Yellowstone naturally: Go find the remote

August 26, 2007|Carolyn McCarthy, Globe Correspondent

YELLOWSTONE NATIONAL PARK, Wyo. -- The mist was lifting on Fishing Bridge, where an elk forded the river upstream. I stood on the bridge and watched, the sole witness, as he crossed the current, strong and swift. It was shortly after 7 a.m. When I got in the car and prepared to move on, a bison wandered onto the bridge. A motorist eager to cross edged toward it. But bison do not behave like cattle. A muscular, one-ton muddle of dreadlocked fur, the bison bucked and snorted.

The minivan conceded. Meanwhile, cars and RVs had accumulated on both sides of the bridge. The bison ambled across, instigating the day's first "bear jam," a term coined by rangers to describe the gridlock caused by wildlife-watching in high season.

Last year almost 2.9 million people visited Yellowstone National Park, and many did not stray far from their cars. According to Nathan Varley, a wildlife biologist who grew up in the park as the son of a fisheries biologist, "It's a road park. Around 95 percent of all visitors to Yellowstone are traveling through on the road and hitting the main attractions."

For a nature lover it can be daunting. Old Faithful's parking lots make Wal-Mart's look rinky-dink. Most visitors drive "the loop," a 96-mile trundle through changing landscapes of lakes, thick stands of lodgepole pine, geysers, mud holes, and giant meadows where you can see herds of bison or grizzly sows and their cubs. The country's first national park, Yellowstone may still be its greatest. But how can a high-season visitor lost among the throngs get personal?

"Solitude is important and healing. It gives us a chance to reflect," says Norm Bishop, the park's former resources interpreter, now retired but back for a visit. Bishop is a park icon who was instrumental in bringing the wolves back to Yellowstone. He returns frequently to cross-country ski, revel in the wilderness, and teach others to do the same. "Go half a mile from any parking lot or road," Bishop says, "and you'll have it all to yourself."

If only I had had that advice a few days earlier. Following the signs to a turnoff called Petrified Tree, I drove a long, narrow road (the first I saw that was prohibited to RVs). Hopeful, I continued along, only to get funneled into a narrow, car-filled parking lot. The attraction a few yards beyond was a beautiful remnant of a petrified tree, blocked off by an iron fence. A dozen of us stood there, trying to angle our cameras to exclude the iron bars. We spent an equal amount of time making three-point turns out of the lot.