Jimmy - Yellowstone Day 1
Dennis is exhausted from driving through the night so I take over driving the last 200 miles or so to Yellowstone. This drive really tested my manual driving skills, as I had to go through a few stop signs and change gears more than before.So I guess I’m getting a little better at this driving stuff.While Dennis was sleeping, this shady navigation system decided to play a trick on us and lead us to this dirt road that was suppose to bring us to Yellowstone. So we drove down this dirt road for a good half hour or so and then we decided that that wasn’t the way to Yellowstone so we turned it back around.
We stopped in a local gas station and got correct directions to Yellowstone. So Dennis takes back over driving and we decided to stop at the Mesa Falls. It was two waterfalls - one was the lower falls and the other was the upper falls. The lower falls kinda sucked but the upper falls were real cool. Here are some photos.
Crappy Lower Falls...
Awesome Upper Falls
After the Mesa Falls, we get to the gates of Yellowstone and just like the Grand Canyon it cost 25 bucks for a seven day pass. First stop in Yellowstone we hit up Old Faithful. For those who don’t know Old Faithful is this massive geyser that goes off ever hour or so. So we waited around for an hour for this thing to explode and it was pretty cool I guess (We believe that there’s just some guy that hits a button and makes it go off but whatever that’s our little conspiracy). If you ask me it was kind of like the water show at the Bellagio.
Since we are terrible tourist and don’t plan ahead we found ourselves homeless and you can’t get a camp ground in Yellowstone because they sell out by 9am. Luckily for us we found a camp ground just outside of Yellowstone but it happen to be in bear country. So it was a peaceful night and no bears came out to harass us. We got some rest and decided to explore Yellowstone some more the next day.
Jimmy - Yellowstone Day 2 and Cody, Wyoming
The second day at Yellowstone we went to check out Canyon Village. On our way to Canyon Village we saw Yellowstone Lake, Mud Volcano and Sulfur Cauldron. I wasn’t that thrilled about the Sulfur Cauldron because it smelled so bad over there but the mud volcano was pretty cool.
Canyon Village had these two awesome waterfalls, they are like the Brock Lesnar of Waterfalls. We hiked down 8,000 feet to get a good look at the second waterfall. It was a hell of a walk and had around 400 stairs or so. We got some nice videos and photos of the area for you guys to check out.
Dennis - Yellowstone
Yo, first off I’m never falling asleep again while Jimmy is driving. I wake up and we’re almost at the park, so I start getting excited. I was skeptical since I expected more traffic on the way to Yellowstone but whatever. We get on this gravel road and decide to keep going – bad move. The GPS tells us the closest gas stations are over 30 miles away and is telling us to go all kind of crazy directions. We said screw that and backtracked, but our detour turned out to be worth it because if not, we never would have came across Mesa falls, which is one of my favorite spots of the trip so far.
Old Faithful is a bunch of hot garbage but at least it does something. There were tons of other geyser-like attractions that are supposedly awesome, but basically it’s like watching a tea pot that’s almost done and never whistles. Oh and they stink like rotten trash, which apparently doesn’t bother some people who park their asses right there to sit and take in the aroma.
I named this runoff Dennis' Falls. There's no sign for it but I can draw you a map if you want to visit.
Being from Jersey, the drivers in Yellowstone were awful to me. Everyone drove like a bitch and even Bison were messing with us, walking down the street at 0.2 mph. At least the Bison had the decency to show their faces in public while the little bitch bears hid all day and night, slaughtering not even one stupid tourist.
The waterfalls at Uncle Tom’s Trail were pretty badass. I still like the Upper Mesa Falls better because you can practically go in it you’re so close. The hike was a bitch and half but was good exercise to battle all the Coors Light, beef jerky, and gummi bears that were constituting our diet at the time.
I don’t get it, Yellowstone is pretty much the size of jersey and they had NO camping spots available. There was one campground at Lewis Lake that still had vacancies when we arrived, but it was 72 MILES AWAY and STILL IN THE PARK! Naturally, it was filled up by the time we got there. How do they not have a couple extra acres of campground is beyond me…
Leaving Yellowstone, we drove through middle of nowhere and stopped at Cody, WY to grab some food. It was barely 100 miles from the park, but it takes long to get out and we were beat, especially after the hike. We ate at someplace called the Irma, and our waitress had a pin that said “Ask me about the Rodeo!” So all summer long they have a rodeo every night at 8pm and the waitress tells us “It’s real rodeo, they go for points!” We get excited, thinking we are going to see a real sporting event, so we buy 2 tickets and decide to get a hotel for the night. A few minutes later, Jimmy goes “What do they do at a rodeo?” I had no idea but we were going to find out.
The Rodeo was definitely interesting but not exactly what we expected. It was pretty much a redneck circus, with flashes of real bull riding sprinkled in between. There was a clown in the middle telling god awful jokes. Families everywhere, tons of kids. More than half the show was kid’s events, mostly teenagers. Then they had and ‘under 7’ group of barrel riders, which stung deep because these 7 year olds have jobs and I don’t. Some 12 year old got stepped on by a small bull and was on the ground for awhile, but no blood or anything and he turned out to be ok, I guess he was just a wuss.
7-years old... doing gymnastics... on a horse...
After leaving the rodeo we stopped at a placed named “Silver Dollar Bar” despite our misfortunes at “Club Silver Dollar” in Elko. It was local scene, but we were exhausted from the day. The hiking, bad jokes, and shame from seeing throngs of ‘tweeners with jobs being more cowboy than I’ll ever be had gotten to me. We left after about 30 minute to get a good night sleep for our trek to Minnesota the next day.
Calf Roping and Bull Riding
It was at the Cafeteria that Franco introduced us to one of his favorite shots the “Water Moccasin” (Crown Royal, Peach Schanpps, Pineapple). So after a round of drinks we made our way to the bar Franco currently works at - Stella’s Fish Café. It was an awesome bar we went up to the patio on the roof and chilled out until they forced everyone downstairs to one of the many bars downstairs. The “Water Moccasin” shots kept coming and we kept drinking em because Jersey can party with the best of em. We were in rare form but we were still standing. We helped clean up and close up the bar and it was back to Franco’s house for some pizza and cookies. Of course we had a sober driver take us home because safety is always number one. Our sober driver was actually driving stick for the first time and he nailed it. Either I’m a shitty driver or Dennis is a shitty teacher, you decide.
After rafting we decided to drive a few more hours to Nick’s lake houses up in Northern Minnesota (Franco’s roommate who would fit in perfectly down the Jersey shore). The party continued as you saw in the video blog with Dennis and the other Minnesotians who were cooking in the backyard. We had some food and drinks and hung out by the fire, it was a pretty chill night. We woke up the next morning and grabbed breakfast at some dinner in the middle of nowhere and we did some antique shopping since it was right next door to the diner. We eventually made it back to the house and just chilled out by the community pool and BBQ’d some burgers and brats. Then we rested up and got ready to continue our cross country casino tour at Mystic Casino.
