We Bearly Knew Ya’ – 10 Surprising Facts About Yellowstone

By Bennett Owen

As part of the My-West fall road trip, we took an early October swing through snow-capped Yellowstone Park…no lines, no traffic jams…and no lollygagging either, because it was freakin’ COLD! The kids will most likely remember one very photogenic chipmunk, a few snowball fights and the view of Yellowstone Falls from Artist’s Point, which suitably blew away the CGI saturated munchkins. 

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In an effort to entertain and enlighten the kids en route, I uncovered some things about Yellowstone that entertained and enlightened me more than anyone else and since they didn’t impress the kids I’m trying ten of them out on you:

10 – Tiny little Isa Lake is the only body of water that empties into both sides of the Continental Divide…feeding both the Missouri and mighty Columbia rivers.

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9 – Redwoods once grew in Yellowstone. Geologists say the Petrified Tree near Tower Junction is “anatomically indistinguishable from modern Redwoods growing today along the California coast.”

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8 – Gardner, Montana at the north entrance of Yellowstone is located directly on the 45^th parallel…halfway between the Equator and the North Pole.

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7 – There is an appropriately named ‘Mae West’ curve on the Grand Loop Road near the Antelope Creek overlook.

Mae West Curve. Credit: mccormacka

6 - You can tell the temperature of the water by the color of the algae. Bright yellow survives at 160 F, while the green stuff means the water temperature is a mere 120 F.

Morning Glory Pool. Credit: jpc.raleigh

5 – That thing hanging from a Moose’s neck is called a Dewlap.

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4 – Bill Clinton was the last of eight presidents who visited Yellowstone Park while in office.

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3 - Steamboat Geyser is the highest erupting geyser in the world, shooting water as high as 400 feet.

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2 – The fastest animal found in Yellowstone is the Pronghorn Antelope, with top speeds of 50 MPH…slightly slower than ME after spotting a Grizzly Bear.

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1-    Yellowstone Park is not only the first US national park but the world’s first as well, and sparked a global effort to preserve and maintain places of rare natural beauty.

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Post Script

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We're just back from our road trip through Idaho, Montana and Wyoming. Along the way we passed through about a hundred small towns. And one thing they all have in common is a one-room post office. Here are a few more to add to our prior post, Post Modern Mails.

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Ruff Riders

By Jim Poulton

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Make no bones about it – a dog in a pickup truck is a sure indication you’re in the West. On My-West’s recent road trip, we saw dogs of all stripes and sizes, sitting in, on, under, and around their owners’ pickups. There’s not much that makes a dog happier than to ride in the open air, head and tongue hanging over the side railing, feeling the wind in their fur.

Here are some pictures of Fidos in Flatbeds, Pooches in Pickups, doing their thing, being our best friends, Wagging in Wagons & Waiting at the Tailgate.

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Just how archetypal is a dog in a pickup? Chevy knows:

Then there's this - from a postcard we picked up in, of all places, Idaho:

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And finally, this:

Share a picture of your dog at: info@my-west.com.

Bannack Star Route - Haulin’ the Mail

By Bennett Owen

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The F-S is a good 40 miles from town, connected by a stretch of two-lane that…well, let’s put it this way, if you’re looking for the road less traveled, you’ll most certainly pass by the F-S on the way. It wasn’t always that easy to hitch a ride out to the ranch, so on a few occasions I became unofficial freightage of the US postal service, riding shotgun on ‘The Stage.’

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No, I'm not that old, by my time the horse teams had been replaced by horsepower and a pickup truck but the idea remained the same. Riding with the stage was a peculiar experience because just outside of town he’d start taking detours off of that ribbon of blacktop onto some dirt washboard roads that were often glorified cow-trails. But at the end of those ‘roads’ we’d come upon something like this –

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Or this ...

California. Credit: Gregory Jordan

The ride took hours and was fascinating for the countryside you’d see. And by the time he dropped off me, and the mail, at the F-S, he wasn’t even half way through his route. 

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There was no TV at the F-S and the radio reception was so scratchy that listening was pretty much limited to Paul Harvey News & Comment.  So the stage was an important lifeline and one of my chores was to walk down the lane and pick up that canvas satchel full of mail and the Montana Standard newspaper. The Sunday edition arrived on Monday, feeding my addiction to Rick O’Shay and Prince Valiant via the Sunday funnies. Yes, I read Ann Landers too.

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Yes a ‘link’ literally with the outside world. All that stuff about rain and snow and gloom of night may sound quaint in the Internet age. But I can remember a lot of wind-swept, snowed over winter days when the stage tracks were the only ones on the road.

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Arizona. Credit: WVS

Post Modern Mails

By Bennett Owen

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My family’s ranch is still pretty remote by today’s standards. By that I mean it is one of the few places left where it’s impossible to get a cell phone connection.  An Uncle recently discovered the only hot spot in the valley but depending on the season you’ll need either a four-wheel drive or a snowmobile to get there.

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What the valley DOES have is a post office. Aunt Mary is Postmaster and the single employee at zip code ----- and the ‘stage’ is still a lifeline to the outside world. But wireless Internet has also reached rural America and that’s mighty stiff competition.

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Snow and rain and heat and gloom of night are one thing. A party line is another.  But the Internet Cloud is a whole ‘nother kind of monster.

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The USPS is deeply in debt, based largely on plummeting demand in the Email age. Statistics show that over half of all bills are paid Online…”the check’s in the mail” is increasingly becoming, “the binary transfer is on the ether.” 

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The USPS plans to shutter as many as 37-hundred affiliates in an effort to regain solvency…85 of those are scattered throughout Montana and in some cases closure will leave patrons up to 60 miles away from the next post office.  As one customer in Dixon, Montana said, “a town without a post office becomes a ghost town.”  Not that we have anything against ghost towns, but…

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…The My-West team is fighting back in our own small way. The next great My-West road trip gets underway on October first and anyone who sends us an address will receive a greeting card, sent from one of the post offices pictured here. Now that’s a special delivery.  Do it for fun! Do it for nostalgia! Do it for…Aunt Mary!

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