Road Trip - June 2025 - Yellowstone National Park

After six days and eight paragliding flights for Andrew, we left Five Springs and headed to Cody to spend the night and get cleaned up again. We couldn't get into the historic hotel we usually stay so went to the Best Western Ivy Inn which was very nice and also had guest laundry facilities. Another much needed re-fresh after hand washing clothes for the past couple weeks.

We had time to spare in the afternoon so, in addition to a coffee stop, we found a short hiking trail along the Shoshone River. 

The drive through Yellowstone National Park was slow and meandering with lots of stops for wildlife. We saw bison close to the road, bears so far away that even with a zoom lens on the camera they just looked like brown lumps, Harlequin ducks, a fast flowing river and big waterfalls.

Just the other side of West Yellowstone, we stopped for the night at Coffee Pot Campground (which we’d been to before) where there are tons of pelicans along the river. We spent a lot of time trying to get good photos of them both on the water and in flight. 

This cute little guy was our friend at the campsite. And the Huckleberry Spritz was a very nice impulse buy to finish off the day! 

Road Trip - June 2025 - Sheridan

With rain and wind forecast for a couple days (which fell nicely into the half way point of our stay at Five Springs), we drove the 1 1/2 hour scenic route over the Burgess Pass to spend a night at Sheridan. We stayed at the Sheridan Inn, another very nice historic hotel. 

Friendly rabbit that was around the hotel quite a bit. 

One thing I really love about Sheridan’s downtown is all the sculptures on every block. I just took a couple photos of them because I’d already taken so many of them last year. 

We spent a good part of our time in Sheridan at the Sam Mavrakis "fishing pond" where we took far too many photos of the bullfrogs, red winged blackbirds, turtles and ducks. 

On the way to and from Five Springs, we saw several moose and got a few photos of the ones close to the road. 

Road Trip - June 2025 - Hiking near Five Springs

Weather permitting, Andrew paraglided in the morning and late afternoon as it can often get too windy by mid-day. This gives me time to do a workout and for us to meander elsewhere during the afternoons. 

We hiked the Stateline Trail which denotes the border between Montana and Wyoming and overlooks part of the Big Horn Canyon and Big Horn River. Thankfully, it's not a very long trail and we made quick time on it as it was very cold and windy that day and trying desperately to rain. 

Another day we discovered Cottonwood Canyon and checked out a few of the back roads in the area. 

The waterfall that was described as a highlight of the canyon was totally dry but you could see where it was supposed to be, pretty much centre of the photo. 

These cactus, and the lizard, were near a boat launch by the river. 

There was another spot along the highway towards Sheridan that Andrew wanted to check out and, after stopping for lunch at a nice viewpoint, we found lots of great flowers. 

And before we left, we also checked out Rainbow Canyon which was very nice! I just love this landscape and all the colors.

Andrew hiked a couple other trails close to the campground (including a new one we hadn't known about before) while I was working out. 

I managed to sneak a photo of this butterfly while Andrew was in the air flying one day.