We took Yellowstone tours with Tied to Nature this week, a day on the lower loop with stops at Old Faithful, the Grand Canyon of Yellowstone with spectacular waterfall views from both close and far away vistas.
The large, new van had plenty of room for us, from 8 to 68 and from 4 ft to 6’8”. Our guide for both days, John Bybee, was knowledgeable and a great driver navigating crowds and stopping at so many sites we had to write them down. Never telling us where we were going he would ask if we wanted to go here or there. Tied to Nature are the guides on the side not the sage on the stage.
From his early arrival at 6:15 the first day for a 6:30 pickup, no waiting, to our secluded lunches where we ate at picnic benches with sweeping views, Tied to Nature made us feel like we were the only people in the park.
Not 20 minutes into our first day our guide spotted a bald eagle flying low over the river next to the road, the bird watcher’s holy grail. Several Black Bears were eating wildflowers on the side of the road where we stopped and watched from across the street. We sounded the same when we saw a bear as we would riding a rollercoaster.
Day 2, the day a new geyser feature emerged in Biscuit Basin, we toured the upper loop where we spotted many animals from the van and stopped to view vast herds of buffalo with our Tied to Nature binoculars and John’s Zeiss scope with a large screen attached, giving us amazing views of an Osprey couple feeding their babies in a huge nest and wolves chasing Bison then the Bison herd chasing the wolves. He later sent videos he recorded from the Zeiss of the encounters to go with our 300+ pics and videos. We have lasting memories of our trip. There were hundreds of barn swallows in mud nests under the eaves of a 140 year old barn and corrals used to house the original Bison brought to Yellowstone in the Lamar Valley, don’t stand under the eaves.
The Sandhill crane was a rare sighting and a yellow striped Marmot posed for us on a nearby rock. Elk, Mule deer, a Black Wolf and 2 pups from the Junction Butte pack and an American antelope shared their meadows with us. Canadian Geese flew over as a badger scooted by our van.
8 year old Stella had her eyes closed in the van riding between stops I assumed she was sleeping. She told me later she was actually listening to John’s calm descriptions of the animals, thermal features and history. She didn’t miss a story.
When John brought out the Zeiss spotting scope with the large screen attached to the viewfinder we had clear views of wolves and buffalos over a mile away and of Osprey feeding chicks in the nest. Other park visitors gravitated to the Zeiss even though they had their own scopes also because of John’s calm, friendly descriptions even as you could hear other guides shouting to their groups some with mic amplifiers, as they spotted animals. John would simply step back from his screen and quietly describe animals and history, still attracting curious visitors. I thought at first, “Hey, that’s our guide” but soon realized the beauty of Yellowstone is a shared experience for all.
I felt a sense of pride when a women and her young daughter approached John and asked how to get to Gibbon Falls. When we arrived there and saw them I was glad they found it because of our friendly group.
We booked our tour over a year ago, giving us plenty of time to watch Adam Brubaker’s Podcasts and Ken Burn’s Yellowstone documentaries giving us a perspective on the importance of the area for the Shoshone, Blackfoot and Sioux people, the first citizens of Yellowstone. Thanks to our friend and nature photographer Seth Brandes for recommending Tied to Nature, we won’t forget our special days in America’s Serengeti!