David Gray's video: Yellowstone National Park Wyoming Backpacking - June 2019

Iconic Yellowstone National Park was the destination for my fourth hike of the 2019 backpacking season, and it is a place I’d dreamed of getting to since I started backpacking. We had a big crew for this hike, once again getting together with Carl and Travis but also joining up with my son, Christian, and Travis’s friend, Justin. Our route was a 4-day, 30-mile point-to-point hike around Shoshone Lake in the Old Faithful area of the Park, with the highlight being the Shoshone Geyser Basin on the 3rd day. With all of us coming in from different directions we had plenty of vehicles for various shuttle options, so the first morning we parked a couple vehicles at the massive Old Faithful parking area (our ending point), piled our packs and people into Travis’s truck and headed to our starting point, the DeLacy Creek trailhead. The hike took us to beautiful campsite 8S1 on the shore of Shoshone Lake for the first night, campfire-friendly inland site 8M2 for our second night, and finally the ‘5-star Hilton’ 8R5 backcountry campsite, also right on the shore of Shoshone Lake, for the third and final night. In addition to the four days of backpacking, the video also contains ‘getting there’ scenes from our first night together in Jackson Hole, Wyoming as well as our ‘staging’ night at the Madison car-camping campground inside Yellowstone. Yellowstone doesn’t have the type of spectacular mountain views that you find in Glacier, Colorado, the Winds, or the Sierra, but I found that it had a unique ‘wild’ feel and beauty to it. We didn’t end up running into any ‘large animals’ (which disappointed me, but some on the hike were quite happy about it!), but there was never a moment on this hike that you weren’t aware you were no longer on the top of the ‘food chain’, and were, in fact, prey! If you’ve never felt that feeling, it is a unique experience. It’s hard to explain the mind-blowing difference between the frontcountry and backcountry experiences in Yellowstone. In the frontcountry it feels very much like a maximum capacity day at Disney World, in the backcountry we didn’t see a single person for three days. Wow! Get to the backcountry to see Yellowstone. For those who have watched my other videos this one is done in the same style – a bit over an hour in length, intended to bring the audience along for the 'ride', and with a still picture slide show with music at the end. If you just have a few minutes skip to the end and enjoy the pictures. Equipment / Gear List: Still and Video Camera: Nikon Z6 with Nikkor Z-mount 35mm and F-mount 20mm f1.8 lens, and FTZ Adapter Video Editing Software: Vegas Pro 16 Pack: REI Flash 55L Shelter: Zpacks Hexamid Solo-Plus Slide show music - Happy Strummin' and Acoustic Guitar 1 by Jason Shaw, AudioNautix. www.audionautix.com Carl kept track of our hike using the app GaiaGPS (great free app, by the way). He's made the trip data, tracks, and waypoints public so you can take a look at our trip at: https://www.gaiagps.com/datasummary/folder/d312b76f-c698-4f5d-a470-9f7aa62f327f/?layer=USTopo