e -Yellowstone - take two

 

Today found us both bleary eyed and rather on the tired side........... Allie was bugged about something during the night and kept on running around the bed.  She would get up on my head and literally walk all the way down me to my toes and then do the same on Frank.  Yes, I did give some serious thought to grabbing them, my purse, Frank and getting the heck out of this volcano in the middle of the night.......... but if it blows - well, we would not be far enough away no matter where we could get to.   Then she settled down and every now and again just whined while looking out of the window.  I was rather unnerving, to say the least - she never ever behaves like this.  At all.  She was fine all day today and is now sleeping peacefully.  Hopefully she stays like this.  

We headed up north to the northern loop of Yellowstone today - and again it was simply wonderful.  I find it difficult to keep describing this place as there are just not enough different words - awesome, amazing, wonderful, beautiful all keep on coming back but simply don't tell the full story.  We stopped at multiple waterfalls today - each one totally different and totally...........there we go - pick a word from above...........  They take my breath away and bring a deep peace that things really do just go on and on and on.........that there really is no power in a human over nature, and nature, after all is said and done, totally rules!  Just watch a buffalo leading a pack of cars down the road and there is even less doubt of this!

There are some drives off the main road that are little more than a trail that has been paved just wide enough for one car and no rails on the edge.  I found myself leaning out of the window, happily clicking way and shutting my mind to the fact that Frank was hugging the edge to give me the best view possible!  It's different looking at something through the camera lens and once or twice I looked waaaaay down without the 'protection' of the camera and ............well, the camera quickly got attached to my eye again!  

There are so many different things to see here.  Almost any type of scenery is somewhere around....... the geysers and vents, the sulphur bubbling and the colors are just stupendous (new word!)  We stopped at one small 'noxious puddle' that really stank like double rotten eggs. (This is where I took you, Kay;)  I am sure one could quite easily get really ill from breathing too much of that in, it sure started the gagging reflex in me.  Much of the area is on 'thin crust' with many a warning  about stepping off the marked trails.  It really is quite something to stand next to a hole in the ground that is sending out bubbling water, or stinking steam and think that right there, at my feet, is a hole that goes down further than I want to think about.  And there might just be another right under my feet!  The sounds of these holes boiling and steaming is quite something too - standing in total quietness and just listening to that, well, it somehow reaches deep inside and makes one take a step or three backwards.  It's a hissing, spitting "don't come closer" sound.  We listened.

The signs around here read in part:  In thermal areas the ground may be only a thin crust above boiling hot springs or scalding mud.  There is no way to guess a safe path:  new hazards can bubble up overnight, and some pools are acid enough to burn through boots.  More than a dozen people have been scalded to death and hundreds badly burned and scarred.

Again, we happily stayed behind any and all signs posted.

We stopped at Mammoth Springs which is simply amazing - there is an incredible build up of minerals and sulphur and a continual bubbling and gurgling of water and steam. It's been going on for a very, very long time and just looking at how it slowly creeps and lays claim to the land around it, puts much in perspective about Mother Nature.  

Around some of the thermal holes (and I am not sure I am using the correct term) its all crystal white, around others there are the most amazing colors all mixed in - orange, pink, yellow, ochre and many more - all with this bubbling water running over it all the time, carrying more and more stuff out from the center of the earth..... That means that there are big holes being left under our feet too?  Ok - lets leave that thought for once we are out of here!  Some of these thermal pools create huge build ups around them that stand like mini hills all over.  Mammoth Springs is an extreme example of this and I only realized too late what I was looking at so have no photo of what it looks like from ground level.

The picture of buffalo grazing in huge herds in beautiful green valleys with the Yellowstone River behind them and thermal vents venting away around them in competition with the steam from their nostrils, is such a typical Yellowstone image and is quite humbling to see.  There is one particular valley like this just north of this campground and it catches both the morning and evening sun in a way that brings out a good many tripods and always a bottle-necked road.

Even after doing both the main loops of this place, and stopping at almost every available pull-off, we know that we have not seen even a small percentage of what the area has to offer.  This is one of those places that I would love to fly over in a small airplane one day.  Tomorrow, Thursday, we are off the see The Grand Teton National Park and then on Friday we will pack up our "Wheelie House" (thanks Debs!  lol) and head out of the West Entrance of Yellowstone and north into Montana.  Send hopeful thoughts that the weather stays or gets clear and that those northern lights fly!

love and light

Annie

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