This is my travel blog!
Documenting my trip across the USA and Canada in June/June 2011.

Wednesday, March 7, 2012

DAY 24 - Grand Northern, Day 18 - Cody to Yellowstone (4th of July - Independence Day)

* Left Cody in the morning to head to rafting down the Shoshone River. There was a 4th of July parade going on in the main street of Cody for those not going rafting. We jumped in the rafting bus and went down to the river and prepared the boats. I was in the second row, paddling on the left side.

* The water was absolutely freezing! My feet were numb the whole time as they were sitting in the water at the bottom of the boat. The rapids weren’t really that strong, although we did hit quite a few big waves which drenched us all. The water was a bit dirty and had a funny smell, but the scenery was pretty amazing. We saw a few deer and some eagles as well.

* Rafting went for about an hour and a half - longer than I expected - and by the end I was freezing and couldn’t wait to warm up my feet. We headed back to the hotel to change, then the group met up and we left for a lunch stop a few minutes up the road, then on to the bus to go to Yellowstone park.

* We got to the park and drove through all the amazing scenery. We made a few stops to walk around and take photos (at one of the geysers and ‘old faithful’ where we had dinner) then kept driving through to the next hotel in West Yellowstone. We spent about 4 hours in Yellowstone and the scenery was really beautiful - had a good soundtrack playing and I was staring out the window in awe (with a few power naps along the way). We also saw some bison, goats and eagles which were pretty cool.

* The weather in West Yellowstone was pretty dodgy. We were supposed to go out to the 4th of July concert/fireworks in the park opposite the hotel at 7pm, but it was raining and storming so we stayed at the hotel until just before 10pm then some of us went over to watch the fireworks. A few of us got dressed up and the fireworks were pretty good for a small town, so it was a nice little celebration for the 4th of July. Went back to the hotel to sleep.

Pretty relaxing day. The rafting was pretty good - would have liked it more if it was a bit warmer and had stronger rapids, but it was still fun and great to see the scenery from the river. Yellowstone was really beautiful - looking forward to seeing more tomorrow. The weather was a bit of a let down, but it was still good to be able to celebrate 4th of July, American style.

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