YELLOWSTONE NATIONAL PARK

This was my favorite place to visit on our holidays and the perfect way to end the trip. We were still a long way from home but after this anything else would seem mediocre so I'm glad we saved it for our last stop.


The approach into the park from the South entrance.

I was surprised to see such a big beautiful lake. Close to where it starts when coming from  the south entrance there are steaming vents right in the water. I thought that would pollute/poison the water but apparently there are loads of fish thriving in the lake and rivers of the park.

Our first mud hole.

Steaming waters.

Our first stop on the way to Canyon Village was a surprise. This beautiful roaring waterfall flowing though colored canyons was totally unexpected. We hadn't read up on the park a lot before we left home so this was a treat.

Below are some shots of the canyon with amazing colors in the rock.

Another look at the waterfall.  So pretty.

Check out the tree with no leaves at the bottom of the picture. It is spiraled all the way to the top.

Our first herd of buffalo. We had hoped to see some and actually saw a single one earlier but this was the first group and we were excited that they were so close to the road. Of course that wasn't close enough for some idiots who had to leave their car and get as close as possible. We used to blame that behavior on Disney for showing wild animals as cute pets but I think it is just stupidity in some people.

                                                                                                                                                                 

The big boy was just interested in his harem instead of us.

Taking a look at the dumb tourists.

Back to more important things. I will be showing more pictures of different herds later on.

We decided to skip the Tower Roosevelt area north of Canyon Village and cut across to the north/south intersection leading to Mammoth Hot Springs and Old Faithful as we wanted to see as many of the geysers as possible in our limited time.

This is the first view of the terraces.

So colorful on the one side and then dead looking on the other.

Then it starts to get interesting.

The colors were incredible and looked like liquid gold coming out of the ground. Apparently it is bacteria that causes the different hues.

As you follow the boardwalk through the fragile area it becomes more impressive.

Close ups don't really show how beautiful the formations are. It is like coral under a thin film of water, the birth of future terraces. 

Flowing rivers of blue and gold and white. Beautiful.

Vegetation doesn't have much of a chance in some spots but I was actually surprised how much was growing the in area of the pools.

Terraces that are no longer flowing. Everything is constantly changing do to collapse either from weight or earthquakes. They don't look very pretty once the water and steam is gone.

A former vent .

Trees that have died still contribute by way of their skeletal beauty.

Back in the car and heading south. There was a huge rock slide area along the way. Since the trees had taken hold again, it must have happened a long time ago.

A much larger herd of bison on the road to Old Faithful

You can see the edge of our car at the bottom of the picture which shows you how close they get.
Stay in your car though!!

A calf, daddy is kissing up to mommy at the left.

We bypassed these Roaring Hills early in the morning when it was quite cool and there was steam shooting out of vents all over the place. By the time we came back down it had warmed up and there was only one or two visible vents steaming.

Guess what, another herd. They are all over the place.

A dead forest area.

What a surprise to see this little guy in the water that was flowing away from the geysers! 

Guess where the edge of the water is. What I don't understand is if it is fatal to trees how does that little snake survive in it.

More golds and blues and corals and reds!

Finally some geysers and these are not every hour or so but constant.

Stay on the boardwalks if you don't want to be boiled or worse.

The following pictures need no comments, their beauty says it all. I have never put so many pictures in my blogs but I simply couldn't pick and choose which to show and which to delete.

Bubbling Mud Pots. What fun.

Down by Old Faithful. We  heard that it was to blow in 45 minutes so walked around to see the rest of the geysers. The smaller ones were more active than the big boy who after 45 minutes still took another 45 to blow. As Old F would start steaming and look promising all the other geysers would blow and that would stop the action of the main attraction. I hope to put some video of it in at a later date as pictures don't really capture the power of the eruption.

This is Old Faithful at rest. Not very impressive.

A cone formation.

The video below is of the above geysers. They are filmed from a long distance so up closer would look more impressive but I thought they put on a pretty good show. Their spewing was enough to delay the eruption of Old Faithful as it had a few attempts which always failed when these geysers erupted                                                                                                                                                

The Old guy is getting a bit more active now but it's all a ruse to get people running to see the show. Then they get to wait half an hour or more. It's very theatrical with build up, the main event, the climax and applause. Do check the projected times for it to happen though and get a seat fifteen minutes ahead of time instead of waiting forever. I will try hard to get the video in as soon as possible.

In the meantime here are my still photos of the eruption. There was probably a thousand people sitting around outside waiting for it and many more inside the buildings.

Video is finally uploaded. Click on the box in the lower right hand corner to enlarge. 

Time to leave and on the way out there were some good views of the edge of the caldera that rings Yellowstone. The collapse took place a long time ago but must have been massive as it's a long way up to the top.                                                                                                                                         

 It doesn't seem like you are driving in the middle of an active volcano but all the time, wherever you are in the park that is exactly what you are doing.

We were now anxious to get out of the park since it was getting late in the day and we had a long way to go before we found a place to spend the night. Suddenly we were stopped in a long line of traffic and assumed that there were either animals to take pictures of or a traffic accident.Finally there was movement and the reason for the delay came into view. This bad boy was slowly making his way down the road, checking out each car as if looking for someone to pick a fight with.

The way he turned in towards us and made eye contact made us think he'd picked us for a rumble but fortunately he ambled on by and we were able to continue our journey. A memorable incident for our last moments in the park.