Leaving Mammoth, Back to Baker's Hole

Friday September 4, 2015     Day 38     Gallatin N.F.   Baker’s Hole Campground, site 27, day 1

18 miles towing

Our 8-day stay at Mammoth Campground was the longest we have ever stayed in one campground.  We like the campground for its uniqueness.  The cliffs across the way always look different depending on sun angle and cloud cover.  We see lots of different cloud formations throughout the day because of the mountainous topography.  It is close to some fine fishing and close to the little western town of Gardiner.  But most of all is the elk.  We enjoy watching them every morning as they pass through the campground while we sit at the fire drinking our coffee.  We have met some really nice people during our stay.

Here's some of them cloud formations I was talking about, taken from our campsite at Mammoth:

So why did we leave?  Because there is more to see and do in other areas around here.  I wanted to fish the Madison River at West Fork again.  And maybe the Gallatin.  Baker’s Hole is better situated for that.  Plus, Labor Day weekend was coming and if we didn’t move we would be at Mammoth for 4 more days.  Not the end of the world, but because it is expected that all campgrounds in the area will be full, we better get to Baker’s Hole and hunker down through the weekend. 

We left Mammoth Campground at 7:11 (we seem to always leave at 07:11).  We headed for Madison Junction campground to dump our tanks.  After 8 days they needed it.  Baker’s Hole and Mammoth do not have dump facilities.  We dumped our tanks at Madison and left there at 08:43.  Exited the park at the west entrance at West Yellowstone and showed up at Baker’s Hole at 09:30.  Baker’s Hole is north of West Yellowstone by 5 miles up US 191 towards Bozeman.

Once we got south of Mammoth we were in fog the rest of the trip until we got past Gibbon Falls.  That side of the park was in sunshine and much warmer.  All you have to do around here is go around a mountain and you will be in a different weather pattern.

We drove in to Baker’s Hole Campground and it appeared that every site was taken.  So we passed through again looking at tags on the posts for dates to see if anyone was leaving.  We found two that were, but someone else had dibbs on them.  We found an open site, but a Jeep Wrangler was parked in it.  We saw the host coming towards us in his host golf cart that they all have and he told us we could have that site.  He took care of getting the Jeep moved.  We lucked out.  We signed up for four days @ $14 per night for an electric site with my senior pass.  We have excellent campground karma on this trip.  We have not made a reservation yet.  Not all campgrounds we stay at accept reservations, but some do fill every day, like Mammoth.  The key is not to show up late afternoon and if it fills up early, like Mammoth or Madison, you need to camp close by and be there by mid-morning if you expect to get a site.  We have done well on this trip in that regard.

Baker's Hole Campground, site 27

Baker's Hole Campground, site 27

We set up and went to town for breakfast.  It was our first restaurant breakfast of the trip.  We went to the Timberline restaurant in West Yellowstone.  It was very good, but a breakfast in West Yellowstone will cost you $15.

Found a bank about 3 blocks away.  We needed some cash at an ATM and it was a nice morning and we walked to it.  We discovered that West Yellowstone had an ACE hardware back there.  It was like there was normal stuff in that part of town that the locals need, away from all the touristy stuff.

Then onward to Bud Lillie’s Fly Shop so I could re-up my Montana license for four more days. 

In the old days when I came out here with my Traverse City pals, we used to go to a bakery every morning to get a cinnamon roll with our coffee.  I took Marsha there and it was closed, under new ownership.  But we saw another one across from the grocery store on a side street.  We went in there and each bought a cinnamon roll and a cherry turnover.  Both were huge.  We would save them for tomorrow’s breakfast.

We sat out for a while after we got back to the campsite.  It was a beautiful sunny day.  Our neighbors across the road were people we met back at Mammoth a few days ago.  The lady is a photographer with those giant Canon lenses and the husband is a fly fisher.  They have Nevada plates and a brand new F-150.  They had been to Alaska a few times and we talked about that.  We are going next year.

Barbequed some boneless pork chops with a baked potato.  And we ate our cherry turnovers for desert.