Yellowstone & Jackson Hole Six Day Tour Trip Highlights: Wildlife: Eagles, Bears & Bison! Active Volcanoes Colorful Lakes & Mudpots Rafting or Floating Exploring the 1st National Park in the USA Fishing
Arrive in Jackson Hole TBig Chill Adventures will arrange transportation for you from the airport to our accommodations for the night and we will have our first group get together at 5:30 pm at our favorite restaurant in town. If you like, we can get you optional add-on tickets to the Unsinkable Molly Brown performance at the Jackson Hole Playhouse that night, or you can wander through the vibrant downtown of Jackson Hole before retiring for the night.
Day One After breakfast we will embark on an amazing white water rafting or float trip down the Snake River surrounded by the majestic mountains of the Grand Tetons. The whitewater rafting section of the Snake River is a Class III river, perfect for people of all ages and experience. Come rafting on the famous Lunch Counter and Big Kahuna rapids! Or, if you prefer, float along the Snake River and enjoy panoramic views of the Teton Range, Gros Ventre Range and Snake River Range. On this rafting trip you can relax and take it all in! In the afternoon we will drive North through the Tetons, with a stop for a hike near Jackson Lake. The Colter Bay area provides habitat for a wide variety of wildlife, including bear, moose, elk, beaver, muskrat, river otters, swans, ospreys, great blue herons, as well as snowshoe hares.
Day Two Into the Park! Yellowstone has many thermal features, but none as consistent in height, interval and length of eruption as Old Faithful; the world s most famous geyser. From Old Faithful we will embark on an easy 2.5 mile hike to the Lone Star Geyser, a cone type geyser which erupts approximately every three hours, reaches a height of 45 feet and lasts about 30 minutes. Next, Grand Prismatic Hot Spring is the most photographed thermal feature in Yellowstone. Extremely hot water travels 121 feet from a crack in the Earth to reach the surface. The hot spring has bright bands of orange, yellow, and green ring the deep blue waters in the spring. The multicolored layers get their hues from different species of thermophile (heat-loving) bacteria living in the progressively cooler water around the spring.
Day Three We will start our day at the Artists Paintpots Trail. We ll wander past a forest of scorched lodgepole pines. These conifers suffered mightily in the large fire of 1988. Once on the boardwalk, we will see steam blanketing much of the landscape. Along this section of the path, you ll notice that the Artists Paintpots feature a collection of pastel colors. This is because iron oxide stains their whitish/gray mud. When the Paintpots blow their tops, they can shoot mud up to 15 feet in the air! After these active volcanic features, we will stop at two amazing geologic wonders: the obsidian cliffs, once used by Native Americans to make arrowheads, and The Sheepeater Cliffs, a series of exposed cliffs made up of columnar basalt.
Day Four Mammoth Hot Springs are a must-see feature of Yellowstone National Park in part because they re so different from other thermal areas in the area! This is largely because limestone is a relatively soft type of rock, allowing the travertine formations to grow much faster than other sinter formations. It has been described as looking like a cave turned inside out. Mammoth Hot Springs is divided into two terraces, the Upper and Lower. Approximately 50 hot springs lie within the area. After stops at the petrified forest and Tower Falls, we will end the day with an Old West Dinner Cookout in Pleasant Valley, which was the sight of "Uncle John" Yancey's Pleasant Valley Hotel, one of the earliest lodging facilities in Yellowstone. Although the buildings are no longer there, a horseback or wagon ride takes us through the Valley for an evening not soon forgotten.
Day Five We will be starting our day as early as possible with a drive through the Lamar Valley to look for wildlife! The Lamar Valley is known for its wildlife viewing. Buffalo, elk, grizzly bears, wolves, black bears, antelope, otters, osprey, bald eagles and coyotes are just a few of the species we might find along the highway as we drive through the heart of this legendary valley of Yellowstone National Park. We will stop for lunch in Canyon Village and then the rest of our day will be in and around the Grand Canyon of The Yellowstone. The canyon is spectacular, with the various terrain of rock and trees surrounded by the perpetual mist of the thermal vents and the river below. Yellowstone Falls consist of two major waterfalls on the Yellowstone River.
Day Six Our last hurrah in Yellowstone National Park will be an 8:45 am guided fishing trip on Yellowstone Lake. If we are fortunate enough to catch and clean some fish during our two hours, we can have them cooked for our lunch! We will drive through the East exit of Yellowstone, which provides a lovely drive to Cody, Wyoming, arriving in the late afternoon. We will have a final dinner together, and then your accommodations are at our favorite place in Cody, the Chamberlin Inn.