Yellowstone (the Park, NOT the series)

     Chad and Peachy decided to make a quick trip to Yellowstone National Park and asked me to go along.  They arrived in Blackfoot late on Thursday night June 24 and we left about 7:30 in the morning on Friday.  We drove straight to the park.  As we got to the park, the traffic was beginning to get congested.  Our first goal was to get to Old Faithful since that was the main thing Peachy wanted to see.  As we were traveling along the road to get there, we saw some people hiking around and decided to stop since we were making slow progress anyway.  Our first stop was Upper Geyser Basin. 

     Once we were back in the car, I spotted a buffalo and since it was across the creek and there was room to pull off the road, we stopped.  We hiked closer to where he was to get some pictures.  We were not the only ones to stop for pictures.  

     

  Next stop was Old Faithful Geyser which involved at least 20 minutes of driving around to find a parking space.  It was then we started keeping track of license plates.  Sidebar: on our little two day trip, we found all but four states and they were all New England states.  Once we found parking, we found a spot on the benches directly in front of the geyser.  That started a LONG wait that included a sprinkling rain and a breeze.  Since Peachy didn’t have a jacket, the two of them went and bought her a hoodie at a very busy souvenir store.  After the eruption (which I apparently got NO pictures of), we were all a little wet and cold, so we walked to an indoor cafeteria to eat lunch and warm up.  Another long wait in line, but by then the sun was out and we ate our lunch outdoors and got to see O.F. erupt again.  We also got to witness the persistence of a fellow visitor who was determined to get the audience to perform "the wave" while waiting.  It took him many false starts, but I think the crowd decided it would be worth participating just to get him to sit down and leave them alone.  It ended with a pretty impressive wave.

   Next, we hiked the trails around the geyser and took pictures.  During our hike, we saw the third eruption which we all agreed was our favorite view.  Standing further back allowed us to see just how high it got.

Notice the dark skies.

    We then headed to Midway Geyser Basin where the Grand Prismatic Spring is located.  Another wait for parking, and as we hiked on the boardwalk around this paint pot, it began to rain again.  We could see that the best view was to hike up to the high vantage point, but with the rain, we didn’t even consider doing it. 

In the shot above you can kind of pick out the clearing in the trees on the top right where people are standing to get a view of the spring from above.  

If we had hiked to the higher vantage point, this is how the spring looks:

We then drove to Gibbon Falls.  The sun was out again and we got some great views of the waterfall.  The following pictures are in no particular order, but they are taken from several nice observation spots.  

It was a long slow drive back to West Yellowstone for some dinner and then we met Katie in Island Park to stay at the Murdock cabin for the night.  Lucky for us, it was still Matt’s scheduled time and Katie was willing to leave her three boys overnight to come stay with us.  It was a lovely cabin with a beautiful view of the lake.

We started Saturday by finding the old Twiggs cabin on Henry’s Lake.  It is now owned by the Lim’s and it has been well maintained.   

    We went right into West Yellowstone and attended the Grizzly and Wolf Discovery Center.  It was fun to see the bears, wolves, prairie dogs, otters, etc.  As we were there observing, Chad found on a sign the show times of all the bears and the largest bear Sam was to make his appearance at 2:00 that afternoon.  We really wanted to see him as he was twice as big as any of the other bears.  We had no trouble killing time by shopping the gift shops and eating lunch at an out of the way saloon.  Sam was an impressive sight, though he wasn’t the most active bear. 

Below is big brown Sam:

    We made a few more stops at different shops and then headed home.  We wanted to see the fireworks in Blackfoot that night for Pride Days along with Katie and family.  After lighting a few fireworks and sparklers in our driveway, the Murdocks went in the golf cart to get a closer view.  Afterwards, they came to the house to play some cards while waiting for the traffic to clear. 

    We will definitely have to plan another trip to YNP as one day was not enough to see everything we wanted to see.  As you observe all the violent activity happening everywhere you look above ground, it sure makes you wonder what is going on under the surface (and it can't be good).  Here is a shirt I would have bought for Quinn except they didn't have his size:

I will end with some of my favorite flowers because they look so cheerful.  We always called them Johnny Jump Ups.  These were in a flower box in West Yellowstone.