Today we left the Divide Route to head over to West Yellowstone. There is no route defined to go to west Yellowstone so we consulted google maps bike directions which suggested some back roads. With little information but a fair amount of satellite imagery it seemed reasonable so we went for it. The trail was actually old railroad bed which was an amazing grade but the substrate was essentially kitty litter. Thankfully it rained the afternoon before and that helped tremendously. It was clearly a favorite trail for atvs but with our early start we only started to see them after getting over the pass. It was a fun old rutted out forest service road down the other side and we really enjoyed the decent in to west Yellowstone
In west Yellowstone we needed to get fuel for our stove. Normally it is available pretty much everywhere, but with COVID and the large influx of folks, the stores were all sold out! I had spent the day before calling around and finally found one near our route. Having secured our fuel, it was off to Yellowstone. We got some good looks coming in through the entrance station as a family of 4 on bikes! 14 miles on the road with traffic to get to Madison campground by 2.30 pm.
All but 2 campgrounds in the park have special hiker/biker sites and they will not turn away hikers or bikers. There is good group of Transamerican route bikers here as well as 5 CDT hikers. It was a fun afternoon hanging with everyone, playing cards as a family, and visiting the camp store for microwave popcorn (!) and snacks. It poured for several hours and we enjoyed sitting under the canopy the camp hosts has set up for us hiker/bikers and feeling pretty smug about not being out in it (this time).
9 pm and it is getting dark. A much more reasonable time now!