I forgot to say… thanks Les & Osc, Peta and Kerry for the birthday cards and dollars, Mum & Dad for the rain jacket, Frank & Vicki for the present awaiting me in Durango, Toni & Richard for the future night in a motel and all the birthday greetings!

We were ready for a break and decided to see if we could stay another night in West Yellowstone. It wasn’t that we necessarily liked the place, but there were plenty of places to eat and a grocery store. Also we could use the internet at the Visitor Information Centre. Our room at the Hibernation Station was booked for tonight, so we decided to move somewhere cheaper. We ended up at the Madison Hotel. It was a cheap and chearful old fashioned place, but it was more within our budget. It didn’t have a shower, but had an old fashioned claw foot tub, which suited us just fine. We managed to sort out another pile of stuff to mail to Durango, including books (we hadn’t looked at them), our Thermarest chairs (every campground had a picnic bench) and our shoes! We hadn’t worn our shoes much as it had been warm and we’d been wearing sandals. Ryan’s feet are so big his shoes weigh a ton and so we decided to be optimistic about the weather and send them on. Our parcel weighed nearly 14 lbs! We used the free WiFi at Visitors Centre, enjoyed a Chinese lunch, did a grocery shop and had microwaved Burrito’s for tea, as we listened to our talking book and drank some beers. We decided just to carry on through Wyoming as planned rather than detour into Utah. We didn’t have topographical maps for Utah and it could end up being a disaster. We’ll save Utah for another trip (at a time of year when it’s not so hot). It was our intention to try to get up really early and get into the Park before all of the cars.

Summed up:

A day of chores and relaxation

Back to the after our chores