Yellowstone Hiking and Wolf Watching

We reserve the right to alter our listed itinerary based on current snow conditions and wildlife movement to maximize your enjoyment!

DAY 1

Your guides will meet you around lunchtime in Bozeman, Montana, where we begin and end our adventure. We’ll transfer from there through the Paradise Valley to Wonderland Lodge, our basecamp in the small town of Gardiner for the week, about 75 minutes away. We’ll have a brief orientation, pack some energy food, and dress for the weather before heading toward the park’s northeast entrance and our first hike at Mammoth Hot Springs (Yellowstone’s headquarters). 

The terraces are unique from other thermal areas of the park. As hot water rises through the limestone from below it interacts with hot gases and forms an acidic solution that dissolves the rock and ultimately deposits a white chalky material known as travertine, which forms beautiful terraces on the side of the hill that we can walk among. Because we are at a lower elevation than most of the Park, the early snow up high entice elk and deer to stick around and you’ll probably see many of them at Mammoth.

Tonight your guide(s) will host a happy hour and casual dinner in their lodge room with our special guest – wolf biologist Jon Trapp, who will be leading us on adventures and educating us about wolves for the next two days. We’ll get to bed early tonight as we’ll be out the door tomorrow before the crack of dawn!

Hiking Mileage: approximately 2 miles 

DAY 2

After a very early breakfast, we'll pack our trail lunches and be on the road while it’s still dark. Our destination? Yellowstone’s Lamar Valley, arguably the best place in the world to see wolves, because they follow the ungulates (elk, deer, etc.) down from higher terrain at this time of year. As the pale morning light reaches the pristine valley, we’ll be on the hunt for glimpses of these ephemeral icons of the wilderness, armed with spotting scopes and binoculars. Our hope is to see a lone wolf, or a pack of wolves, as they awaken for the day and begin moving. As we trundle along the road, we’ll likely experience a few “buffalo jams” (Yellowstone’s version of traffic jams), and we’ll stop frequently to get out and view the landscape and the animals around us, and to hear from Jon about these majestic canines, who are once again such an integral part of the Yellowstone ecosystem. 

At some point, we’ll get out to hike, starting at the Lamar Buffalo Ranch and following Rose Creek up to one of three wolf acclimation pens built for the controversial reintroduction of wolves in the park in 1995. Three wolves transported from Canada were housed in this historic pen until they would acclimatize and not run back north. The pen was opened after several months and the three wolves began their new life in Yellowstone.

You’ll be happy to relax with a glass of wine or hot chocolate next to the fire tonight and regale one another with stories from the day.  We’ll have an early dinner at the Wonderland café before lights out. Another exciting day awaits us tomorrow!

Hiking Mileage: 3 miles

DAY 3

It is another early day for our Yellowstone Safari! We again steer toward Lamar Valley and it is “wolf jazz” all over – looking for tracks and other signs of wolves throughout our day. As we drive further into the Lamar Valley, we’ll keep our eyes open for bison, elk, deer, moose, coyote, fox, bighorn sheep, bald eagles and river otters. Wildlife in the valley is abundant and many of the Park’s species are foraging and preparing for the long winter season ahead. Our main hike today will be to the old den of wolf #9 (one of the first wolves in the Park after the reintroduction). Along the way, Jon will talk about den site selection, trophic cascade (a side-effect when a trophic level (species) of the ecosystem is reduced or removed), and wolf mate selection and biology.

We will also be on the lookout for Rick, the “alpha" wolf-watcher and Yellowstone’s biological technician for the Yellowstone Wolf Project. He uses telemetry equipment to track wolves, as most of the wolf packs include at least one wolf with a radio collar. He has been out in the Park observing wolves every day for the last 15 years! Typically, there are around 100 wolves in the Park at any given time. The Park is 2.2 million acres, so we’ll be lucky if and when we spot (or hear, which is almost as good!) any wolves.

Once again, dinner is at the Wonderland. Afterwards, we’ll don our warm clothes and walk guided by starlight, moonlight (or headlamp) to the iconic Roosevelt Arch to toast the world’s first national park.

Hiking Mileage: 2 miles

DAY 4

Before checking out today, we'll offer an optional early morning walk that begins at Mammoth Hot Springs and takes the old stagecoach road all the way back down to Gardiner. The sweeping vistas in the morning light can take your breath away, and there are usually plenty of bison, elk and antelope roaming nearby. We'll kiss Gardiner goodbye and head through the Park to West Yellowstone. Our main stop on route is Norris Geyser Basin, the hottest, oldest, and most dynamic of Yellowstone's thermal areas and home to Steamboat Geyser, the tallest geyser in the world -- when it erupts it can go up to 400 feet in the air (more than twice the height of Old Faithful)! There are over two miles of boardwalks and trails here to experience the hundreds of densely packed geothermal features in one of the most extreme environments on earth: geysers, pungent odors, hot springs with all the colors of the rainbow, microscopic life, and hissing steam.

We'll enjoy a final dinner together before tucking into bed. Perhaps we’ll be serenaded by the wolves who live across the street from our hotel as we drift off to sleep!

Hiking Mileage: up to 6 miles

DAY 5

After breakfast, we'll walk over to visit the wolves and grizzlies at The Wolf and Grizzly Discovery Center. After viewing and snapping photos of these beautiful animals, you’ll have time to shower and pack up before we check out and return to Bozeman by 11:30, where you can choose to extend your vacation or return home.