We got an early start this morning at 7:30 AM and drove through Grand Teton National Park first. The mountains seem like they rise up out of nowhere and the sun illuminates them in the morning. Some of the peaks are covered with glaciers so that is the white you see at the top. We had a terrific breakfast in Colter Bay before heading into Yellowstone National Park.
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| Mt. Moran |
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| Colter Bay Marina |
We crossed the
Continental Divide three times. This was the highest point we were at today, 8391 ft and fortunately we could still breathe.
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| Black Pool at the Edge of Yellowstone Lake |
Our first visit in Yellowstone was to the
West Thumb Geyser Basin where we saw many different pools.
On the way to the
Old Faithful area it started to rain. Fortunately when we got there it was only 15 minutes to the next eruption and the rain stopped for us to see it.
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| Old Faithful erupting at 12:42 PM on 9/8/10 |
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| Steam venting in background |
It was raining too much for us to tour the Upper Geyser Basin, but we did look at the historic Old Faithful Inn. It really is an architectural treasure.
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| Chimney inside Old Faithful Inn |
We went to
Midway Geyser Basin again and visited the thermal features there while slugging through some rain. The weather was very unpredictable. We had layers of jackets on one minute and then took them all off 15 minutes later. At almost every site, you follow a boardwalk to the different features, so doing this in the rain with steam from the vents in your face was a feat.
We have a CD for the car that gives you the highlights of Yellowstone and there was one track on the horrible deaths from people who ventured off of these boardwalks.
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| Boiling water runoff from Excelcior Geyser |
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| Does she look scared to death. |
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| Spasm Geyser erupting |
In the
Lower Geyser basin, the weather was sunny again and we did the whole loop seeing the Fountain Paint Pots and we also saw Spasm Geyser erupting.
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| Silex Spring |
This area is very barren from all of the thermal features. The hottest pools are blue, others have different colors representing different bacteria that grow in them.
By this point in the trip we were wondering where all the animals were since we had only seen some horses and a hawk. Then out of nowhere this is the one buffalo grazing in the grass. A short while later we came upon an elk, then another buffalo walked right next to our car on the road.
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| Our first buffalo |
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| An elk |
At the end of our day we took the one way
Firehole Canyon Drive which shows off some of the lava flows and has some nice water features. This is also the site of the last stagecoach robbery in the park. Then it was off to spend the night in West Yellowstone, Montana. We had a nice dinner in a storefront restaurant, Sydney's Mountain Bistro.
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Firehole Falls
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Beautiful Place!
ReplyDeleteDave, awesome postings!!
As we were driving into Yellowstone, Dace put on a CD in the car that informed us about what we were going to see in the park.
It started with warnings about the hot springs. The narrator told a story about a dog who jumped out of car into the hot springs and his owner jumped in after, both to their deaths.
It continued about a 9 year old boy who fell in
to his death.
By the time I got to the hot springs, I was a wreck! You walked along a boardwalk. There were areas with no guard rails during which I just said "Hail Marys" until I got to an area with rails.
The waterfalls are beautiful and the scenery is gorgeous!