Although the wildlife was somewhat lacking on this trip, Old Faithful, the waterfalls and the other scenery was still breathtaking…

C:  Now, I ask you, was that so hard???  I told you he was waving at us.

And if you keep your peepers peeped and get a wee bit lucky you just may spot a moose…

That’s it for now folks.  Thanks for your indulgence.  See y’all next time.  Hugs, Chuck and Zookie

And thusly we concluded the Zookie’s Birthiversary Month.

The remainder of the weekend was somewhat of a disappointment in the wildlife department as most of the bison and elk had already moved on to winter feeding grounds and we were relegated to seeking out a few of the smaller inhabitants of the park who proved to be a lot more difficult to spot and, due to their constant motion, even more difficult to photograph…

After a grueling month of wining, dining and providing 24-hour a day entertainment for my traveling companion, the calendar, which I’m certain is powered by snails, has finally moved through the remainder of August and into September.  This rather mundane passage through time heralds the end of the Zookie’s Birthiversary Month and the return of sanity to my usually peaceful existence, however, I would be remiss if I did not include the final chapter of the previous month’s shenanigans for your perusal.

We arrived in Yellowstone National Park (that’s YNP to us professional travelers)...

Locating these rather smallish critters required keen vision and the ability to provide our onboard nature photographer precise descriptive locations as to where our furry little friends could be spotted.  A typical sighting would go something like this:

C:  Marmot!!!
K:  Where?
C:  THERE!!  (pointing and gesticulating wildly)
K:  I don’t see it!
C:  Between the trees!
K:  Which trees?
C:  That smallish tree right over there.
K:  Over WHERE????
C:  Forget the trees; he’s on that log now!!
K:  What log??
C:  The log between the trees!
K:  WHICH TREES!!!!
C:  The trees beside the log!
K:  There are LOTS of logs and LOTS of trees!!
C:  He’s on the little log behind the big log between the trees.
K:  I still can’t find him!
C:  He’s sitting on that little log grinning at us!
K:  You’re messin’ with me, aren’t you!?
C:  NO!!  Look!!  He’s waving!!
K:  He’s WAVING????
C:  AND grinning!!!
K:  HAH!!  Now I KNOW you’re messin’ with me! YOU take the camera.
C:  Okey dokey. (click click click)  There ya go…

on August 31 and set up our tent and cages at the Fishing Bridge RV Park on the north shore of Lake Yellowstone and immediately set about searching for the ever elusive wildlife.  The never elusive bison were the first of the critters we located ambling slowly across the Park roads and creating an obstruction of the type you will only find in this little corner of the world…

We are now in Rawlins, Wyoming, and plan to stay here through the weekend and then we’ll be off to explore the Colorado Rocky Mountains.  The wildlife around here is substantially more abundant and can be easily seen on the courthouse lawn and munching on the greenery surrounding the neighboring church…

This event is further complicated by the tourists (that would be the amateur group of travelers) who simply abandon their vehicles in the middle of the road and gather around the obstructees, ignoring all the posted signs declaring bison to be “Wild and Dangerous Creatures,” snapping photos while edging ever closer to these 2200-pound behemoths and, long after the bison have cleared the road, these same tourists are still gathered in clumps comparing “war stories” and pictures of their recently shared encounter while their vehicles remain haphazardly strewn across the roadway creating a traffic jam of California freeway proportions.  This is definitely not the place to be stuck should you be traveling with someone who HAS to pee…SOON…and refuses to simply stand behind the nearest tall bush to take care of business!!!  

Since this was the last day of August, I treated my blushing Bride to one last celebratory dinner, inclusive of wine and piano music, playing ever so lightly in the background, at the Lake Hotel…

   YNP                                                                      September 8, 2012