Q: What's the best month to visit Yellowstone?
A: That depends on what you want to do. May and June are great for seeing lots of baby animals. Late June into early August are best for wildflowers. September has fewer visitors and usually relatively dry weather. All roads and facilities are open essentially from June through September, other months are more limited in terms of what is open.

Q: How much time do I need to see all the best sights?
A: Three days inside the park is a bare minimum, and a week is much better. For some ideas of not-to-be-missed features, see the Recommended Sights page.

Q: Is it better to stay inside or just outside the park? Where can I camp/park my RV/stay in a cabin or hotel? How long in advance do I need to make reservations?
A: There are beautiful and delightful things to see and do along all five approach roads to Yellowstone, so staying a few miles outside may appeal to you for part of your visit. Both the gateway communities and numerous places within the park have campgrounds, some especially suited for RVs, and also cabins and/or hotels. There are twelve campgrounds inside the park and six villages with cabins or hotels. You'll want to be inside the park for the majority of your time to enjoy its unique wonders.

Call Xanterra Parks & Resorts at 866-439-7375 or use their Web site at www.yellowstonenationalparklodges.com to make reservations in lodgings and five of the campgrounds. The other seven campgrounds are maintained by the National Park Service with no reservations, but they may fill up by 10:00 or so each morning.

Q: What does the park offer to entertain small children?
A: Frankly, it is not a place that's suitable for children under about five years. There are no playgrounds or activities designed for them. Some areas, particularly the hydrothermal basins, are too dangerous for a child who is not fully under the control of a responsible adult.

When a child has grown to be interested in looking about him or her and learning about the strange surroundings, that is when a trip to Yellowstone can be delightful. The park's popular Junior Ranger program is for children ages five to twelve. You can prepare the child for what the family will see by watching videos, reading books, and letting him or her help plan the trip.

Q: Why should I buy a guidebook? Aren't there plenty of signs to direct me where to go and rangers who give tours and answer questions?
A: Short answer: No, the signs are sometimes inadequate, and the park's budget does not allow for enough rangers to guide visitors everywhere, although they are wonderful people and do the best they can.

The Guidebook page gives you more reasons.

Q: If I visit Yellowstone in winter, should I go by snowmobile or snowcoach?
A: You are asking a person who has never liked snowmobiles but is trying to remain open-minded. I know that many people like the thrill of being out on a small, rather fast machine in cold weather and beautiful scenery, and that for several decades Yellowstone's roads have been groomed for them for eleven weeks or so of the winter. So the expectation of both the visitors and the gateway business people is that this way of visiting the park should continue.

Personally, I would like to see the number of snowmobiles allowed into the park gradually decline and that of snowcoaches increase somewhat. Our society will become more and more conscious of what we are doing to the earth to make it uninhabitable and what we can do to prevent further damage. That is a big topic that will be discussed for many years to come. In a word, I believe that snowcoaches are the way to go, but even they need to be limited and made as environmentally friendly as possible.

For pictures and story of my most recent winter trip see A winter visit to the park.

Q: Where can I see the most wildlife?
A: We tell you in Where are all the bears? that the best area to spot black bears at relatively short distances from the roads is around Tower-Roosevelt Junction. Other good possibilities are the Mammoth Hot Springs area and between Old Faithful and Madison.

For wolves, go to the Lamar Valley (Northeast Entrance Road), preferably in the early morning or evening, and look for turnouts where people have set up spotting scopes. That's where the knowledgeable wolf watchers will point out to you where to look.

For bison and elk, they may be almost anywhere, but the Hayden and Lamar valleys are great for bison, and the whole west side of the park from Mammoth to Old Faithful has many elk.

Smaller animals, like coyotes, marmots, squirrels, chipmunks, and all kinds of birds, may pop up wherever you look.

Q: Is Yellowstone a good place for birders, and if so, where should I go to see the most birds?
A: Over 300 different species have been sighted in Yellowstone. Look at Yellowstone for birders for suggestions of where to find some of them.

Q: How can I be sure to see Old Faithful Geyser erupt?
A: Anyone who spends two hours of daylight at Old Faithful Village is sure to see it, because it erupts about every 92 minutes. In the summer the predicted eruption time (within a 20-minute window) is listed at the Old Faithful Visitor Center—and also at Grant Visitor Center and the Information Center at Madison Junction.

Please don't make the mistake that a majority of visitors make, thinking that Old Faithful is all there is to see in that area. Four other geysers with eruption predictions listed at the visitor center are within walking distance of Old Faithful Geyser, and another, Great Fountain Geyser, is a short drive away. Then, too, there are beautiful hot springs to see, and if you walk around the area, you may catch some of the interesting unpredictable geysers erupting.

Q: Should I be concerned about another eruption of the Yellowstone Caldera "supervolcano"?
A: The movie that the BBC produced on that subject in 2005 scared a lot of people, including me! But see what the Yellowstone Treasures geologist has to say about it in The Yellowstone supervolcano, or, Is Yellowstone about to blow? and check out the link to the USGS site at the bottom of that article.

Q: What should we see if some in our group are not good walkers?
A: Near Old Faithful, besides wonderful Great Fountain Geyser, which can be seen by walking a few yards from your car, there is the short walk around Black Sand Basin.

At Canyon Junction, Artist's Point is quite an easy walk to see the Lower Falls and colorful canyon. Uncle Tom's Overlook, for a view of the Upper Falls, is even wheelchair-accessible. On the North Rim of the canyon, Inspiration Point and Grand View are the least strenuous walks.

You can easily reach the features along Upper Terrace Drive at Mammoth Hot Springs and some of the walkway at Mud Volcano. And of course, the whole western and northern shores of Yellowstone Lake are available all the way from West Thumb Geyser Basin to Sedge Bay.

For all the facilities and features in the park that are wheelchair-accessible, contact the park's Accessibility Coordinator at 307-344-2017 or download their pdf file at www.nps.gov/yell/planyourvisit/accessibility.htm.

Q: How can those of us who like to walk find hikes that are fun to take?
A: For ideas, see

• What can I see at Mammoth Hot Springs?,
• The moods of West Thumb Geyser Basin,
• Short hikes to see lakes,
• Crazy about waterfalls,
• Six hikes near Yellowstone Lake,
• Wonderful geysers not to be missed, and
• How to find great hikes in Yellowstone.

Here's part of the table in the guidebook called 58 Recommended Walks. Only one of those walks is more than 6 miles (9.6 km) in length or 600 feet (180 m) in elevation gain.

Q: I've heard that all you see are lots of trees and cars. Are the roads always full of bumper-to-bumper traffic?
A: You can certainly avoid most of the traffic by traveling in the mornings before 10:00 and evenings after 5:00, but animal jams may happen at any time of the day, causing traffic to back up. Remember that seeing animals is why many people go to Yellowstone, so that inconvenience has to be tolerated. You can help to lessen the traffic jams by always pulling off the road if you want to watch the animals.

If you arrange in advance to stay in several places during your stay, you can avoid covering given distances more than once, sometimes by traveling in a loop, and that way you can still see a large part of the park.

There are lots of trees in the park, even though the 1988 fires affected over a third of the forests. But the fires opened up vistas along the roads you could never see before, and the places where you seem to be in a tunnel of trees are much fewer than before. Of course, getting away from the roads a mile or so on a trail is the best possible way to get away from crowds.

I've noticed over the years that a large percentage of people on the trails are speaking a foreign language. It's Americans who've forgotten how to walk, and maybe that will begin to change as we gradually stop thinking we must go everywhere in big cars!

Q: Is there cell phone and/or Internet access in the park?
A: Yes and no. Cell phones are currently useable at Mammoth, Canyon, Tower-Roosevelt, Old Faithful, and Grant. A spring 2009 communication states that adding the Lake area to this list is in the National Park Service's preferred alternative plan.

I have been able to connect an internal modem in the rooms of some of the hotels and through the public phone jacks at the Snow Lodge at Old Faithful and the Lodge registration office at Canyon. Wireless access is only available in gateway communities at present, but, as with cell phones, there is talk of extending it into the park. In the same Wireless Communications Service Plan that deals with cell phones, the question of WiFi access in the park is discussed. It is likely that it will become available except in park buildings that are now or are likely to become National Historic landmarks, such as Old Faithful Inn, Lake and Mammoth hotels, and Old Faithful, Lake, and Roosevelt lodges. No timetable for these changes is mentioned. The entire document is available at: http://parkplanning.nps.gov/document.cfm?parkID=111&projectId=12023&documentID=26758