Yellowstone National Park is a cornucopia of sights and experiences. It was the first national park– not just in the United States but in the world! From the eternally iconic Old Faithful Geyser to the dozens of dazzling hot springs in the park to the breathtaking Grand Canyon of Yellowstone and all the little wonders in between, Yellowstone is memorable! One day certainly goes fast, but we can help you maximize your time!
In a park of this magnitude, you could easily spend a week hiking and leisurely exploring the park. However, if you’re planning a multi-park road trip or perhaps trekking across the country, sometimes there’s only time for the essentials. If you’re hoping to hit the highlights, we have a jam-packed one day itinerary for the adventurer looking to do the most. For anyone looking to spend two days in the park, we have a bit more in depth itinerary here.
Fast Facts About Yellowstone National Park
Size: 2,221,766 acres
Visitors: 4,501,382 visitors (data from 2023)
Closest Airport: the Jackson Hole airport (JAC) is ~50 miles from the south entrance of the park and the Bozeman airport (BZN) is ~90 miles from the north entrance
Became a National Park: March 1st, 1872 when President Ulysses S. Grant signed the Yellowstone National Park Protection Act (first national park in the United States AND in the world)
Highest point: 11,358 feet at Eagle Peak
Fun Fact: Yellowstone is larger than Rhode Island and Delaware combined! Even more fun— more than half the world’s geysers exist in Yellowstone.
road trippin’
We recently spent a few days in Yellowstone as part of a cross country road trip, and we found Yellowstone to be unique for a few different reasons. It truly is a diverse park. Yellowstone has hot springs, geysers, mountains, an incredible canyon, waterfalls, and amazing opportunities for wildlife encounters. The breadth of experiences here is special!
Yellowstone is also one of the most tourist-friendly national parks we’ve been to. What do we mean by that? There’s good to excellent accessibility at most of the viewpoints, lots of bathrooms, lodge accommodations, campgrounds, restaurants, gas stations throughout the park etc. It feels like a park that’s equipped for large volumes of visitors, without going toooo far to feel like a theme park-esque experience.
making an entrance
There are five entrances into Yellowstone: East, Northeast, North, West, and South. Realistically, the entrance you plan to arrive through will dictate the order that you hit everything. As such, we’ve detailed the top must-do spots and included a map of where exactly everything is, to help you see the day from a bird’s eye view.
Grand Loop Road effectively makes a circle through the park, so this road serves as the backbone of our highlight reel. It also simplifies navigation in the park. Service in the park tends to be pretty poor, so the straightforward driving route and copious signage helps ensure everyone gets where they intend to.
Rest Up
How to make the most of a full day? Get a good night’s sleep! And when you only have one day in Yellowstone, it’s important to make the most of your time! If you are able to arrive in the park the night before, it can help with the flow of your day. There are accommodations near the various entrances to the park, but most entrances to the park (i.e. all but the north entrance) are still about an hour away from the big sights.
If you want to stay in the park, there are two general options: camping or lodge life. The park lodges are unique to each region of the park they’re in, which gives each place historic character. You can check out all nine options here. The lodge and cabin stays in the park tend to run a little on the expensive side, but park of what you’re paying for is the location of being steps away from something amazing!!
It’s a little strange but four of the campground’s sites are available through recreation.gov (linked here). The other five are booked through the lodge reservation webpage (linked here). The booking itself is relatively straightforward— just a little peculiar to have it split up!
THE KEY STOPS:
Between the multiple entrances to the park and the many welcome stations at each entrance, the arrival process into the park is as streamlined as it gets; however, it’s always a good idea to get into the park sooner rather than later (or just stay in the park overnight :)). Things start to get more crowded around 10am, so an earlier start helps ensure you can enjoy a bit more nature to yourself.
Grand Canyon of Yellowstone
The Grand Canyon of Yellowstone stretches for about 24 miles, and this amazing feature is worth taking in from a few different vantage points. There’s a bunch of awesome viewpoints to take in the canyon from different vantage points. We found Yellowstone to be a more accessible park, so even if you can’t or don’t want to hike, you can still take in the awesome vistas, just steps from your car.
Artist Point
If you’re in the park early, this is a nice overlook to wander over to. You are able to see both the canyon as well as the waterfall from afar– it’s a nice spot to catch the sunrise! With this as your first stop, it’s an amazing way to start the day.
North Rim Hike… or Drive.
The North Rim Overlooks are connected by road as well as hiking trail, making them relatively easy to access to a variety of adventurers. While there are overlooks up by the parking lot, some of the cooler views are accompanied by a bit of sweat equity. For example, the Brink of Lower Falls trail drops 600 feet over a short 0.4-mile stretch of switchbacks to the Lower Falls viewpoint. This was probably our favorite spot along the North Rim but they are all worth hitting!
Lookout Point, Grand View, and Inspiration Point all afford slightly different vantage points. Similar to Lower Falls, Lookout Point (view pictured below) also has a combination of stairs and graded descent that are worth the huffin’ and puffin’. Whether you’re driving or hiking, you won’t regret going to at each stop!
If you look closely or zoom in on the above picture, just to the right of the falls, you will see a viewing platform with a handful of people standing on. This is the Lower Falls viewpoint!
The Yellowstone River and Canyon are truly breathtaking and it’s so grounding to take in the technicolor wonder. What makes this canyon even more interesting is its constant evolution. If you look out across the canyon walls, you’ll notice some steamy, active hydrothermal features. The Grand Canyon of Yellowstone was our favorite area of the park!
Hayden Valley
Driving south from the Grand Canyon of Yellowstone, along Grand Loop Road, will take you through Hayden Valley. This approximately 7 mile stretch of landscape is gorgeous to drive through. Keep your eyes peeled for wildlife because this area is one of the best spots in the park to spot some of the large mammals the park is home to. The grizzly and black bears are spotted more frequently in the spring and early summer days. They tend to be found at higher elevations as the summer goes on, but you never know where you might see one. Bison are more likely to be seen at any time throughout the summer, with coyotes commonly spotted as well!
There’s so many different areas to pull out if you *think* you might see something off in the distance…. or if you want to simply stare at the bison grazing nearby. There’s no singular recommended destination or overlook in Hayden Valley. It’s simply a beautiful drive with a high probability of animal sightings. This is first on the list because early risers may be even more likely to spot animals if you’re driving through at dawn (or dusk).
If you see a bunch of cars pulled over, there’s a good chance someone has spotted something exciting! If you see a cluster of cars, it doesn’t hurt to pull over as well! You never know what you might see!
Old Faithful
Timing up your Old Faithful experience takes a bit of planning. This iconic geyser erupts every 94 or 68 minutes… plus or minus ten minutes. So while the eruptions are routine, they’re just far apart enough that you might find yourself waiting a while if you arrive right after the previous eruption. The Old Faithful Visitor Center has a sign out that estimates when to expect Old Faithful’s next performance. This is helpful but having something online is just a bit more useful as you try and time up your morning.
We used this NPS website and this informative site to help give us an idea of when to show up. It’s better to be 15 min early than 2 minutes late!
The Old Faithful area of the park will get busy… there’s no getting around that, but if you get to the park relatively early, you do have time to do the Grand Prismatic Overlook hike first. We recommend this because the ambient temperature earlier in the day is still rather chilly– even in the summer months. Why is this relevant? Well, Old Faithful is erupting hot hot hot water, so if it’s cold outside, the water plume becomes pretty shrouded in steam. Still neat to see but perhaps not the expected view.
Upper Geyser Basin hike
The Upper Geyser Basin hike begins just steps away from Old Faithful and showcases dozens of hot springs and geysers (AllTrails link here). This boardwalk trail stretches about 3.5 miles total. While it’s totally possible to just walk part of the trail and then head back, in our opinion, some of the more impressive features are further along the trail. Morning Glory is the final hot spring on the path, and we were glad we walked all the way to the end to check it out!
Yellowstone is home to so many hot springs and geysers, you’re be hard-pressed to hit them all, even with a few days in the park. While this walk doesn’t highlight all of them, you can leave knowing you were able to see some unique geological wonders.
Grand Prismatic Hot Spring Overlook Trail
There’s so many hot springs in Yellowstone, but none is more memorable (or larger) than the Grand Prismatic. You can certainly check out the overlook at ‘ground level’, but in my opinion, the bird’s eye view is superior. There’s a bit of sweat equity involved, but the 1.5 miles round trip is very manageable (AllTrails link here)!
When you’re nearing the hot spring, you want to park at the Fairy Falls trailhead. If you’re driving around Grand Loop road clockwise, this means you’ll take the turnoff for the Fairy Falls trail, which is actually just before the Grand Prismatic overlook parking lot.
This is a relatively small viewing area and it does get rather popular, so come with patience in your heart. When you’re in Yellowstone— especially in the summer— it seems like everyone’s advice is to get to ‘XYZ’ early. Generally speaking, this is great advice, but when you’re only in the park for one day, you can’t hit everything early!
In our opinion, the Grand Prismatic is a spot that’s better to hit later. The colors of the hot spring “pop” and become more vibrant when the sky is overhead, so arriving a little later in the day should afford you awesome, vibrant views. It’s never fun to do a hike in the hottest part of the day, BUT at least it’s a relatively short hike!
Mammoth Hot Springs (optional)
Just inside the North entrance of the park, you’ll find Mammoth Hot Springs.Yellowstone is home to many different hot springs– what makes these springs unique are the travertine terraces that have formed as a result of the hot springs. The thermal water rises through limestone, carrying dissolved limestone to the surface, creating the memorable terrace formation these hot springs are known for.
To take in the multi-level wonder, there’s a boardwalk path that weaves in and through the hot spring. If you hit every nook and cranny, it’s about 2.5 miles long. Now, if you have time and want to stretch your legs, it’s a nice board walk saunter with a healthy amount of stairs. If you’re rushing along, you can more or less get the gist of it by poking around for 15 minutes or so.
If you’re planning on either arriving or departing the park via the North entrance, stopping here is a no-brainer. The terraces are rather unique and certainly worth a stop if it’s along the way. That being said, and this might be an unpopular opinion, but if you’re coming and going through the East, South, or West entrances, tacking on this stop miiiight not be worth the drive time. Beauty is in the eye of the beholder, but if we were crunched for time AND knowing this is the only big stop in the north part of the park, we’re not sure the “awe-factor” here is worth allllllll the extra driving it would take to see this single geological wonder.
One day in Yellowstone flies by! Maximizing your time can feel tricky… trying to see as much as you can but not be so rushed you hardly enjoy it. Our plan should thread that needle perfectly. We hope you have an amazing time exploring all the breathtaking beauty this historic national park has to offer. Happy travels!
written by Hannah
Hannah traded the warm beaches of southwest FL for the outdoor adventure locale that is Bend, OR. Despite the distance, Hannah maintains her bossy big sister role with regular phone calls to keep up with all the little sister shenanigans. Notoriously chatty with her patients as well, Hannah stays busy as a physical therapist, but loves making time to explore newfound hikes. These days she has some extra pack weight; however, Xavier is notorious for being unimpressed by sweeping vistas.
