Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
perhaps to desperately lonely men who have been away from home for a very long time.
They looked a little bit like tits to me.
GrandTetonNationalParkandYellowstoneNationalParkruntogethertoformoneenorm-
ous area of wilderness stretching over a hundred miles from north to south. The road con-
necting them, Route 191, had only just been reopened for the year, and the Teton visitors'
centers were still closed. There were hardly any other people or cars around and for forty
milesIdroveinsplendidisolationalongthewildmeadowsoftheSnakeRiver,whereherds
of elk grazed against the backdrop of the tall and jagged Tetons. As I climbed into Yellow-
stone the clouds grew moody and looked heavy with snow. The road I was on is closed for
six months of the year, which gives you some idea of the sort of winters they have there.
Even now the snow along the roadside was five or six feet deep in places.
Yellowstoneistheoldestnationalparkintheworld(itwascreatedin1872)anditisenorm-
ous, about the size of Connecticut. I drove for over an hour without seeing anyone, except
for a park warden in a wooden but who charged me ten dollars to get in. That must be an
excitingjobforacollegegraduate,tositinabutinthemiddleofnowhereandtaketendol-
lars off a tourist every two or three hours. Eventually I came to a turnoff for Grant Village,
and I followed it for a mile through the snowy woods. The village was good-sized, with a
visitors' center, motel, stores, post office and campgrounds, but everything was shut and
every window was boarded. Snowdrifts rose almost to the rooftops of some of the build-
ings. I had now driven seventy miles without seeing an open place of business, and gave
silent thanks that I had filled up with gasoline at Jackson.
Grant Village and the neighboring village of West Thumb are on the banks of Yellowstone
Lake, which the highway runs alongside. Steam was rising from fumaroles in the lake and
bub bling up through the mud by the roadside. I was in the area of the park called the cal-
dera. Once there was a great mountain here. But 600,000 years ago it blew up in a colossal
volcanic eruption that sent 2{c\}0 cubic miles of debris into the atmosphere. The geysers,
fumaroles and steaming mud pots for which Yellowstone is famous are the spluttering rel-
ics of that cataclysm.
Just beyond West Thumb the highway split in two. One branch went to Old Faithful, the
most famous of all the geysers, but a chain had been strung across the road with a red sign
hanging from it saying, ROAD CLOSED. Old Faithful was seventeen miles away down
the closed road, but eighty miles away down the alternative road. I drove on to Hayden
Valley, where you can stop the car at frequent turnouts and look out upon the plain of the
Yellowstone River. This is where the grizzly bears roam and buffalo graze.
