We drove across Idaho and stopped for a couple hours at Craters of the Moon National Monument. This was a good stop with a lava field and formations as far as you could see.
By Sunday evening we arrived at West Yellowstone, MT. I had originally planned to go in the south entrance but luckily researched it and found it was still closed. Although spring is a great time to visit these parks you have to make sure you know what's open. The section between Canyon and Lamar Valley was closed until Memorial Day.
We went in the West Gate and turned towards Old Faithful. This section has several short, easy trails to see the hot springs, geysers, mud pots, fumaroles.
The first was the lower geyser basin and we crossed over the river to view the pots that were overflowing into the river.
My pictures are not in any certain order as I took so many I can't label them all so here's an overview of the Artist's paintpots and the midway geyser basin and the Norris geyser basin.
Some are brilliant turquoise and others are gray mud. You can hear the bubbling underground and the smell is sulphur is strong. It's a little freaky knowing that all this thermal activity is going on right under your feet. They say that Yellowstone is set to erupt again soon.
Old Faithful is 100 feet high when it blows. It erupts every hour and a half for just a minute or so but is impressive. I tried to video but hit the wrong button and turned it off.
After that we had to backtrack due to the closed roads and as we drove I spotted a grizzly bear in the woods. Sonny turned around and we got back to the spot as another car spotted it too. Within minutes there was a "bear jam" with about a dozen cars and bunches of people.
Then we saw a coyote and an eagle and a prairie dog, more bison and elk.
ELK
coyote
prairie dog
We headed across the park to the Canyon area to walk down to the Lower Falls Brink. This is a very steep trail that took me a while to come back up as I had to rest every few minutes. It is a very beautiful view of the Yellowstone River and Canyon and the falls are very powerful with the early spring waters.
After this we decided not to go south to the lake as it would take too much time so we backtracked again to Norris and headed north towards Mammoth Hot Springs. Along the way we stopped at a pullout and spoke with a man that told us we should go to the Lamar Valley to spot wildlife. He had a large spotting scope and had seen several wolves and grizzlies the day before.
This area is different with large white mineral ledges with an occasional hot spring. As we drove through the village their were elk everywhere. Emily lived in the dorms here the summer she worked here.
the original gate from 1872
In the morning we did decide to go back and saw lots of elk and deer along the roads. We were again stopped by Bison in the road. There is a standing Petrified Tree that is millions of years old. We stopped to talk with people with spotting scopes and saw a grizzly back in a field. We HAVE to get a spotting scope. My binoculars could see the animal but not the hair on his back. Another spotter showed us a Bald Eagle in a nest with a baby- They kept bobbing up and down in the nest.
Of course I have a hundred or three more pictures that show the surrounding beauty but I have to stop somewhere. Try to get to this park before the next big volcano destroys it. It is magnificent and we can't take for granted that it will always be there. Thanks for reading.
