We were successful in acquiring an early access permit time slot for Yellowstone National Park! I received the following email on Monday, 25 March which stated:
“Congratulations! We wanted to let you know the Yellowstone 2024 Early Access Lottery lottery drawing recently took place and you’ve been awarded with early access for an opportunity to create a reservation prior to the general on-sale.”
Both HD and I were successful in this lottery but my time slot of 12 April at 3pm MDT was better than his, which was 14 April, so we will use my permit to make our reservations.
Our time in Yellowstone requires only three overnight reservations for the CDT, and those primary campsites are Summit Lake Campground (OE1), Outlet Shoshone Lake (8S1), and Heart River 8J6. We will spend time in Yellowstone Village with HD’s family for three days after Summit Lake Campground, as his mom, sister, and aunt are flying in to visit us and to also celebrate HD’s birthday!
The fact that we were not successful with Glacier puts added pressure on us at the start of the trip, but the fact that Glacier backcountry sites will have only been open for only two days prior to us starting the trail (opens 15 June and we start 17 June), makes us optimistic that we will have less trouble acquiring walkup permits at the Saint Mary’s Visitor Center and Ranger Station. With us visiting Yellowstone in the month of August, there would have been a higher probability for failure in acquiring our desired backcountry sites utilizing the walkup permit method in that month, due to the popularity of the park.
Overall, we are pleased to have had success in one of our park lotteries, and hopefully we can utilize our assigned timeslot on 12 April to remove some ambiguity from the trip.
