Yellowstone National Park
[ Main Index ] [ Previous Day ] [ Next Day ] [ Photo Gallery ]
We awoke to rain falling on the tent. I wasn’t too freezing, but then again, I was wearing a t-shirt, a sweatshirt, a flannel shirt, sweatpants and socks, a hat, and lying in a sleeping bag. Actually, the rain was much more of a concern. The rain fly held but the walls started getting damp. Les finally had his wish of being in the tent in the rain. I hope he enjoyed it.
The rain finally stopped. I ventured forth and started the hot chocolate. Les got a fire started then started heating up the macaroni and cheese/burger combo we had for dinner last night. Then Les went off to call home. That’s when it started raining again. Not too hard yet. When he got back, I went off to call home. By now it was raining really hard. When I got back, Les was in the tent trying to stay dry and warm. I got in with him and we waited for the rain to stop.
After 15 minutes or so, it let up enough that we packed up the tent contents. Then there was a lull where we were able to get the tent down, dried off to some extent, and packed. Our hands were muddy and freezing, our feet were wet and freezing and best of all, it started raining again.
With this auspicious start, we headed off to see the rest of Yellowstone. The plan was to head up the east side and come back around and start heading south for the Tetons. It half worked.
We headed up along Lake Yellowstone. Lake Yellowstone dominates the southeast corner of the park. Off in the distance across the lake we could see (occasionally through the cloud cover) snow covered peaks. Very pretty. We stopped briefly for photos. Along the way we spotted a bald eagle sitting in a tree.
The first stop was the “Natural Bridge”. The book gave the impression it was close to the road. We saw a trail marker so we pulled over. The trail meandered along a bay ultimately turning into the woods at the opposite end of the parking lot from where we started (about 1/4 mile). I was wearing my boots (to try to warm up my feet) and they weren’t too good for walking. Les’ feet were getting pretty wet. We walked awhile on the path until it hit a service road, then continued down that a ways. All told we went about maybe 3/4 of a mile and finally decided we weren’t getting anywhere. There didn’t seem to be any hills or rocks where there might be a natural bridge. So we turned back.
We followed the road back until we realized it was headed the wrong way. So we cut through the woods and walked back along the edge of the bay. At one point my boot sank into the mud so deep that I walked out of it. I realized it before I put my foot down, and hopped on the other foot for a few steps until I found a rock to put my non-booted foot down on. It was a pretty good move according to the various witnesses in the parking lot.
After we got back to the truck we decided to check out the service road. We found a sign for the bridge and it turns out it’s a mile down the road. So we were probably within 300 yards of the place. Oh well.
Next stop, some geysers (oh look, some geysers!). They were called paint pots because they were mostly mud and kind of gurgled like paint splashing. Much like the other ones. Most of the geysers had dragon names like dragon’s den, dragon’s cauldron, dragon’s nostrils, dragon toenails, etc. One thingy, made this booming noise. No water shot out or anything, but steam did. It really looked like a dragon’s den. Very cool.
We passed some bubbling yellow sulphur pools on the way to the Grand Canyon of the Yellowstone. We crossed the “Fishing Bridge”, clearly marked with No Fishing signs. I guess in the “old days” they used to be lined up on the bridge to fish. But not anymore.
My first reaction to “Grand Canyon of the Yellowstone” was “yeah, right”. Get’s a little deep, they call it the Grand Canyon. We made our way to a spot called Artist Point. This was one of maybe 2 places on our trip so far that I noticeably stepped back in awe. It was incredible. We caught it in just the right light. Off in the distance the lower falls of the Yellowstone tumbled 300 feet or so down through canyons of yellow stone (that’s why they call it…) in amazing formations. There were splashes of other colors, trees hanging from the cliff faces, thermal doings down in the river. Hopefully, the pictures will come out. (They didn’t really do it justice as it turns out.)
Of course, it started raining again at this point which prevented us from wandering too far down the path. We drove back to the upper falls area and set up the cook stove and made soup. Finally the rain stopped. As Les said, nothing like a cold shower, some hot soup and some sunshine to make you feel better. This was the turning point of the day. (Up to this point we were still pretty grumpy about breaking camp in the cold and rain).
As we were getting ready to leave, Les handed me the binoculars and as I looked through them, for no particular reason, I saw a brown clump, which I thought was a rock. But it didn’t look quite like a rock. It turned out to be a porcupine, just milling about having lunch. We walked almost right up to it and it didn’t seem too concerned at all. Just raised the needles on his back a little which is porcupine-speak for “Do ya feel lucky punk?”.
We crossed back over the river and continued up the east side. We reached the canyon cutoff road that would take us back to the west side. It was getting to be late in the day and we didn’t want to miss Old Faithful (again) so we headed south down to it.
Old Faithful goes off (faithfully) every 45-90 minutes. We arrived at 5:05. Old Faithful had gone off, oh about 10 minutes ago. Figures. But, Old Faithful is part of a much (much) larger geyser basin so we wandered around looking at some more stuff until time rolled around. There’s a big circular path around the geyser (and hotels, gift shops, snack bars, visitor centers, etc.) with benches for people to sit on. About 10 minutes before, people started arriving (how did they know?).
At about 5:45, it went off. It was so cold out that the water turned instantly to steam and clouded the whole area. We couldn’t really see the water shooting up. Still, it was pretty cool.
We figured while we still had light left we’d wander the basin area. The place is crawling with thermal activity. Geysers galore, steam vents, you name it. We saw all kinds of stuff. The Lion geyser went off (only 2-3 times a day so we were lucky). As we got to Grand Geyser, we ran into a party of 2 women and 4 or 5 kids in yellow Mickey Mouse rain ponchos, who were waiting for the geyser to go. They wanted to make hot chocolate but had forgotten matches for their stove. We just happened to have some (for our stove) and made their day. We left them to watch the geyser and continued on. We found a variety of pools with really striking colors and all kinds of weird formations spewing smoke.
Grand Geyser started making some “going off” noises so we hurried back. But, it was just a ruse. We stayed and talked to the people there for 15 minutes or so as it got dark, hoping to see it, but no luck. We left them all standing there in the dark waiting for it and headed back to the truck.
We had decided not to risk another morning like this morning and stay in a hotel. The hotels are at the north end of the park, we were at the south end. We drove back to Gardiner (Montana for the last time, and I mean it) and got a room at the Super 8 again. At least this time we didn’t have to check every hotel in town for prices. Along the way, we passed the 3000 mile mark. We had a short ceremony on the road.
Les cooked up some ramen and hot dogs (in the bathroom) and we settled in. Yet another shower tomorrow. What luck.
[ Main Index ] [ Previous Day ] [ Next Day ] [ Photo Gallery ] [ Top ]