July 8th: to see or not to see!

I felt excited today and the plan was to leave early, until I saw my battery of my cell phone was low. We postponed our departure for half an hour. Then it was into Yellowstone National Park. Sofie raced off, leaving me behind in my usual slow but steady pace. Ha, she missed the scenic route along the river. The eagles nest was empty and even the trumpeter swans were on holiday. Madison Campground was our first goal that day. Here we pitched my tent and put all our bags in the bearproof box. Second part of the day we bicycled up along the Firehole river and falls to the lower and middle basin. The smoke of the hot water coming from the hot springs or mud holes or geysers were in contrast with the cool mountain air. Dark clouds were gathering and I let Sofie decide if she wanted to go on to Old Faithfull (seeing that geyser is THE attraction for most of the tourists) with the chance of getting hit by a rain storm or heading back to the campground. Well, the second option was taken ... giving Sofie a reason to come back to see Old Faithfull! Told her she wasn't the first one who didn't see it. On our way back we saw bison and elk along the road and we just hardly made it into camp before the storm hit. I sat in my tent (cosy sleeping bag) while Sofie was standing in a small room (1m by 1m) watching the hail fall (she said they were almost the size of pingpongballs). We had our dinner after the storm: yes - salmon, something bears like! No spilling Sofie! Another storm rolled in and once again Sofie didn't make it in time for the tent. At last the sky cleared somewhat, but the temperature had dropped a lot. It was definitely time to hit the sack.