YNP October 2011 (and a little lagniappe)

All the Yellowstone photos in this post will be from the Mammoth Hot Springs area because I didn’t do any traveling within the park during the three weeks I was there in October. That was just as well, because during the following six weeks out of the park, I slept in Bozeman, Livingston, Duluth, St. Paul, New Orleans, and on buses and trains in between.

The most exciting event in Mammoth was one I only learned about by email—NPS confirmed that a mountain lion was seen one night behind the hotel! I never saw one in the park.

The first snow of the winter in Mammoth arrived early in the month; roads at higher elevation in the interior of the park were temporarily closed.

The trace of snow didn’t stick around, but the bull elk were back in town.

I sometimes saw large bullsnakes (living off the ground squirrels, and sometimes mistaken for rattlesnakes) in Mammoth; on my last hike before leaving, I settled for this shed skin.

The last YNP wildlife photo of the season was a pronghorn.

I first visited New Orleans in the late 1980s on a vacation during the brief (but miserable) corporate phase of my life, so it was no surprise that I loved the contrast of the city and considered moving there. I didn’t move there, but the trip did speed up my quitting the job. I expected to return often but I didn’t; now I was visiting while living a life I mostly loved—I was curious to see how I’d react this time.

I enjoyed visits to the aquarium and insectarium, riding a ferry across the Mississippi, and wandering around City Park.

But music and food are the main NOLA attractions for me, so I went to performances by Jon Cleary, Walter Wolfman Washington, The Revivalists (who later hit it big; I saw them play at a food festival), and Colin Lake. I skipped the fancy restaurants this time, and my favorite meals were a lunch of gumbo, garlic oyster po boy, and a fine Bloody Mary; and a southern feast of catfish, shrimp creole, greens, and yams.

It’s probably not shocking that I didn’t love the city as much this time, but there were many reasons besides the changes in my age and lifestyle. I was sick part of the time and tired of traveling, and my hotel was a dump compared to where I’d stayed previously, and although most people were still friendly and I acquired a couple nicknames while there, I also encountered more aggressive panhandling than I was used to. And some days were much too humid for mid-November—on my last day, I decided to walk to the train station but by the time I got there I was so sweat-soaked that I found my cleanest dirty shirt (as Kris sang) for the ride north on the City of New Orleans. Snow was waiting for me.