Hello. I set out from Tucson on a 3-month road trip in mid-March, now in the 9^th week, having visited Prescott, Holbrook, Cortez, Monticello, Moab, Vernal, Dubois, Buffalo, Sheridan, Cody and now West Yellowstone. I just don’t have the energy or inclination anymore to write the organized travel reports which I believe I have produced in the past. So this report, though lengthy, is somewhat disorganized and rambling. However, do check out the photos below.

The early weather in Arizona was nice, but starting while I was in Cortez, Co. I experienced periodic snow almost every 3^rd day along with high winds. From Vernal, UT. and particularly in Dubois, Buffalo, Sheridan, and West Yellowstone, the afternoon winds have increased to occasionally 50 mph gusts, along with cold and snow showers. It has shredded my intention for daily short hikes and walks while searching for wildlife in the Wind River Range and Bighorns. West Yellowstone has had the worst wind and chill of all sites so far.  So, I daily just cruise the park, in my heated vehicle, having reasonably good luck with spotting big bears (not hard as dozens of photographers usually already park in the area).

I previously have published numerous travel reports with photos of much of the wonderful park scenery in Arizona, Colorado, Utah and Wyoming, so, with a few exceptions, will only publish photos of “new things”, which means mostly wildlife. I also will report on some fantastic public art, in the form of life-size, realistic, highly detailed bronze sculptures, spread throughout the historic downtowns of Buffalo and Sheridan, Wyoming. I have in recent years published a number of photos of the wonderful street bronzes in so many of the cities of Spain, almost all with exacting realism; very little “modern” art anymore. This is true here in Wyoming in two small towns along the Bighorn Mtns. Buffalo, population under 4,500, has a number of life-size bronze scenes involving multiple individual bronzes. Sheridan has about 8 historic blocks with sidewalks filled with close to a hundred bronzes, many depicting the plains Indians and the local Wyoming wildlife, again almost all finely detailed realistic depictions.

Local traditions also make the historic small Wyoming towns lively. In Dubois, population 950, I joined a large proportion of the locals in the Noon Rock bar and pizza parlor across the street from my motel for the weekly evening of “music bingo”. The squares of each bingo sheet contain the names of various country or pop musical performers rather than numbers. The owner would play a short segment of a song and the bingo players had to recognize and identify the performer and piece and X the box if it was on their sheet. I didn’t know half the tunes, and so never could have won. The woman at the bar next to me, who was the Town Manager, explained to me that all the players in the bar were looking down at their cell phones which had a downloaded app to identify the tunes – seems unfair to me.

In the historic Occidental Hotel bar in downtown Buffalo, population 4,500, I joined the long-running weekly Thursday evening crowd to enjoy several local country or pop music groups, all musicians being well into their ‘later’ years. The crowd loved it and many danced (this is the site of a number of Johnson’s Sheriff Longmire stories).

Most of the grizzlies photographed are known “road-side” regulars, with life-long territories in areas through which Yellowstone roads run. The Park rangers have tagged (small ear discs) most of these bears, and identify them by 3-digit numbers. Local regular photographers and bear watchers dislike using the numbers and so most of the bears are given names when first year cubs – I have been unable to establish what committee votes on these names; by the second year a common name is arrived at through widespread use. I have used these names in my photo captions as I have learned to identify several bears.

Besides a few scenic photos and a few of the bronze sculptures, the wildlife photographed below includes many bears plus moose, elk, double-crested cormorant, common merganser and harlequin – one of the most beautiful ducks on earth, but rare to find except at the LeHarde Rapids in Yellowstone.

Tomorrow I move from West Yellowstone to Gardiner I the north. Later. Dave

 

 

I moved from West Yellowstone to Gardiner in the North last week to have better access to Lamar Valley and its wolves. That led to disappointment, and I wound up driving daily back to Hayden Valley and the north shore of the lake for grizzlies. 13 years ago, when I started visiting Lamar Valley, I was up before dawn with other photographers looking for wolves and recent elk kill. In more recent years the Lamar Valley now fills with first-time visitors, all armed with spotting scopes. The crowds wait in the handful of overlooks for hours to catch sight of wolves at great distances. The elk population in this part of the park seems to have dramatically fallen, and the wolf packs work at great distances from the crowded road-way.

Online investigation informed me that now there are a number of published guides, including from the Park Service, suggesting such viewing activity. Further around a dozen guide services now carry electronic receivers to locate and triangulate (with multiple receivers) wolf activity at a distance. They use radio communication to race to the nearest determined wolf activity, almost all of which is close to a mile from the roadways. Bottom line, Lamar Valley seems very different to me from a decade ago, and not very friendly for wildlife photography.

Anyway, as I spent more time in the lake shore roadways, I was within good photo range most days, and captured more wonderful “big bear” shots, plus sighting Black Bear a number of times, and the ever-present encounters with thousands of Bison. I believe some of the big bear shots are more entertaining than those I published last week.

I am now in Bozeman, Mt, enjoying the Museum of the Rockies, and will in a few days start the trek back to Tucson, just in time for the World Cup and triple digit heat. Later. Dave