Visiting the amazing National Parks of United States has always been on my bucket list and at last I had the opportunity to visit one with my family in July 2016. The first national park on my list was, of course, Yellowstone National Park. Unfortunately I only had a day set up to see the park on a roadtrip I took from Chicago to California. Yellowstone National Park is an enourmous supervolcano with an immense expanse of land, geysers, lakes, rivers, waterfalls, valleys, mountains, and its wildlife. So how on Earth will I see it all in a day?
Don't expect to see everything in one day
The truth is that you can’t see all of Yellowstone National Park in a day. It’s just so immense that even in a week you can’t see it all. It’s a living supervolcano that is constantly changing the landscape and weather so be prepared for all types of weather and be alert at all times for your safety. Now comes the planning.
1. Entrances to the Park
There are five (5) main entrances to the park and getting there depends on which part of the country you’re coming from. You absolutely must drive into the park, it is the safest and fastest way to move around. You can drive your own car, a rental from the closest airport, or rent an RV.
These are the five (5) entrances to the park:
- The Northeast Entrance at Silver Gate, Montana,
- The North Entrance at Gardiner, Montana
- The West Entrance at West Yellowstone, Montana
- The South Entrance that connects to Teton National Park
- The East Entrance which is approximately 53 miles west of Cody, Wyoming
Click Here to check out my detailed guide to deciding which entrance to Yellowstone National Park is best for your trip.
The two best entrances, in my opinion is the North entrance through Gardiner, Montana or the West entrance through West Yellowstone, Montana. I was driving from Chicago and the northeast entrance to Yellowstone, which is at Silver Gate, Montana, was the best option for us to enter the park, but it’s not the safest road to take during bad weather. During great weather, however, the northeast entrance route has spectacular views of the park and wildlife. At the time of my travel, during the summer, there were bad storms in the area with snow in higher elevations. I decided that even if it meant I would drive further, we were going to enter the park through a safer road because of the weather and so we entered through Gardiner, Montana (the North entrance).
2. What to See
Considering the incredible amount of natural wonders you can see at Yellowstone it was hard to narrow it down to a list of important things to see. There are key points to see, however, in a known route. It is known as the grand loop and it takes you to most major sites on the list.
Plan to see key important points in the park only
It’s best to decide on how much you want to do in one day, but in order to “see” Yellowstone in one day you have to make a list of the most important “attractions” you want to see. Your best mode of transportation will be your vehicle and you better wear your comfortable walking shoes as there are many walking trails. Some attractions are a walk away from parking areas. This list consists of the most important places to see:
- Mammoth Hot Springs
- Lake Yellowstone
- Old Faithful Geyser
- Midway Geyser Basin
- Morning Glory Pool
- Grand Prismatic Spring
- Lower Geyser Basin
- Fountain Paint Pots
- Great Fountain Geyser
- Steamboat Geyser
- Lamar Valley
- Tower Fall
- Dragon’s Mouth Spring
- Mud Volcano
- West Thumb
![Jorge Magana at Blue Lagoon, Yellowstone National Park](https://jorgemagana.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/11/yellowstone-bluelagoon-jorge-featured.jpg)
3. How to See Everything
If you check out the map at the top of this article you can see that the road makes a couple of loops to form a sort of number 8. The route totals about 142-miles long and curves throughout the park. There are narrow areas of the road which cause problems during the saturated summer months. Your best bet to avoid the crowds is late spring or early fall.
We came into the park through the North entrance at Gardiner, Montana.
STOP 1: was the boiling river where the waters of a hot spring mix with the river to create warm waters. It is an area designated for swimming, unfortunately for us it started to rain so we kept driving.
STOP 2: We came onto the massive and spectacular Mammoth Hot Springs just about 5 miles into the park, where we saw the Libery Cap Spring and the Devil’s Thumb as well.
STOP 3: A little further down the road we stopped at Beryl Springs where you can hear the loud hell-like sounds of the hot gases and water vapor exiting the vents at the spring. As small as they are, it truly puts into perspective that you’re walking on an active super volcano.
STOP 4: As you keep driving you come onto the Norris junction where you can see the many geysers of the Norris Geyser Basin. Of course there’s so much to see, but since we only have one day we drove and parked at the museum and walked on trails to the closest natural attractions. We saw the following: Porcelain Basin, Black Growler Steam Vent, Ledge Geyser, Sunday Geyser, Hurricane Vent, the Emerald Spring, and the Steamboat Geyser. The area by the Steamboat is huge and we just didn’t have the time to see the other areas. We decided to use the restrooms by the museum and kept driving south from the junction.
STOP 5: Further south on our drive we come to another junction at the Madison campground. It’s a perfect place to camp, close to West Yellowstone (to the west) and Old Faithful (to the South).
![Old Faithful Geyser, Yellowstone National Park, USA - Photo by: Jorge Magana](https://jorgemagana.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/10/yellowstone-oldfaithful.jpg)
STOP 8: It’s lunch time and since Old Faithful did not disappoint, it was time to eat to keep going. Since there is a variety of dining options by Old Faithful, we ate at the Geyser Grill at the Old Faithful Snow Lodge. It has a variety of fast-food that is delivered fast and hot for those that don’t have reservations for the other lodge restaurants or you can make your own food at the many picnic areas in the park. Running low on gasoline? This is the best place to pump more gas.
STOP 9: We drove east towards the West Thumb area and Yellowstone Lake area. There are so many springs/geysers to see at West Thumb that we spent only a couple hours in the area. There’s a lot of walking involved in the area so wear your good walking/running shoes. And then there is the huge Yellowstone Lake, surrounded by wildlife. Here is where we experienced seeing the buffalo.
4. Where to Eat
Just because you’re visiting a national park and also a supervolcano does not mean you have to rely on packed lunches or sandwiches as your only food source. There a few options of where to eat when you’re in the park and plenty more on those entrances which have a town nearby such as West Yellowstone, Montana to the west or Gardiner, Montana to the north.
Inside the park you have the following options:
- Old Faithful Inn Dining Room
- Lake Lodge Cafeteria
- Lake Yellowstone Hotel Dining Room
- Roosevelt Lodge Dining Room
- Old Faithful Snow Lodge Obsidian Dining Room
- Canyon Eatery
- Old Faithful Snow Lodge Geyser Grill (We ate at this location)
- Grant Village Lake House Restaurant
- Canyon Village General Store
- Mammoth Terrace Grill
- Old Faithful Inn Bear Paw Deli
- Mammoth Dining Room
- Tower General Store
- Old Faithful General Store Grill
- Fishing Bridge General Store
5. Where to stay
If you plan on spending the entire day at Yellowstone and you would like to rest before heading home or if you plan to stay more than one day because you absolutely fell in love with Yellowstone, then you’ll need a place to stay close by.
Whether you’re staying for more days or leaving the park after a full day of sightseeing, here are your options:
Staying Inside Yellowstone National Park
Camping:
Yellowstone offers a variety of lodging options within the park. If you love camping, there are many campgrounds inside the park along many of the routes entering the park, but mainly near the north, west, northeast, and east entrances. There is also the Madison Campground, Norris Campground, Canyon Campground and more.
RV:
Hotel/Lodge:
Lodge/Inn
Leaving the Park and Staying Outside
If you are returning home the next day, then you have to find a place to stay on your route home. Depending on where your home is (north, northeast, west, east, or south) will be where you are going to want to exit the park. Here are your options:
North:
West:
Northeast:
East:
South:
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