We're going to be staying at Yellowstone for 5 nights at the end of May. We had been planning to stay all of them at Fishing Bridge but someone mentioned we'd be wasting a lot of hours driving around to the northern areas for Lamar Valley/Mommoth attractions and then western for Geysers.Is it better to split and stay a couple of nights in Gardiner and a couple of nights in Western Yellowstone?

I stayed at fishing bridge for all of my stay. did the north loop one day, south loop the other, then went to other areas I wanted to see in more detail. I would NOT stay outside of the park and have to drive in every day.are you talking about this May? have you made reservations yet? your issue may be solved if you have no reservations yet.bumpy

Fishing Bridge and Gardiner is about the same distance from Lamar Valley, so I don't see the advantage. Gardiner is really only advantageous for Mammoth, so perhaps leave Fishing Bridge, visit Lamar, on your way to Gardiner, and then visit Mammoth/Norris before you leave.Fishing Bridge vs West Yellowstone is about the same, driving wise to the main thermal area, but Fishing Bridge is closer to Grand Canyon of the Yellowstone, Mud Volcano, Hayden Valley. The drive is more scenic to Old Faithful from Fishing Bridge.Frankly, if you can camp without hookups for a couple nights, I would split the trip between Fishing Bridge and Madison.

Yes, Fishing Bridge then Madison. Madison also offers a trip into West Yellowstone, maybe an afternoon and dinner.

Unfortunately Madison is full the week we'd go. So it would have to be outside the park. Also, come to find out the road from west thumb to old faithful will still be closed. Why I started thinking that a split trip would be best.

katleman wrote:Fishing Bridge and Gardiner is about the same distance from Lamar Valley, so I don't see the advantage. Gardiner is really only advantageous for Mammoth, so perhaps leave Fishing Bridge, visit Lamar, on your way to Gardiner, and then visit Mammoth/Norris before you leave.Fishing Bridge vs West Yellowstone is about the same, driving wise to the main thermal area, but Fishing Bridge is closer to Grand Canyon of the Yellowstone, Mud Volcano, Hayden Valley. The drive is more scenic to Old Faithful from Fishing Bridge.Frankly, if you can camp without hookups for a couple nights, I would split the trip between Fishing Bridge and Madison.Actually, it is 35 miles from Fishing Bridge to the Roosevelt intersection to turn towards the Lamar Valley. From Gardiner it is 23 miles to that same intersection. The route from Fishing Bridge is over Dunraven Pass and you would have climb it twice in a commute from Fishing Bridge. That would make a round trip from Gardiner easily an hour or two shorter. I would disagree about the drive from Fishing Bridge to Old Faithful being more scenic than the drive from West Yellowstone. That drive from West first goes along the Madison river and then you can take the Firehole Canyon Drive followed by a visit to the Biscuit Geyser Basin, Grand Prismatic Spring and then on to Old Faithful. The shortest Distance from Fishing Bridge is along the lake, through that dense forest at the South Entrance and then on up past Kepler Cascades to Old Faithful. I find the drive along the lake and in the forest to be about the most boring drive in Yellowstone (a lake is a lake is a lake and trees all look the same, but it is all relative, since it is about 1000 times better than a drive through wheat or corn country). All that being said, you can't go wrong anywhere in Yellowstone. The big advantages ( or disadvantages depending upon your tastes) to the two developed entrances West Yellowstone and Gardiner is the fact you can get Wifi, Cable TV, restaurant choices, some shopping, some commercial things like rafting, horseback riding, IMAX theater, Grizzly Discovery Center etc. at those entrances. Some people need a bit of civilization, some don't.

Yellowstone-Fishing Bridge or Outside Park | Good Sam Community

28 Replies

RuthieT
Explorer
Apr 29, 2015
We are staying at Bridge Bay for 4 nights. Wanted to stay at Fishing Bridge but we have a large 40ft fifth wheel and they had no space for us. Each day we plan on splitting the park up into 4 days. North 1 day, South another, etc...
Bumpyroad
Explorer
Apr 19, 2015
2gypsies wrote:
Here are some photos of Fishing Bridge. It's not a parking lot like some folks state. There are a lot worse RV parks in the vicinity!

Fishing Bridge RV - Pictures

just checked out the layout diagram at that link. Have those bathrooms that are located at various locations always been there? All I remember is using the showers at the main office area.
bumpy
GeoBoy
Explorer
Apr 19, 2015
Stay at Grizzly RV Park in West Yellowstone and enjoy your stay.
2gypsies1
Explorer III
Apr 18, 2015
Here are some photos of Fishing Bridge. It's not a parking lot like some folks state. There are a lot worse RV parks in the vicinity!

Fishing Bridge RV - Pictures

Really, there shouldn't be any problem for you to get to Old Faithful and many other geysers by way of Norris/Madison. You would want to drive that road anyway, I would think. There's lots to see in the area.

For anything south of Old Faithful until the construction area, you could get to from your stay in the Tetons.
SwanInWA
Explorer
Apr 17, 2015
kfrost72 wrote:
It was actually one of the tour company's I contacted that said Fishing Bridge was a horrible place to stay and I should split my stay to Gardiner and West Yellowstone.

Fishing Bridge is NOT a horrible place to stay -- and this is coming from someone who generally dislikes RV Parks and avoids them like the plague. :) We spent the majority of our Yellowstone/Teton trip in rustic camp areas, but knew we'd need some shower and laundry time so we booked a couple of nights at Fishing Bridge to accomplish this. Turns out, I enjoyed it more than I thought I would. It's clean and quiet and surrounded by trees. I would have no qualms about staying there again.
Jim_Shoe
Explorer
Apr 17, 2015
The Grand Loop in YNP is just that - a loop, and one lap is 140 slow miles long. Wherever you are on it, there's another spot on the loop where you're as far away as you can get from the first spot and still be on the loop. Except for the CG amenities, it doesn't matter where you stay. I always stay at Grizzly because of the hookups. That adds 14 miles to the trip each way, but it isn't a tunnel. I spent one entire morning covering that 14 miles because of all the wildlife. It was spring. Even buffalo babies are cute.
OutdoorPhotogra
Explorer
Apr 17, 2015
I know these aren't the best directions - and it's been a year - but here is a tip on wildlife. We drove over the entire park hoping to see a grizzly, like most people and one of the most dependable spots was right on top of us. Buffalo are easy. Ditto elk. Never saw a moose.

From Fishing Bridge, turn right (North) onto Grand Loop Road. 3-5 miles down the road there is a big hill (mound?) on the left side of the road. It's about 1/4 mile before Alum Creek goes under a bridge to join the Yellowstone River. The river bows out with a pasture between the road and the river. This spot was one of the best spots I found. Our trip was 4-10 July.

Top of the mound looking West. A grizzly would hang out about 1 mile away early morning and late evenings. We drove past the crowds at dusk for several days before I was smart enough to see what they were looking at. He wasn't there everyday and this requires patience but word from regulars is he would be there several days per week dusk, dawn, or both. It's a higher percentage than random driving. Also, I saw a pack of wolves at the same place. Couple with spotting scope tracks them every year. I had a 70-200 lens with 1.7 teleconverter and they were small. Binoculars or spotting scope would have been much better. Watched them for an hour and they eventually crossed the highway near the bridge.

On the West side of the road, a herd of elk was usually by the river and to the SE was a cove where black bears would frequent.

Wildlife requires luck, but getting up at dawn and a little patience and you can increase your odds.
Bumpyroad
Explorer
Apr 17, 2015
kfrost72 wrote:
. It was actually one of the tour company's I contacted that said Fishing Bridge was a horrible place to stay and I should split my stay to Gardiner and West Yellowstone.

I think they had some kind of an ulterior motive. Fishing Bridge is not a horrible place to stay. In fact they had some of the best/most powerful showers I have used anywhere. I used the campground as a home base to travel around the park and see the sights, not to make somores and sing songs around a campfire.
bumpy
kfrost72
Explorer
Apr 17, 2015
We are coming in from the south and already have two days planned in Tetons, at Colter Bay. Apparently we'll be there the first day they reopen for summer.

And we do already have our reservations for Fishing Bridge. There are no yellow bus tours when we're there, we'll be leaving the day they start up. But we are looking at doing a private tour focusing on finding wildlife one of the first days we're there. It was actually one of the tour company's I contacted that said Fishing Bridge was a horrible place to stay and I should split my stay to Gardiner and West Yellowstone.

Thanks for all your input. I'm going to sit down with a map and figure out how many days we want to spend on the east side (Canyon, Lamar, Hayden, Mud Volcano's, hiking, etc) and then how many days on the west with the Geysers. My biggest concern is that I got the road opening announcement the other day and the road between West Thumb and Old Faithful won't be open till after we leave. So to get to the geysers we'll have to drive up and around through Norris towards Madison.

I did look at switching to Madison for a couple of days, but since we're a TT and a truck we definitely need the 40' in Madison and it is booked all that week. Maybe I'll get lucky and there will be a cancelation(?)
jalichty
Explorer
Apr 17, 2015
I think the problem with West Yellowstone is that there is a bunch of construction going on on that side of Yellowstone and that will impede you travel more than buffalo, bear or elk jams. Fishing Bridge, while not really central in the Park, it's probably the best place in the Park to see the features on both of the loop. And, if you have to travel south to get home, take an extra day and go through Grand Teton on the way home.