The trip starts with a bet.

Usually my husband, Chris, and I discuss our parenting plans together, but at dinner—after waking up at 4:30 that morning to fly from our home in New York City to Bozeman, Montana, and then driving two and a half hours west to The Ranch at Rock Creek—I impulsively blurt out a wager to our 11-year-old son, Calder: “I bet you $100 you can’t go the whole week without playing video games.”

Both he and Chris balk at the figure. “$100?” they ask in unison—Chris a bit more incredulously. But I have my reasons.

We had come out West with a plan to wild our city kid: Spend a few days at this luxury dude ranch, doing the kinds of activities we can’t in Manhattan (fly-fishing, horseback riding), and then go explore Yellowstone National Park for the first time, to see Old Faithful and the Grand Prismatic Spring and look for wolves and bears. I wasn’t sure if Mother Nature could compete with Minecraft and Roblox, though. The only way to give her a fighting chance was to remove the competition.

“What do you think?” I ask Calder in between bites of brisket and cole-slaw, as Luke Combs croons through the speakers. “Can you do it?”

He looks at his phone—the one we bought him when he started middle school—and then he pushes it to the other side of the table.

**

My childhood could not have been more different from my son’s. He lives on the 18th floor of a high-rise Manhattan apartment building, in a sea of concrete and glass, where he watches helicopters land and take off while he eats his Cheerios in the morning and listens to sirens blare as he drifts off to sleep at night. He can also walk out his door and, minutes later, marvel at Egyptian tombs and Monets at the Met, score last-minute tickets to a Broadway show, catch a Yankees game, and eat any cuisine he could possibly desire.

These are all things I couldn’t do where I grew up, in a small city in Western Kentucky— but I could build a fort in the empty lot next to my house, search for crawdads in the creek across the street, ride horses on my friend Liza’s farm, and listen to the crickets sing at sunset.

Sometimes I wonder if I’m doing right by Calder—if he’d be better off growing up like I did. At the same time, I wonder if anyone in our wired world grows up like that anymore. So, when I see a chance to show him an IRL that’s 10 times better than any screen, I jump.

**

We start the first day of our Great Western Adventure by slipping on coveralls and waders to go fly-fishing. Calder clomps about, looking like an Oompa Loompa clocking in at Wonka’s factory. None of us has fly-fished before, so our affable guide, Nathan, first shows us how to cast on dry land outside the ranch’s Rod & Gun Club. Calder looks like he’s trying to lasso something; Chris swings his arm too far back; I generally flail about. A bald eagle flies over us, shockingly close, no doubt judging our poor form.

At the creek, though, we improve. “Think about what your flies would be doing if they weren’t attached to a line,” Nathan tells us. We cast again and again, keeping our lines straight and avoiding “the bullwhip sound.” We’re all quiet, standing at our own designated spots along the bank, listening to the water rush past the stones and the meadowlarks sing in the trees.

Chris is the first to find success, pulling in a cutthroat trout. “I know that fish,” Nathan says with a laugh. He points to a barb wound from a previous catch-and-release session. “What’s his name?” Chris asks—not a silly question, it turns out. “Oh, you’ve gotta catch the same fish three times before you can name him,” Nathan responds. “I have pictures of five different people holding the same fish. It would have been six, but somebody lost him.”

Calder scores next. I watch as Nathan hurries over to help. Calder hands him his rod, picks up the net, and splashes into the water. By the time I make it over, they’re releasing the cutbow trout—a crossbreed between a cutthroat and a rainbow—back into the water.

“I kinda caught a fish,” Calder says, with a shrug.

“But you didn’t reel it in!” I tell him.

Nathan shakes his head: “To be fair, I did say, ‘Calder, do you want to reel it in?’ And you said, ‘I’ll get the net!’”

Actually,” Calder corrects him, “you said, ‘Do you want to fight it?’ And I didn’t want to get in the water and punch a fish!”

While I didn’t catch a trout, I do have one for lunch in a tasty grain bowl with quinoa, kale, mushrooms, and pickled eggs at the ranch’s Buckle Barn. Chris has a fried fish sandwich and Calder opts for a cheeseburger. While Calder usually spends meals out in NYC float-ing reasons why he should get to play a game on his phone, today he doesn’t even take it out of his pocket. Instead, we talk about how meditative fly-fishing was and how we’d like to do it again.

Our next activity is the one I’m most excited about: horseback riding, something I loved to do as a kid. Calder, meanwhile, is borderline terrified. He’s never been on a horse; he did attempt to ride a donkey in Jordan two years ago, but ended up jumping off in the middle of our ascent to the Monastery at Petra. Our guides, Gracie and Jessica, assure him he has the friendliest horse at the ranch, Domino, but before Calder mounts up, he makes them promise that they’ll let him call it quits whenever he so chooses. I look at them and mouth silently, “He’ll be fine.”

As predicted, five minutes into our gentle trail ride Calder is totally at ease and, dare I say, enjoying himself. “Watch out,” Gracie says to me. “I came to my first dude ranch when I was 11, and now I’m a guide.”

We mosey along the creek and up a hill, with the majestic Pintler mountains framing the scene and making us feel like extras in some John Wayne movie. (The borrowed cowboy boots help.) When our ride is over, Calder strokes Domi-no’s muzzle. “You’re a really nice horse, Domino,” he whispers. “Thank you.”

That night, after a hearty “home-stead supper club” dinner of spaghetti carbonara and beef tenderloin, we stop in the Silver Dollar Saloon to bowl. We somehow have the place to ourselves and, while we put on a pitiful, gutter-filled show, we have a blast. By the time we call it a night, the sky is filled with stars.

The next morning we fill up on ricotta blueberry pancakes and then tackle an activity that Calder usually engages in online: target shooting. Having watched him drill scores of zombies on-screen, Chris and I are a little wary to let him near a rifle, but I know we’re in good hands when we meet Richard and Clayton, our guides. “We take safety very seriously,” Richard tells us. “If you don’t follow the rules, we’re done here. We pack it up and call it a day.”

Calder has been looking forward to this activity most of all, and he approaches the experience with respectful caution. Much to my chagrin, he turns out to be a sharpshooter; I lose count of the number of times Richard calls out, “Smoked it!”

Hanging out with Richard and his buddy Clayton maybe even more fun than smoking those targets. The two serious outdoorsmen grew up together in Baton Rouge, Louisiana, hunting, fishing, and generally running amok, but both were working 9-to-5 jobs before coming to the ranch, which Richard discovered after Googling “outdoor job Montana.” At one point, a golden eagle soars overhead, and we all stop and marvel at its massive wingspan. Richard and Clayton have seen them before—Richard even witnessed two battling in the air once—but they seem just as in awe as us. They have the kind of reverence for nature I want to instill in Calder.

Afterward, we tackle a ropes course that makes us all feel brave and sore, and then we explore the property on bikes. From inside a fenced-off area, we watch the ranch’s 80 horses being released into a literally greener pastures. The only time Calder pulls out his phone is to take pictures.

**

We’re up early the next morning so we can pack and head to Yellowstone. We have a short hike planned, but it’s raining and I wonder if Calder will want to go. He surprises us by putting on his boots and raincoat without us even asking. Richard is our guide once again, and he leads us up a fairly easy trail that still leaves us huffing and puffing. He regales us with tales of hiking the Pacific Crest Trail, and Calder hangs on every word. But Calder also asks about birds we hear (black-billed magpies), scat we try not to step on (elk), and bushes that are unfamiliar to us (huckleberries). At the top of the hill, Calder spreads his arms wide and turns his face up to the rain, a huge grin on his face, spinning round and round like Maria in The Sound of Music.

I expect Calder to be devastated to leave a place like this, but he can’t wait for Yellowstone—especially after Rich-ard went on and on about how lucky he is to go. And so we climb into the car and set off, armed with delicious boxed lunches from the ranch’s kitchen staff.

The rain stays with us for the three-and-a-half-hour drive, but it gives a haunting beauty to the stunning mountain scenery after three days of cheerful blue skies. When we arrive at Gardiner, the town just outside the north entrance to the park, we have to slow down to let two statuesque elk cross in front of us.

Our first stop in the park is the Mammoth Hot Springs. The terraces look like a frozen waterfall, but the rising steam reminds us of their dangerous thermal heat. We continue east on the Grand Loop Road for a bit, scanning for possible wildlife—which turns out to be bison. So many bison. On the hills, in the valleys, on the road’s shoulder, blocking traffic. It’s quietly hilarious how many there are (about 5,000 in the park, apparently), their gentle, loping presence an integral part of the backdrop.

I’ve been told that if we see lots of cars stopped, we should stop too, and after rounding another herd of buffalo we do just that. We park and walk over to a group of people gathered around a spotting scope. “What do you see?” I ask.

“Oh, you just missed it,” a man replies. “There were four grizzly bears here—they just crossed the street, and now we can’t find them.”

“No way!” Calder laments.

“But this one,” the man continues, pointing to a boy no more than 6, “just spotted a couple of black bears up on the hill. Do you want to see?” I look, and sure enough, there’s a mama bear and her cub. The man lowers the scope for Calder, who watches for a while with a smile on his face.

Things are bustling at the Mammoth Hot Springs Hotel & Cabins when we check in. We happen to have arrived on opening day for the summer season, and the hotel is full of tourists and locals alike. Artists have set up tables displaying their works, and I buy a small print of a bison, titled Mrs. Wagner, by a gregarious painter named Erin Lee Dentinger. We head into the Map Room—named for the grand map of the U.S. made of 12 kinds of wood that hangs on the wall—just in time for a blessing from Scott Frazier, a San-tee and enrolled Crow tribal member.

“First maker of all things,” Frazier begins, “we pray for purity and innocence for those going and those coming and those on the path of life.” He prays for the animals, the trees, the water. “We pray that people respect the sacredness of this place.” I steal a glance at Calder, who is rapt, and squeeze his hand. “First maker of all things, we pray unto you for all of the workers and all of the guests who come and feel the nature of this place, feel the spirit in their heart. Let it seep in. Let the world go away for a moment… All of these people are here for different reasons: dreams, visions, healing. And we ask, first maker, that you heal the broken people who come. Heal, make them strong again.”

When he finishes, Frazier invites everyone to come forward to bless themselves with sacred water from his reservation. Calder immediately walks forward, dips his hand in the water, and reverently touches his heart and head. I can’t help but wipe a couple of tears from my eyes.

**

Our alarm sounds shockingly early, but we’re all excited to hit the Yellowstone Loop. Chris and Calder—who share the surname Norris—take a few too many photos at our first stop: Norris Geyser Basin. They pose with goofy smiles in front of the signs for the Norris Area and Norris Museum. Finally, we make it to the basin itself, which bubbles and steams and reeks of sulfur. “Of course your area smells awful!” I joke. They high-five.

Next, we walk around the Grand Prismatic Spring. Colors seem to slither across the surface; at one angle it appears blue, then yellow, then green, a delicate mist hanging above it all that we try to blow away. We stop again soon after, when Calder spots a baby bison among a herd along the side of the road.

The baby is orange and shaggy, more like a golden retriever than a stoic buffalo. We keep a safe distance but walk over to a ranger who’s parked nearby. “How old is he?” I ask. “Less than 24 hours,” he replies. Calder’s jaw drops.

It’s not much farther to Old Faithful, which we discover has a countdown clock to let anxious visitors like us know how long we have to stand outside waiting. We get a good spot and strike up a conversation with the couple next to us, who tell us they’ve been coming at least once a year for a decade now. “Is it loud when it erupts?” Calder asks them. The guy’s eyes grow wide: “The ground rumbles! The trees shake! People fall down!” He pauses. “No, it’s not loud,” he admits with a laugh. “If I sat on it, would I fly up into the air?” Calder asks him. “I can imagine Wile E. Coyote doing that,” he replies, clapping Calder on the back.

When it does erupt, the crowd oohs and ahhs in unison—and all of us film it on our smartphones, of course.

Eager to see more animals, we venture into Lamar Valley, known for its epic wildlife sightings. After driving alongside about a million more bison, we see a few cars parked near a rest area and two guys walking up a hill holding spotting scopes. “Let’s follow them!” Calder says. We hike for about 10 minutes before reaching the top of a hill where there are eight people in a line, each armed with a scope or large binoculars. “We’ve got a gray wolf,” a man tells us, a grin on his face. “A juvenile. All alone.” He ushers Calder over and lowers his scope. “I can see him!” Calder shouts. Chris and I take turns peeking through the high- magnification scope; I catch the wolf doing a downward dog, which makes me miss our dog back home.

I’m struck by the camaraderie at Yellowstone, how everyone we meet is so eager to share their experiences. The group discusses other recent sightings, and Calder talks about the bears we saw yesterday and an elk skeleton we saw at The Ranch at Rock Creek. “We’re pretty sure a mountain lion killed it, not a wolf, because the skeleton was totally intact,” Calder tells the men, who look impressed. “Wolves would have made a mess of it.” The men nod in agreement, and Calder looks pleased with himself.

That night, at dinner in the Mammoth Hotel Dining Room, we run through a few firsts from this trip: first wolf, first bear, first bison baby, first horseback ride, first fly-fishing experience, first strike in bowling. Calder rolls his eyes when I point out it’s the first time in a while we haven’t fought about screen time. “It’s also the first time in a while that we spent this much time together,” he retorts. The implication is clear: Maybe he wouldn’t spend so much time on a screen if we spent more quality time together. Maybe if Chris and I didn’t spend our Saturday afternoons working, or turn back to our laptops after dinner to reply to one more email or finish one last task, then our kid wouldn’t be so quick to log on to Roblox or disappear into YouTube shorts.

Chris and Calder fall asleep quickly that night—Calder, no doubt, dreaming of the $100 he’ll receive tomorrow—but, as usual, I lay awake, my mind running. I don’t want to go home, to return to stressful days and deadlines and arguments about screens and homework. I calm myself by thinking of Frazier’s prayer, how he asked the first maker of all things to let the spirit of Yellowstone seep into the hearts of all who come here.

And I make a new bet with myself: I bet that I can keep that spirit in my heart. I can take it with me when I leave. I can be present with my son. I can go on adventures with him anywhere. He doesn’t need mountains and wild animals and inspiring guides, as wonderful as all of that is. What he needs is me.