1 Dunraven Pass RoadAfter a good night’s sleep in West Yellowstone, we got a somewhat early start on day two of our sightseeing trip through Yellowstone National Park. Our plan was just to stay on the west side of the park. We were going to head up to Mammoth Hot Springs then back down to Old Faithful and call it a day. Doing that meant we would miss out on Tower Fall in the northeast corner of the park, but didn’t really want to backtrack through both Canyon Village and Norris. That was the plan anyway….until we got in to the park.
We actually got quite fortunate. There was construction on the Grand Loop Road for about 11 miles north of Norris. Grand Loop is a two lane road…one in either direction, and there’s no room to make another lane when they need to repair the road….so there were delays of over 1/2 hour while one direction was shut down so the other lane could slowly make their way through. As we were heading north, we were lucky enough that the road was open for us, but we didn’t want to take the chance of it being closed for a while when we headed back.
As an alternative, we decided just to head over to the Tower/Roosevelt area of the park and loop back to Norris before heading to Old Faithful. Along the way, we thought we would stop at the Roosevelt Lodge for lunch, but many, many other people had that same idea. Even though there appeared to be open tables in the rustic, log cabin restaurant, we were told there would be a 30-45 minute wait….so we just kept driving.
We eventually came up on Tower Falls and there was a General Store at the trail head. J was really hungry and just needed something to eat. I wasn’t quite to that point, but since we were stopping anyway, I figured I may as well grab something.
The Tower General Store is one of many stores in the park hawking souvenirs, snacks, and drinks in the park. A couple of those general stores have full on fast food like restaurants, but this one just has a small snack bar. Not a lot of choices, but they had something we could eat just to get a little bit of food in our bellies while we continued our trip through the park.
J got in line while I looked around the general store a little bit. I assumed it would be a quick stop and she would get the food ordered while I ran to the bathroom, but damn, I was wrong. There were two, maybe teenagers…maybe young college kids working the concession stand and I wouldn’t be surprised if the one actually getting the food was high. He was not a multitasker and didn’t do anything in a hurry. The line was starting to twist through the general store and his pace didn’t pick up at all.
Like I said, the menu was pretty small. J ordered herself a hot dog which came with a bag of chips and I ordered nachos. We both got drinks and then headed outside to find a picnic table to sit down and eat. The bill was around $15 and the food is about what you’d get at a baseball game. The same type of nachos with the same cheese out of a bag and the a roller hot dog in a white bun. J put some mustard on her hot dog to give it a little more flavor.
Let’s be honest. We were hungry. They had food. We ate food and went on our way. That’s about all you can say about this place.
1/4 lb Hot Dog w/Chips
Nachos w/Cheese
