Watch out for that spider!

Had a nice run this morning and headed out to look at the river before the kiddos got up.  Almost ran into this web/spider!  

 It was a beautiful morning!

 The kids wrapped up their Junior Ranger packets and were able to get their badges.

 We did a brief wildlife viewing tour that night.  

I'd heard the Wind Canyon Trail (easy .4 mile loop) was a great location for sunset viewing.  Turns out I'd heard correctly.

 Saw him on the way back to camp.

Wildlife viewing at Theodore Roosevelt National Park

After settling in at camp and having dinner we did the scenic route in the car of Theodore Roosevelt National Park.  We headed out east passing Prairie Dog Town (one of many).  Amazingly, there weren't two many to see.  

Our first wildlife sighting:

Like the South Dakota Badlands, this park was covered in Sweet Clover (yellow flowers).

We got out for the photo-op at Scoria Point Overlook:

Then we headed to the Ridgeline Nature Trail (easy .6 mile loop):

The views weren't too bad!

If you look closely I (my shadow) even made it in the family pic!

Hike: Ridgeline Nature Trail

Trails Used: Ridgeline Nature Trail

Distance:  .6
Difficulty: Easy
Overall average: 2.2 mph
Overall Time: 27 min
Total Ascent: 196 ft.

Then we headed to the Badlands Overlook:

We saw pronghorns and deer:

We finally saw some of the wild horses before we hit the Coal Vein Trail.

Coal Vein Trail (easy .6-.8 mile loop):

Beautiful evening!

Hike: Coal Vein Trail
Trails Used: Coal Vein

Distance:  .87 miles
Difficulty: Easy
Overall average: 2.2 mph
Overall Time: 23 min
Total Ascent: 90 ft.

We stayed in the car after that trail.  The mosquito's were crazy.  We finished up the loop with more wild horses way in the distance.

Lots of bison:

Wildlife viewing is one of the kids and my favorite activities while on a trip!

This guy had an itch that needed to be scratched!

Heading back to the campsite we saw this elk:

A visit to the State Capitol: Cheyenne, Wyoming

Our exciting day trip to Cheyenne began with a visit to the State Capitol building.  Since we saw the Denver one earlier in the summer we thought we should take a peek at this one as well since it's so close.  We all agreed that the Denver one was nicer but that's not to say that this one shouldn't be visited as well.

Bison, wolves, and moose

After the Lewis and Clark Caverns we headed for Yellowstone.  We had missed the Lamar River Valley and I figured since we were so close we could drive through around dusk, look for wildlife, and then find a campground outside of Yellowstone's northeast entrance.  This couldn't have worked any better.  We saw herd after herd of bison.  This experience was made better since they were all snorting, grunting, and purring en masse. 

We finally stopped at a pullout that didn't have buffalo knee deep for a quick dinner @ 8:15.  I was making the sandwiches when a bunch of cars and trucks started pulling up.  One of the guys asked us if we knew that there was a black wolf out in the field.  Of course we didn't, we were too busy stuffing our faces.  He was nice enough to let us look through his high powered scope so it was just like the wolf was right in front of us.  Later on we saw another bear from far away too.  I'm so glad we went through Yellowstone again.

We stayed at Fox Creek Campground outside of Yellowstone that night.  It was a nice place with good views of mountains.  Headed to Cody and Sheridan, WY in the morning.  Dead Indian Pass on the way to Cody had great views and was very curvy. 

 

Went to the visitor's center and the Old West Miniature Village before heading to the Chinese buffet on Main street in Cody.  The kids 'loved' it.  We were going to do the Buffalo Bill Museum but we ran out of time.

Stopped at the Shell Falls Interpretive Center (worth a stop).  We received  great info for our camping that night. 

 At the top of Granite Pass we saw three moose. (I'd been dying to see some moose that you could tell were moose)

Tried to camp at Sibley Lake but it was all reserved.  We turned around and headed back to Prune Creek and managed to get the last site available.  We probably would have stayed another night if we could have but they were all booked up the next day.  It was a pretty camping area along the creek.  There was lots of noise from the road that took away from the camping experience a bit. 

 

Did a little running while I was here and saw a moose and nine deer. 

Run: Prune Creek

Trails Used:  ?

Distance: 6.53 miles

Difficulty: Easy
Overall average: 6.0 mph
Overall Time: 1 hrs, 05 mins
Total Ascent: 573 ft.

We crossed over to South Dakota the next day on the way to Custer State Park.

We cheated a little since we didn't get the Wyoming sign the day before.