Yellowstone Where to Stay Inside the Park

Mammoth Hot Springs Hotel

All the accommodation within Yellowstone Park itself is run by one licensed concession, Xanterra. There are various options during the summer months including cabins, lodges and hotels.  During the winter, only the Old Faithful Snow Lodge and the Mammoth Hot Springs Hotel are open. As with all the other Parks, you should bear in mind that the high prices do not necessarily reflect the quality of accommodation – you are paying for scarcity and for location.

It is also worth bearing in mind that some of the accommodation is a tourist attraction in its own right, especially Old Faithful Inn and Lake Yellowstone Hotel. This means that the public areas of these hotels can get very busy so you may have to fight your way through to reception etc. You will also need to ensure you reserve a table for meals as people often visit and have a meal at the same time. If you want your choice of time, it can be a good idea to do this when you book your accommodation, there is an online request form on the Xanterra website.

Finally, if having access to a good phone signal and wifi are important to you, it may be better to stay outside the Park or at least check very carefully what is available if you are looking within the Park. Most of the rooms do not have TV, many do not have a phone and I have not found anywhere offering wifi. Personally, I quite like the opportunity to ignore the outside world for a while but life without connectivity can be frustrating.

The main benefit of staying within the Park is that it is easier to get some of the major attractions to yourself either before all the day-trippers arrive or after they have left for the day. Watching Old Faithful is quite a different experience when you are sharing it with a couple of other people rather than a large camera-wielding crowd.

Lake Yellowstone Hotel

Of the accommodation available, Old Faithful Inn and Lake Yellowstone Hotel are the most interesting buildings. The Old Faithful Inn is a quite magnificent log structure with a steeply angled roof enclosing a cavernous lobby and a massive stone fireplace. Whether you stay there or not, it is definitely worth a look. The Lake Yellowstone Hotel is a very elegant, yellow clapboard, colonial style building overlooking the Lake. At the time of writing, it is in the process of being refurbished so check carefully to ensure you have the type of room you want and whether the level of disruption is acceptable to you before booking.

The other accommodation is mostly based around the major attractions such as the Mammoth Hot Springs Hotel and the complex at the Grand Canyon of the Yellowstone that includes Dunraven Lodge and Cascade Lodge. Various levels of accommodation are on offer at different price points.

The notable exception to this is Roosevelt Lodge Cabins. If you want to get away from it all, this is your best bet. There are no major attractions here to draw the crowds and the setting is beautiful. The main lodge has a fabulous porch on which to sit in a rocking chair and take in the scenery. All accommodation is provided in various cabins. They are quite basic but some have more amenity than others, e.g. a private bathroom. There is a restaurant and a small shop. There is also an Old West Dinner Cookout that is hugely popular and involves either a wagon or a horse ride and a cowboy style meal complete with entertainment. This gets sold out really quickly so again, if you would like to go you should reserve as far in advance as possible. I can’t see a way to do it online so you may have to call the reservations number.

For more information regarding all of the accommodation within the Park and to book, go to the Xanterra website.