Yellowstone – summary of recent visits

Posted on August 25, 2015 by liv2rv

Today is the 99^th Birthday of the National Park Service!

We have taken advantage of having an entire summer to explore at the very first National Park, Yellowstone. We are very grateful that many intelligent folks had the foresight to protect and preserve so many parks, monuments, caves, historical sites, etc., for future generations to enjoy.

Yellowstone is such a wonderful park with so many unique features and areas to explore. Previously I have written about the thermal features in great detail. Instead of doing a lot of separate posts on the different areas, this one will summarize our last several visits. So this is a bit photo heavy.

ANIMALS

The animals are a big attraction in the park, and sometimes people forget this is not a zoo. The animals are wild, and this is their home. To date, five people have been gored by bison (buffalo). Four of them simply walked up to the bison to take a better picture, and one startled a sleeping bison while hiking. Just remember, bison have no interest in being in your “selfie”! We have seen our fair share of animals, except for a grizzly and Bull Moose in the park. The Lamar Valley area is best known for animal sightings, and we spent a day driving in that area. If you want to see animals, go early (think 6am).

Lamar Valley

The park has a lot of Pronghorn’s

pronghorn

As well as bison

where the buffalo roam

And a few bison that seem to hang out right near the road, so you can view them safely from your vehicle

no selfies please!

But the highlight of our trip this day was seeing a bear foraging for food. We watched him/her(?) about 10 minutes lifting up trees stumps with ease, searching for food. The bear finally stopped and looked back at all the people, and then disappeared into the woods. A park ranger had also stopped, to insure people were not getting any closer to the bear. We stayed in our truck, but many people had exited their vehicles. I think my photo from the safety of the truck turned out just fine. No need to walk closer to the bear.

hmm, tasty people

WATERFALLS

As you are aware from previous posts, Yellowstone has plenty of waterfalls. After viewing the animals, we headed over to Tower Fall, which we had not yet seen. At 132 feet, the falls is a very popular viewing area. It is a very short walk (150 yards) from the general store in the Tower-Roosevelt area of the park. I am not sure why it is called Tower Fall, instead of Tower Falls.

Tower Fall

There is a more challenging ¼ mile walk down to the river, but you are rewarded with some nice views in the valley.

Tower Creek

On our way back up, we encountered a baby pronghorn that was munching away right on the path, oblivious to the warning on the sign!

what sign?

MORE GEYSERS

After viewing the falls, we decided to hit the Norris Geyser Basin even though it was over flowing with visitors. They say attendance is way up this year, and we believe that! This geyser basin has a lot a fumaroles (steam vents), which are the hottest of the geothermal features in the park. They have been measured at 280 degrees, and quickly boil away what little water is in the vent.

Norris Geyser Basin

steam vent

steam vent boiling

ARTIST PAINT POTS

On another day we checked out the artist paint pots area, which is a short walk around some mud pots, geysers and hot springs. The trail climbs to an overlook, which gives a nice overview of the area.

Artist Paint Pots

mud pot

FOUNTAIN PAINT POTS

Another section of the park, on the way to Old Faithful, has more paint pots. Paint pots are a vat of bubbling mud formed by the mixture of heat, gases, volcanic rock, water, minerals, acid and living microorganisms. The pots in the Fountain Paint Pot section are fun to watch. Photos just do not do justice to these. You have to watch and listen to them plop and throw mud up and around.

Fountain Paint Pots

In this same area, is another fumerole, Red Spouter. This was formed after the earthquake in 1959, which is example of just how unstable the ground is in many parts of Yellowstone. Prior to the quake, it was just a grassy hill.

Red Spouter

And as luck would have it, we were fortunate to watch two geysers in this area erupt at the same time! Spasm geyser on the left, and fountain geyser on the right.

twin eruptions

Having our geyser fix, we headed down Firehole Lake Drive to see what was located there. The Great Fountain Geyser, which had erupted the day before, was still very impressive to look at.

Great Fountain Geyser

If you notice in the picture above, there is a castle shaped geyser in the background. (you may have to click the picture to enlarge) Shortly after this photo, that geyser started to erupt, so we watched from a distance. Given the relatively few people around that geyser, it was not a planned eruption.

White Dome Geyser erupting

After that one settled down, the Great Fountain Geyser started acting up, spewing a bit of water, before settling back down.

Great Fountain acting up

We drove over to the White Dome Geyser for a closer look. This geyser continues to get taller every year, as a small amount of silica is deposited on the sides after each eruption.

White Dome Geyser

On our last visit to the park, we explored the West Thumb Geyser Basin and Yellowstone Lake. Due to the wildfires in Montana and Idaho, the air quality has really decreased, and there is a constant haze over the area. We stopped along the road to watch this little geyser erupt, with Yellowstone Lake in the background. You cannot see the mountains on the other side due to the haze.

Yellowstone Lake

Fishing Bridge used to be a popular area for fishing, but the park service no longer allows fishing in the area, as people were too successful, and the wildlife in the park depends on the fish more than us humans do. I was lucky to snap this photo just as four corvettes were crossing the bridge.

Fishing Bridge

The most famous feature at the West Thumb is this hot springs fishing cone in the lake. Fisherman would boast about how they could catch a trout in the lake, then dunk it in the boiling water in the cone to cook it! This practice was banned in 1911.

Fishing Cone

We just never get tired of all the ever-changing features of Yellowstone National Park. It is truly an amazing place. If you have never visited, please put this on your ‘bucket list’. You will not regret a visit to the park, even if you only have a day. Thank you for following along this summer on our trips to Yellowstone. Hopefully you have enjoyed the photos (we have taken hundreds each visit), and learned a few things on geothermal features.

Quote for the day: “There can be nothing in the world more beautiful than the Yosemite, the groves of the giant sequoias and redwoods, the Canyon of the Colorado, the Canyon of the Yellowstone, the Three Tetons; and our people should see to it that they are preserved for their children and their children’s children forever, with their majestic beauty all unmarred.” – Theodore Roosevelt

Hiking with Friends (x 2)

Posted on August 11, 2015 by liv2rv

Wow, it is hard to believe that our time here in West Yellowstone is almost over! We have only 4 weeks left of work, before we start venturing back east for a few weeks to visit with family and friends, as well as dentists and doctors (for Dan….Makena and I are good!). Then we will be heading down to begin our fall jobs at Amazon in Jeffersonville, IN.

The temperatures here still get in the low 40’s at night, with 70’s during the day. It has been a very pleasant summer. We have been venturing into Yellowstone every week, mostly for just a few hours, as it gets extremely crowded. Towards the end of August, it should get better, as the kids start going back to school.

Since we need to start increasing our walking to get ready for Amazon, we met up with friends for two hikes last week. Originally, I was going to do both hikes in one blog, but decided to split them up, as it was getting a bit lengthy. So the second part will be posted in a few days.

On Sunday, we met up with Karen and Al at Biscuit Basin in Yellowstone for a short 3 mile hike to Mystic Falls. We started out looking at the various geysers in the area, the most famous of which is the Sapphire Pool. It had biscuit shaped formations surrounding it, but they were all blown off in the 1959 earthquake (our previous blog gave more details about this earthquake). The beautiful sapphire color remains, and it is one of the prettiest geyser (as far as color) that we have seen this summer.

Sapphire Pool

The trail starts out relatively easy, and then the trail splits off. We had been advised to “go left” as it was the easier route to the falls. We discovered later that was very good advice, as it is much easier to go down the steeper climb of 700 feet, then up! The trail winds along the Little Firehole River, and is very scenic.

the easy trail

Even though there were “bear aware” signs, we did not see any wildlife at all, except this little guy.

our ‘wildlife’

After less than a mile, we reached the 70 foot high Mystic Falls.

Mystic Falls

Karen and Al

We had 2 options, go back the way we came, or take the more strenuous and less scenic route. We all opted for the latter! The new route back down began with a steep climb, but did offer a nice overlook to the Upper Geyser Basin which is about 3 miles away.

Old Faithful in distance

We continued climbing, and commenting that we are supposed to be ‘heading down’. Al has a GPS tracker on his iPhone, and it indicated we had climbed over 650 feet in a very short distance. We were happy much of it was in the shade of the trees. We stopped at the ‘scenic overlook’ which looked over the parking lot and the Biscuit Basin where we began our hike. In the upper right corner of the photo is the Upper Geyser Basin where Old Faithful is located.

Biscuit Basin overlook

And then we began a rapid descent, going down switchbacks for most of the way. Al’s GPS indicated we were going down a 12% grade. We met a lot of people huffing and puffing their way up, and were glad we chose the “left” option up, and the “right” option down. Dan is in the center of the photo below.

heading on down

Al is the tiny orange dot in the center of this picture.

Hello Al!

After we made it back down, we decided to go to the Old Faithful Inn for lunch. After lunch, we discovered a tour of the Inn was in progress, so we tagged along on. The tour lasts about 45 minutes, and is very informative, and includes a view of one of the rooms for rent. This room rents for $109.00 night, and you have your own sink (not original) but do share a bathroom with everyone else on the floor. It was quite the deluxe room back in the early 20^th Century!

Old House Room

sink is not original

On the second floor of the Inn, there is an overlook into the dining room where we had lunch.

Dining room

The flag inside the Inn contains 45 stars, representing the 45 states at the time the Inn was complete in 1904. By 1912 there were three more stars added to the flag, with Oklahoma, New Mexico and Arizona being added. The remaining two stars were added when Alaska and Hawaii were added to the union in 1959.

45 stars on the flag

We hope to get together with Karen and Al one more time before we leave this area, to do some more hiking.

Quote for the day: “Hiking is just walking where it’s okay to pee.” – Demetri Martin

YNP – Mammoth Hot Springs

Posted on July 10, 2015 by liv2rv

Mammoth Hot Springs is in the Northwest corner of Yellowstone National Park, near the city of Gardiner, Montana. Previously, we discussed how Yellowstone contains the largest hydrothermal features in the world. This area, as the name implies, contains hot springs. There are no geysers in the area. With hot springs, hot water travels underground through limestone, and dissolves carbonate materials. Water can easily flow to the surface where the heat escapes from runoff or evaporation. The water coats the surface with the carbonate materials, which hardens into travertine rock. Travertine is too soft to create enough pressure to form a geyser.

The drive up to the area is very pretty, and gives you an idea of how expansive this park is.

Yellowstone National Park

As you get closer to the area, you can see how the landscape changes, as a result of the hydrothermal features. The white colored rock is from the limestone deposits.

limestone hills

The park service has put in extensive board walks around the travertine terraces in the area, so you can spend an hour or two taking a leisurely stroll to admire the beauty of these features. The colors in the springs are from thermophiles, an organism (think bacteria) that can survive extremely high temperatures. The hot springs area is constantly changing, as it is a living, breathing eco-system.

Liberty Cap, a hot spring cone, where the “plumbing” system remained open in one place for a long time, allowing mineral deposits to build up to a height of 37 feet.

Liberty Cap

Palette Springs is a beautiful display of the hydrothermal features of this area, created over thousands of years.

Palette Springs

Hot Springs can have a life cycle as this example of Jupiter Terrace demonstrates. In 1923, it was documented that water was flowing extensively in the area. The calcium carbonate materials choked off the roots of the trees, and they died off. Since 1998, this area has been dormant. If it continues to remain dormant, new trees and grass will start to grow in the area. As you can see by this picture, a small amount of vegetation has grown over the past few years.

Jupiter Terrace

grass starting to grow

Minerva Terrace is an area that alternates between abundant water flow, and minimal flow. This changes over several years. The area of color, is where the water was flowing when we were visiting.

Minerva Terrace

Here are some additional views along our walk

New Blue Springs

Cleopatra Terrace

This is an overview of the Mammoth Hot Springs visitors center, shops and hotels.

view down to “city”

The original entrance to the park, in Gardiner, has the Theodore Roosevelt arch, which was constructed in 1903. President Roosevelt himself placed the cornerstone during construction of the arch by the U.S. Army which was stationed in the park. Dan and I remembered driving through this arch in 2004 on our brief visit to the park, and since we were so close, we decided to drive through it again. Only to discover it currently looks like this:

Roosevelt Arch

slogan on top of arch

The park service and the town of Gardiner are re-doing the entrance into the park and making the road through the arch one-way, with pedestrian access as well. There is a doorway in the arch, and people will be permitted to walk through the door. The town is also putting a bypass around the arch, to improve traffic flow. This construction should be completed later this year.

After a brief stop in the town of Gardiner, we headed back into the park, and down towards home, with a brief stop to check out the Golden Gate Canyon bridge and waterfall. The first bridge in this area was built in 1885 after blasting out 14,000 cubic yards of rock, and hauling them off via horse and wagons. By 1900, the bridge was too unstable and stagecoaches were falling off. The bridge has been rebuilt 3 times since, most recently in 1977.

Golden Gate Canyon

A highlight of our trip today was a brief visit with Christine and Herb, who were busy working at the Mammoth Hot Springs gift store. We worked with them last year at Crazy Horse. It was great catching up with them, and we hope to try to get together this summer, although our off days do not coincide with theirs.

Quote for the day: “Nature does not hurry, yet everything is accomplished.” – Lao Tzu

A day of premature eruptions!

Posted on June 19, 2015 by liv2rv

Our friends Karen and Al are working near Grand Teton National Park, and we had planned a get together once the southern road in Yellowstone finally opened up after June 11. With the way the weather has been, picking a date (June 14) so far in advance can be challenging. But we could not have asked for a better day! Our plan was to explore the Upper Geyser Basin of the park, which contains the very popular Old Faithful. Many people stop to watch Old Faithful, and then go on to explore another area of the park. But they are missing out on a lot of other geysers.

The largest concentration of active geysers in the world are contained in the Upper Geyser Basin. Time for a quick geology lesson! Three major volcanic eruptions have occurred in Yellowstone within the past 2 million years. The hydrothermal features in the park include geysers, hot springs, mudpots and fumaroles. Three features are needed to produce these: heat (from the magma 3-8 miles underground the park), water (from the rain and snow), and plumbing (from the natural underground cracks).

Today our focus was on the geysers, which are formed when the plumbing/cracks are constricted enough to prevent the water from easily getting to the surface, which would allow heat to escape. The water beneath the surface is under intense pressure, heats up to boiling, and is eventually forced out through an eruption of water and steam. That’s the quick and easy explanation!

The National Park service now has a Geyser App for your phone, so you can easily monitor when they will be erupting. Of course, cell phone service in the park is very spotty, so you are better off writing down the times that are posted in the visitors center. We arrived early in the morning, in time to watch Old Faithful erupt. In the photo below, take note of the number of people watching.

Old Faithful in the morning

Old Faithful erupts about every 90 minutes, and goes for 1 – 5 minutes, expelling 3700 – 8400 gallons of boiling water depending on the length of the eruption. It is the one geyser closest to the visitors center, but it is not the largest geyser in the park.

Old Faithful eruption

Afterwards, we headed for a quick breakfast, and planned out our day based upon the predicted geyser eruption schedule posted in the visitors center. A side note, we were pleasantly surprised at how affordable food is in the park, compared to West Yellowstone (about 1/2 the cost for breakfast!).

After breakfast we took a “brief” hike up to Observation Point. I put that in quotes because the posted sign stated it was only 1/2 mile, but it was almost straight up a hill. From that viewpoint, we were able to watch Old Faithful again erupt,(for the scheduled 11:14am time) and take in the beautiful scenery surrounding the area. In the photo below, you can see Old Faithful on the left, and the famous (and super expensive) Old Faithful Inn on the right. The crowd on the boardwalk is getting a little bigger.

Observation Point view

We took a short stroll down to Solitary Geyser, which is named because it is far from the other geysers, and no one seems to visit it. This geyser was altered by humans, before they truly understood what geysers are all about. It was originally a hot spring, and the park put a pipe into it to divert the hot water down into a pool (around 1915). When the water level dropped, the “spring” started erupting. The pipe was removed and the water level restored, but the geyser continues to erupt every 4-7 minutes, to this day. We watched it bubble up and erupt twice while we were there. It goes a few feet in height. Al, Karen and Dan are on the left in the picture below. We had this geyser to ourselves for about 15 minutes before another couple showed up.

Solitary Geyser

Continuing along the boardwalk, we stopped to look at several small geysers on the way to Castle Geyser, which was set to erupt at 12:25pm (+/- 45 minutes). The park service has a nice trail guide (available for a $1 donation), which has a detailed map and description of all the geysers. We arrived at Castle Geyser a little after noon, and took up a spot to view the eruption. Note the lack of people in the photo in the background.

Castle Geyser

The Castle Geyser only erupts once every 13 hours (+/- 1 hour), and lasts 15-20 minutes for the water phase, followed by 30 minutes of steam. It reaches a height of 75 feet. A little after noon, the smaller pools around the “castle” started boiling, and soon the water started erupting, at first in small bursts, then in one large burst.

Castle Geyser

We were happy we arrived early, since the geyser started erupting early, and it was an amazing display. Much more impressive than Old Faithful, even though it does not spew water as high. And to be able to watch a geyser that only erupts every 13 hours was a great experience. We planned on watching the geyser for a while, since the Grand Geyser was not set to erupt until 2:25pm (+/- 75 minutes).

After about 15 minutes of watching the geyser, we started hearing people screaming in the distance. We turned around to discover the Grand Geyser was also erupting way ahead of schedule. Again, there was very few people around the Grand Geyser at the time.

Grand Geyser viewed from Castle Geyser

The Grand Geyser is considered to be the tallest predictable geyser in the world (just not today!!). Since the duration of the eruption is only 9-12 minutes, we sprinted up the boardwalk to watch the remainder of the eruption. Within the Grand Geyser is also the Vent and Turban Geysers, and they were erupting as well. Vent, on the left and Turban on the right are mostly steam, with Grand in the middle spurting the water.

Vent, Grand, Turban Geysers

Vent, Grand & Turban Geysers

While this was going on, the Castle Geyser had switched over to the steam phase. You can see it in the distance from the Grand Geyser.

Steam phase of Castle Geyser

Unlike the Castle Geyser, when the Grand Geyser ends, it is if someone turned the switch to “off”, because everything just stops. It just looks like a dormant geyser. Note how the trees near the geyser have turned white from the steam and water spray.

Grand Geyser

By this time, it was a little after 1:00pm, and the next scheduled eruption was 1:50pm (+/- 30 minutes) at the Riverside Geyser. Thinking we had plenty of time, although aware that everything else had gone of prematurely, we headed down to see the very popular Morning Glory Pool. We passed the Grotto Geyser on the way, which has no predictable schedule. It is very unique in its shape.

Grotto Geyser

The Morning Glory Pool was named after its likeness to the flower. The pool is a hot spring, not a geyser. People have thrown coins and other objects into the pool over the years, which have clogged up the steam vent. As a result of this vandalism, the temperature in the pool has been lowered, and more bacteria has grown. The park service has tried to lower the water level and vacuum out many of the objects, in order to restore the pool back to its natural state.

Morning Glory

And yes, while viewing the pool, we again heard more screams in the distance, and turned around to discover the Riverside Geyser was also erupting early!

Riverside Geyser in distance

The Riverside Geyser erupts every 6 hours, and lasts about 20 minutes. It is on the bank of the Firehole River, providing a very scenic display.

Riverside Geyser downstream

Riverside Geyser across stream

We sat and watched the geyser for about 10 minutes, before making the almost 3 mile walk back towards the visitors center. We stopped along the boardwalk to view a few more geysers, and stopped to watch the Anemone Geyser. The geyser is actually two geysers close together, and are named after the Anemone flower. Most people just walk right on by, not realizing these little geysers erupt every 7-10 minutes. It is worth the wait, because you could get splashed by this geyser, depending on which way the wind is blowing.

Anemone Geyser

We ended up with a splash of water and steam.

Anemone Geyser erupting

After a reasonably priced, and tasty meal at the Old Faithful cafeteria, we headed over to the Midway Geyser Basin to try to view the Grand Prismatic. At 370 feet in diameter, it is the largest hot spring in the park. It is also difficult to see, due to the constant steam (blue colored) floating up from the spring.

Grand Prismatic

another view of Grand Prismatic

To get a good view, click here, for some google photos. Some folks do go “off trail” and hike up the hill you see in the background of my photos.

According to Al’s fitness app on his phone, we walked over 12 miles in about 8 hours. It was a wonderful day with good friends, and spectacular eruptions. We feel very fortunate to have been able to view so many geysers erupting in one day. If you have the time, don’t just watch Old Faithful and leave. Go take a walk around the entire Upper Geyser basin, and look at all the wonderful thermal features. Perhaps if people realized this is the only place on Earth to see so many, they would spend more time here.

Oh, remember my first photo of Old Faithful (yes, I know this is a long blog) showing a few hundred visitors? This is what you will encounter when you go in the afternoon (taken when we were leaving the area). Thousands of people crammed together! Go early!!

the tourists have arrived!

Quote for the day: “I don’t drink water, because if water can erode rock, think what it can do to flesh.” – Jarod Kintz

Rain, Rain and a brief park visit

Posted on June 9, 2015 by liv2rv

Since we arrived in West Yellowstone, MT three weeks ago, it has rained every day. The locals are happy about the rain, as they did not have much snow this winter. As many have put it, more rain in May means less smoke (forest fires) in August. I’m thinking it will be a bumper crop for mosquitos this summer!

The forecast for this past Sunday indicated it would be nice until the afternoon, so we decided to get up early and head over to Yellowstone National Park for the morning. We got up bright and early….to thick fog! The best wildlife viewing is early morning or just before sunset. We decided to wait a few hours for the fog to lift, so we were not expecting to see much wildlife on this visit. Since we are here for the Summer, we have decided to do the park in small sections. The park is divided into eight sections, and we decided to head to the Canyon Village area, to view the Grand Canyon of the Yellowstone, along with the Upper and Lower Falls.

Grand Canyon of Yellowstone

The canyon is over 24 miles long, and is continuously changing, due to wind, water, earthquakes and other natural occurrences.

Along the way to several viewing positions, remnants remain of the glaciers that melted over 10,000 years ago. This boulder, as big as a small home, remains nestled in the pine trees.

glacier boulder

At 308 feet, the Lower Falls is the tallest waterfall in Yellowstone National Park.

Lower Falls

The Lower Falls

The Upper Falls, is named because it is at a higher elevation on the river. However, the waterfall is only 109 feet.

The Upper Falls

We did stop and view one geyser on our way to the Canyon Village area, but I forgot to take a picture of the sign, so I have no idea what this one is called. It was very small and all by itself.

unknown geyser

The highlight of the day was encountering two beautiful Elk that were hanging out near the parking lot by the Upper Falls viewing area. Elk shed their antlers late March thru April, and then begin re-growing them almost immediately. They can grow as much as 2 inches per day. They are velvet covered during the period of growth, and by summer the blood flow stops to the antler, and it hardens. The Elk scratch their antlers along trees to scrape off the velvet.

Big Daddy

Hello!

We are very excited about having the entire summer to take our time exploring the park.

Quote for the day: “Think of your life as a waterfall; it may come crashing down at some point, it may have it’s ups and downs, but in the end, it will continue to flow.” – unknown

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Tag Archives: Yellowstone National Park