Where of where art thou Yogi Bear?

Wyoming, what can I say? But god the mosquitos at Riverside - population 69 for a very good reason. Then the long, straight and once again, hot, roads. Followed by a strange lunch in Landers. Trailer trash company while we eat burgers for lunch, followed by a too short test ride on the much talked about 2008 KLR. Oddly, neither Mike or I are convinced about it so I leave my credit card in my pocket and continue the ride to the stunning Grand Teton National Park on my own familiar and comfortable KLR.
The Grand Tetons are Bear country, so we had to be careful with all of our 'smelly' stuff. But where were we supposed to draw the line? Would our smelly socks attract the attention of the bears? Paranoid, we didn't take a chance. Even our panniers were put away in the bear lockers, we didn't want the bikes torn apart while Yogi searched for the source of the peanust butter scent and my Dove Eyecream.

Somewhere in the Grand Tetons is Yogi!

We spend the day looking for Bison, elk and other wildlife, but have no luck with the bears. The next evening we're a little more relaxed about the wildlife and we even venture to meet some of our camping neighbours. They're riding Honda Goldwings and I have to say its the fold-out tent trailer they've got that grabs my attention first. Finally I know what some of those bike trailers are carrying, and I thought these guys just took the kitchen sink with them on holidays. This bunch of riders are pretty cool though and even dish us out some massive blueberry muffins, another reason for needing a trailer I guess, these things wouldn't have fitted into our relatively minuscule panniers. And although its not a Harley, Mike accepts an offer of a ride on the Goldwing, was he converted? Not on your life. He could barely lift the thing off the sidestand weighing in at over 900lb (Not sure of the conversion but just think, serioulsy heavy). But with 1800cc (That's almost three times the cc of my little KLR) he admitted that once he had it going, it was very comfortable and easy to ride.

As we've timed our travels through the USAs National Parks impeccably to coincide with the summer school holidays, we get up at 6am, skipping breakfast (Shock, horror, how did we cope I hear you ask? Well I was a little grumpy later on) just to ride the 50 miles up the road to the famous Yellowstone National Park and secure a campsite. Just as well as the campsite was full by midday.
After a haphazard start we finally get breakfast and are able to get some sightseeing in. Yellowstone is huge and has two circuits through it to take in most of what the park has to offer, that being hot sulpher, often smelly, springs including 'Ol Faithful', waterfulls and of course, the wildlife. Afternoon One took in the less than spectacular but at least on time 'Old Faithful', Virginia Waterfalls, the only time we felt we were alone in the park, and a drive through the Yellowstone River valley. A gorgeous setting for all of the bisen and elk that roam freely.
Day two we back track through the Yellowstone Valley for more Bisen spotting, or avoiding in this case as they wandered along the roadway. We also spy a grey wolf on the prowl before heading north. Following the advice of a local on where to spot the bears, we begin our search whole heartedly, stopping at every pull out. All to no avail. Just when we had given up all hope of meeting Yogi we come across an 'animal jam'. A term coined by the rangers to describe the traffic jam caused by cars stopping on the road to view and photograph the wildlife. Yogi wasn't in attendence but Boo Boo, Yogi's side kick was, and with a friend. They were meandering along a creek below the road, searching out the berries.
We'll hopefully see some Grizzlys (Or brown bears as they're called in Alaska) when we get to Alaska, obvioulsy from a distance.

Not quite Yogi, but Boo Boo makes an appearance