A Few Malihinis: Bear World, Yellowstone, and the Tetons: AKA My Favorite Part of Vacation

First stop: Bear World. I had mixed feelings going into this experience and it was recommended to us as a great way to take the pressure off of seeing wildlife in the park (i.e. help our kids not be disappointed if there is nothing visible from the road). It felt a little icky going into a for-profit location with bears in captivity. Simultaneously, it was awesome to see all the bears and feed off the enthusiasm of our kids.

Owen: "I'm fine with bears. I want to pet one."

Coleman and Roni met up with us for this segment of our vacation, keeping to our friendship tradition honoring the outdoors.

Anderson and Owen are almost exactly the same age and height. Anderson kept telling Owen he was taller and Owen disagreed.

It was so hot, but not as hot as the previous week where it hit temperatures over 100 degrees. The 90s were brutal enough to have us seeking shade.

They had a butterfly room and nectar to attract them.

There were also several carnival rides, and I haven't seen Kate and Zachary laugh the way they did together on those rides in a long time.

Owen rode his first roller coaster, and I'm now wondering how much he will like Disney next month. He was happy and white-knuckled nervous.

The petting zoo fawn.

Two giant slabs of pork.

Zachary hates being in pictures, but he was so willing and agreeable to pose throughout our entire trip.

Round 2 driving through the park.

Owen decided he had seen enough and crashed. Also, I miss my water cup and hope it found a happy home in Lake Powell on someone's boat.

Brady hasn't been back to Rexburg since his year studying at Ricks College in 1999. We stopped on the way to Yellowstone and took a photo in front of his apartment, as well as in front of the temple.

We also made a brief stop at the Johnny Sacks cabin in Island Park. The kids kept asking, "What made this guy so special?" We did not have a good answer for them, other than he built a log cabin in one of the prettier places of the world.

We did not arrive into Yellowstone until after 5pm, missing the masses of people that line up to get in and out of the park each day. I had seen a post about national park overcrowding earlier that day and I was concerned the crowds would prevent us from getting around and exploring. We stopped at Old Faithful at 7pm that night, planning to walk around but getting dumped on and hiding out in the Visitor's Center instead. The rain broke in time to see the eruption.

Owen bought a Yellowstone coin at the Visitor's Center for $1. He lost it and then lost his mind--Old Faithful eruption kind of losing his mind. He found it in his pocket a few minutes after we tore the car apart looking for it. He lost it again, hysterically cried for minutes, then found it in his hand. Tracking the Old Faithful coin became a big priority for us.

All summer, I read books about Yellowstone to Owen and he was counting down the days until Grand Prismatic Springs. We stopped at the boardwalk there and sat in the car as the rain came down in sheets. None of us had rain jackets and we knew the result would be an evening with wet clothes, but we finally decided we wanted to see it enough to jump out of our cars and run. We were gifted with the very best moment of our trip: a double rainbow over the vibrant springs.

When the weather cleared and more people made their way from cars to the boardwalk, the rainbow was gone. Surely there is a lesson here about seizing opportunities and taking risks.

Also, we are proud of bringing rainbows from Kauai to Yellowstone.

Shadow Brady.

Kate's socks were perfectly chosen.

We all lost our minds at the first wildlife sighting: a bison. We jumped out of the cars and gaped at the massive animal.

That night, we found the only place in town that would feed all of us without a 45-min wait at 9:15pm. Brady told the Millers to meet us at "Bluetooth BBQ" instead of "Beartooth BBQ" and we laughed and laughed at the mistake. We later came through on our promise to let the kids swim. They finally got out of the pool after 11pm. The great thing about being on Kauai time is it felt like 7pm.

The bad thing about being on Kauai time is when the alarm goes off just before 6am the next morning. We were committed to beating the crowds (and get my workout in). We woke up our groggy kids who jumped out of the bed for the breakfast buffet. They were all kinds of cooperative and we got through the gates with minimal waiting. That is more detail than I need but I was reflecting on this trip about what it takes behind the scenes to make vacations happen. It means you are packing clothing options A and B for each person at 1am by your phone's flashlight. It means you are willing to eat mediocre hoagie sandwiches from your cooler 5 days in a row. It means you eat terrible BBQ with your besties from college and try to convince yourselves that eating out in Yellowstone is FUN. But mostly it means that you get spectacular experiences because you were willing to make it happen.

First stop: Gibbon Falls. I sent these photos to Emily.

The smartest thing we did on this trip was let the kids bring "their phones." They have no service but take photos and videos, and Zac and Kate took hundreds of each in the park. Owen took my phone and shot his own footage, too.

Artist Paintpots was exotic and unique, with mud pots, fumaroles, and springs in every direction. The kids gasped and exclaimed at each new discovery and I remembered my time at Yellowstone seeing these things for the first time, too.

Owen thought the farting mud pots were the best part.

280 times larger than the 1980 eruption of Mount St. Helens...seriously?!?

We stopped at Yellowstone Upper Falls viewpoints. Someday, Uncle Tom's Point will reopen and we will get the views closer!

I wanted to eat in the car everyday but I'm glad Brady convinced me that part of a trip to parks is the lunch experience and it has to be at a picnic table in the shade.

Next up, we took our less cooperative and less excited children on a 4-mile hike to Lower Falls. To her credit, Kate's only complaint was: "This is not a hike. It is paved. I want something harder."

Zac grumbled privately to us but he was sweet with Anderson and made it fun like he always does.

Owen and Risa were buddies the entire way, holding hands, skipping, and singing.

Whew! The river runs through it.

Bison Zac.

We spent nearly an hour in line for ice cream, with Zac and Owen choosing soda instead. Owen had to pee 4 times in the next hour.

Owen, completely serious: "Mom, can I buy that moose?"

We drove through Hayden Valley, searching far and wide for wildlife. Zachary kept playing wolf by yelling "Bear!" A few times, he yelled right in my ear, then followed up by saying, "Sorry, Mama Bear." We spotted plenty more bison as well as elk. Zac dropped a couple more funny lines: "I see yolk out there!" and "Nice eye, Mom guy!"

We left the park late in the evening, breaking our vacation rule of never eating at a place you can find in Kauai and scarfed down McDonald's at 10pm and followed it up with another evening swim and frantic packing session.

The next morning, we stopped at the appropriately named Sulphur Cauldron on our way to Mammoth Hot Springs. Zachary had his fill of stinky by this point. "It's even making my hair smell!"

Mud Volcano had bison up close.

We crossed the street to see bison in the river and noticed bubbling hot springs as we all threw rocks at targets (not bison, ha!).

A bear! A real bear sighting! It was a black bear mama and her cub. Yayayayayay! We were pumped full of adrenaline. It is always more fun to see animals in the wild.

Mammoth Hot Springs was the only part of the park I'd say was underwhelming. I think if the area had more rain, the colors would be vibrant rather than white.

My kids squealed over the squirrels.

Zachary acquired some nasty silvers from the railing.

We drove down the roads recommended for spotting wildlife with no luck. We did see a group of tourists looking for wolves with a guide, and after listening to "American Wolf," I wished I'd asked the name of the guide.

WHAT!? ANOTHER BEAR SIGHTING!! Yay! We are fairly certain this was the same mama bear and cub from earlier in the day. This time, we got to watch them run across the hillside.

It started raining hard and that's when our windows also stopped working. Thankfully, that was not a long-term issue.

It was also at this stop that we came back to the car and Zachary freaked out, "DAD PLANTED A BUG ON MY JACKET! He pranked me! I'm sure of it." Actually, the bug flew in the window and put itself on his jacket but the moment was hysterical.

Lamar Valley! We stopped and watched the bison up close, laughing as one male rolled around in his fresh urine to attract an uninterested female.

The best part of the day was taking a 7-mile dirt road (Blacktail Deer Plateau Drive) off the beaten path, attempting to see more wildlife. We did not see more animals, but it was easily the best hour of our entire vacation. Owen slept hard while Kate and Zac took turns with their bodies out of the sunroof. We smelled the flowers and pines, and I cried with happiness being reunited with mountains and sharing these moments with my kids.

The mountains are calling!

Owen finally woke up and we took one more hike to Wraith Falls, dodging mosquitos, watching butterflies mate, and snagging more photos of squirrels on the way.

We also found tiny raspberries.

Tower Falls and Mount Washburn access points were closed, so we very thoroughly explored the park in our days there. On the way back through Mammoth, we stopped for dinner and did trust falls, ate dinner with elk, and played tag through sagebrush with rattlesnakes. Just kidding about the snakes but we put a quick stop to that and let the kids know why. We had one last bonus moment, spotting a Grizzly bear on the way back to the hotel.

We also had enough cell service to learn our Lake Powell trip was cancelled--the house boat had plumbing issues and a motor issue--and everyone was frantically scrambling to find other ideas to replace the house boat experience. The kids were crushed.

After another late swim and late goodbyes to Millers, we packed up to leave the next morning.

By the time we made this final stop at Yellowstone Lake to see the West Thumb Geyser Basin, the kids were anxious to get back to cousins.

I'm so glad we pushed them to get out of the car once more and got these stunning shots.

I tried hard on this trip to not be the sleeping passenger but I failed for this 20 minute snooze.

I have no recollection of ever visiting Grand Teton National Park. We stopped at Lake Jenny to ride the ferry. The kids were less than stoked, and by that I mean they were audibly complaining and moaning. Mountains were calling us and cousins were calling them.

The Oregon wildfires were socking this area in with smoke. The guide said it is like this every summer now.

I loved this spot and these views but there were a LOT of people there.

When we decided to skip the ferry and hike an extra two miles back, the kids almost staged a revolt. They trudged along not very willingly until finding wild huckleberries. I do think that feeding them lunch prior to this excursion would have been a good idea--we did not get back to our car until 3pm.

I told Zac I would pay him $2 to jump in the lake. He immediately took shoes and socks off. Brady claimed that was low and offered $5. Next thing you know, we had three kids jumping in.