The Rise Up Ride: Day 38-39, Waiting Out the Memorial Day Crowd
Date: 30-31 May 2021
Start Location: Canyon Campground, Yellowstone National Park, WY
End Location: Canyon Campground, Yellowstone National Park, WY
Distance: 0 km
I'm hoping that by waiting an extra day at my campsite in Canyon that the horde of Memorial Day tourists will have left. Yellowstone's roads, narrow and with no shoulders, were just not designed for cyclists. Between the "genitally-challenged" locals in their coal-rollers who have no patience for cyclists, to the guy driving his first rental RV, without a clue how wide his mirrors are, I'm more frightened of them than the wildlife.
Tomorrow's ride to the South Entrance will be about 100 km but could turn out to be much farther if there are no places to camp just outside of the Park at Flagg Ranch. I'll try to find something there but may have to push on to a hiker-biker site in Coulter Bay, about 22 km down the road. But at least I'll be out of Yellowstone.
The character of Yellowstone is much changed for the worse on this trip for various reasons. The most obvious difference is that the place is full of Americans. The usual group of young Park employees from Europe on short-term work permits are missing, unable to get their visas processed even after they were hired. And all the international visitors are gone giving the place a very less interesting all-American vibe.
The threat of COVID has had a big impact, with Federal restrictions used as an excuse by the Park vendors to cut back on the niceties like indoor dining, comfy seating around fires in the hotel lounges, and (the worst of all) no showers in the campgrounds. I don't recall any scientific study showing higher virus transmission rates in cold, drafty campground shower rooms but as a result, I haven't bathed since leaving Cody. But the Yellowstone licensee has saved in labor costs by not hiring the workers they can't find anyway.
And I ran into the first cyclists I've seen also riding the Parks, Peaks, and Prairies Route. Brad and Sherry, who are heading eastbound, stopped by camp after dinner and I shared some info on safe places to camp when leaving the Park and some must-see stops along the route. I hope they have as much fun on the way to Minneapolis as I did coming from there.
Tomorrow I'm up at "bird dawn" to cook breakfast, take down my tent, pack the panniers, and pedal out of camp early to beat the traffic. Yellowstone National Park shouldn't be scary for cyclists. In the coming years, I'd like to see the Adventure Cycling Association work more closely with the National Park Service to get them to give policy and planning preference to hikers and cyclists, making it difficult for people to enter our Parks if they can't experience nature without hauling all their creature comforts with them in massive "recreational vehicles."
But tomorrow I'm getting the hell outta Yellowstone!
