Road Trip Day Six: Yellowstone, Grand Tetons, HOME!

This was the last day of our trip. As much fun as we had been having, it was still nice to know that we would be sleeping in our own beds that night. We packed up, had some more Brandin’ Iron breakfast, and headed out. It was a COLD day. We bundled up in our warm clothes and wished that we had packed more. Road trip lesson of the day: Take winter coats to Yellowstone (at least in June).

Probably the most exciting part of the day was finding a Vermont license plate. Ben spotted it just after we left our hotel and we did a quick u-turn to see if he was right (we take these things pretty seriously). We actually saw three more Vermont plates that day, but still no West Virginias or Rhode Islands. Who would have guessed that we would see three Hawaii plates on our trip and not one West Virginia?* The license plate game turned out to be a great purchase. The kids really got into it and were super excited when we would find a new plate. Even Abby liked playing and anytime we were in a parking lot she would say, “I’m looking for license plates.” She mostly just cared about the Utah plates and every time she saw one would yell, “I see a UTAH!”


We stopped at the fountain paint pots where we saw some cool bubbling pools and the Clepsydra Geyser. We thought we had great timing and were really lucky to see it erupting. Later we found out that it pretty much erupts continuously. We’re not quite as charmed as we thought.


Our next stop was the Grand Prismatic Pool. The colors are so amazing in all of the pictures I’ve seen, so I was really excited about seeing it. It wasn’t that great in real life. The weather was so cold that there was just a thick cloud of steam covering the whole thing.


After freezing our hineys off at those two stops, we were done with Yellowstone. It was just too cold to tempt us out of the car for anything else. We did have a couple of cool wildlife sightings . . . a bald eagle on the way into the park and a mama elk and her baby on the way out.




We drove home through Grand Teton National Park. Maybe it was because it was overcast and all of the mountaintops were covered with clouds, or maybe I was just done with looking at scenery, but I wasn’t overly impressed.

Our ride home was pretty painless. We listened to the end of Harry Potter and watched Wallace & Gromit. We pulled over when we got to Lava Hot Springs so the kids could see some people jump off the super high diving platforms and see the big water slides that go over the road. The kids were in love. We promised to take them there someday down the road. Our last pit stop of the trip was at Wendy’s in Tremonton, then home again, home again, jiggety jig! 2,158 miles and six states in six days. It was so much fun! I’m already planning next year’s trip (and the next three after that). I can’t wait!



*Nate saw a West Virginia plate on the way home from work the other day. The kids were so happy when he showed them the picture he took with his phone. We’re not holding out hope for Rhode Island.