This is where you can find websites, helpful phone numbers, friends groups and cooperating associations, and, sometimes, books related to the park.
Yellowstone National Park: www.nps.gov/yell
Visitor Information
307-344-7381
You can find a nice array of maps of the park at this site.
Xanterra Parks & Resorts, the lodging concessionaire:
http://www.yellowstonenationalparklodges.com/
Friends Groups and Cooperating Associations
The Yellowstone Park Foundation is a non-profit organization whose mission is to protect, preserve and enhance Yellowstone National Park. They rely solely on the generosity of private individuals, foundations, and corporations to support projects and programs that are beyond the financial capacity of the National Park Service.
The Yellowstone Association's mission is to foster the public's understanding, appreciation and enjoyment of Yellowstone National Park and its surrounding ecosystem by funding and providing educational products and services.
Helpful Books
Backpacking Wyoming, From Towering Granite Peaks To Steaming Geyser Basins
This book will practically take you by the hand and lead you along some long-distance hikes in Grand Teton and Yellowstone National parks.
Stars Above, Earth Below, A Guide To Astronomy In the National Parks
Add Stars Above, Earth Below, a Guide to Astronomy in the National Parks to your library and you'll not only gain a better appreciation of the dark skies over national parks, but you'll also be better informed on the stars twinkling at you.
It was two decades ago when the cardboard-box-protected book arrived in the mail from the National Geographic Society. Inside, in collector's edition beauty, was a richly written and gorgeously photographed book on Yellowstone Country.
Written by Seymour L. Fishbein and photographed by Raymond Gehman, the book delved deeply not only into Yellowstone National Park and neighboring Grand Teton National Park, but also into the surrounding communities to take a good measure of both the beauties, and the controversies, of the landscape. Varying parts travel guide, historical text, geology course, and primer in wildlife biology, the book overall is a rich resource for national park junkies interested not only in learning more about these two parks, but in developing a feel for the surrounding lands and the issues that helped define them early on and which continue today.
Be Expert With Map And Compass, The Complete Orienteering Handbook
With all the electronic gadgetry that exists -- cell phones, GPS units, personal locator beacons -- why bother learning how to navigate like pathfinders of the last century, with map and compass? Well, for starters you won't worry about your batteries failing you.
Thank goodness there still are independents taking pen to paper to produce guides to national parks. Forget the cookie-cutter approach, toss aside worries about over-emphasizing one area, never mind about catering to one demographic. Janet Chapple's Yellowstone Treasures is a must for Yellowstone National Park visitors.
Yellowstone and the Snowmobile: Locking Horns Over National Park Use
What is the role of a national park? How should we value what lies within the boundaries of a national park? Those are simple and yet provocative questions these days. Some answers -- perhaps the answer -- can be found in a new book that chronicles Yellowstone National Park's bittersweet history with the snowmobile.
Hawks Rest, A Season In the Remote Heart of Yellowstone
Eleven weeks spent in what arguably is the most remote corner of the continental United States taught writer Gary Ferguson that, sadly, some who pass through the landscape take it too much for granted.
Super Volcano, the Ticking Time Bomb Beneath Yellowstone National Park
Quite a bit has been written on the geologic underpinnings of Yellowstone National Park, particularly the aspect of the park sitting atop a gigantic volcano. The latest window into this world, from Greg Breining, is a good read for the lay volcanologist with an interest in the park.
One of the most direct books I've read on avoiding bears in the backcountry is Dave Smith's Backcountry Bear Basics, which recently arrived in its second edition.
Top Trails: Yellowstone and Grand Teton
You'll find all sorts of charts that let you know whether a particular hike is one-way or roundtrip, steep or level, good for mountain bikers or equestrians, child friendly, and on and on. In fact, the charts and their symbols are so plentiful that the book actually takes a section to explain how to use this information.
Yellowstone to Yukon: Freedom to Roam
In Yellowstone to Yukon: Freedom to Roam, a collection of 200 pictures and essays from such notable nature writers as David Quammen, Rick Bass and Douglas Chadwick strives to lend context to the proposal to create a wildlife corridor from Yellowstone all the way north to the Yukon.
Among the best books explaining why national parks are not to be confused with city parks when it comes to danger.
Thomas Moran: Artist of the Mountains
As Adams was a master with film, Moran was a master with canvas. Perhaps the definitive biography of Thomas Moran, this book traces his upbringing, his introduction to art, and his time spent in the parks.
