Day 4

On Monday after buying everyone a Yellowstone t-shirt we headed back into Yellowstone and drove the southern loop around the park.  Sadly, we didn't see any buffalo heading into the park.  We went and saw Lower Geyser Basin, the Fountain Paint Pots, Old Faithful, Yellowstone Lake, and Artist Point.  The Fountain Paint Pots and Lower Geyser Basin were so colorful.  It really did look like paint pots placed really close together with so many different colors: orange, yellow, green, blue, grey, brown.  We enjoyed hearing the mud bubble as it boiled.
Old Faithful had gone off just before we arrived.  The parking lot for Old Faithful is huge- luckily Scott can remember where we park because I tend to forgot;  and to forget in a huge parking lot like that would be a lot of extra walking around.  So, we sat for 85 minutes while we waited for the famous geyser to spray.  Getting there that early meant that we had front row seats.  It was a little warm, and sunny, so we took turns sitting on the bench and sitting under a big tree.  Macy was a little scared when Old Faithful went off, but everyone enjoyed seeing the spray 150 feet in the air.
After Old Faithful we drove an hour to Artist Point.  We passed hundreds, if not thousands, of buffalo along the way.  They were eating, bathing, sleeping, it was great to see.  Artist Point is a hike that has over 300 metal steps down to a viewing of the large waterfall that we had seen the day before.  We were a little (maybe a lot) nervous about taking Macy on that hike- really didn't see any kids on the hike)- but Scott took her on his shoulders on the way down.  The view at the bottom was pretty good, but the area is small so you just have to turn around and walk back up 300 rickety steps.  Macy wanted to walk, and she made it more then half way before she got too tired and was placed back on Scott's shoulders.  I was just glad when we made it to the top and back to solid ground.
After the hike, we turned around and drove an hour to the east park exit.  This drive was much slower since the buffalo were crossing the street constantly for their evening/bed spots.  The buffalo are much more fun to see going 35 mph then at a standstill for over 30 minutes.  But, it is a memory.
We drove past the fire ruins from a few years ago, down an incredibly steep mountain road with sharp turns, over the Buffalo Bill dam on our way to our hotel in Cody, Wyoming.  I think it was around 8pm when we made it there, and then again ate dinner around 9pm.  It was another great day.