRONG animals. One pissed-off bull, after bucking his rider, charged the straw man, and just sort of...blew through him like it was...well a straw man. It was a little horrifying because it was such a vivid illustration of what might happen if someone didn't dodge fast enough.
What DIDN'T need to happen, was the MC insisting that it was Bill Clinton getting what he deserved. And then kicking it around some more. In the nuts. Sigh.
I must say I was shocked that these comments were being made in public, but I guess Wyoming is really a different part of the country!
Cutest part of the rodeo:
- All the little kids in the audience were invited to come into the arena and try to pull ribbons off of three calves' tails for a prize. So cute...baby cows are much better at running than baby humans.
- There was a kid (must have been 4 years old or so), who did his barrel race at a walk. Reminds me of how I did barrel racing at Don-E-Brook, haha.
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