Monday, September 28, 2015

Yellowstone - Part 2

The largest thermal plain in the world.  Think about that.  There are over 500 geysers, hot springs and mud pots in Yellowstone.  Just about every where you look there is steam coming up out of the ground.  It is a little spooky, truth be told.


We decided to start out at Biscuit Basin.  On the map it looks about 5 minutes away, but Suri says it is about 48 minutes from our current location.  And who is bound to be right.  Well my advice is turn Suri off and stop listenting to her.  We drove 48 minutes, right out of the park and into a little town.  We got out of our cars and looked at each other - asking did anyone see any sign?  WTF.  Well up side, great t-shirt shop that is closing for the winter and everything is on sale.  So after shopping we start back into the park to have lunch at a spot Christine has picked out.  


A lovely spot among many lovely spots.

With that said, as much as I'm showing and talking about there is so much more than I can put into this blog.  So if I forget anything (Cheryl, Mare, Fred & Christine) it is not because I don't think it is important or fun or that I forgot it, I just can't fit it all in.

After a lovely lunch, we part ways with the very fit Fred and Christine and head out to explore some more of the park.

One place we stopped was Kimball Falls


This was a great waterfall.  I'd like you to take a real close look at this photo.  In the bottom right corner you can see a little yellow dot.  That little dot is a man, well that is kind of weird.  How did he get down there?  Yeah, weird.  But what was weirder?  The first people I saw down there were a woman and a young child.  WTF???  Really???  I mean look at the picture.  How did they get down there?  Seems they hiked down there with the kid in a backpack carrier.  As we stood there and watched them they started back out.  They went up, they went down.  The woman, who looked pregnant was having a very difficult time climbing over trees and around rocks.  The guy had the kid in the backpack and kept trying to find the best way out.  Could not believe what we were watching.  Now maybe the guy and the woman were very experienced hikers, but with a damn baby on your back?  One false move and it is lights out for the little kid.  We watched, they looked like they were in trouble, we watched some more and they finally came back down to the river below the falls and crossed over the river and were able to walk around the corner and out of sight.  Maybe the going got easier?  Maybe eventually they could come to a place and be able to get up off the river bed?  Maybe someday they will grow a damn brain.  We wondered what to do as they struggled.  Call the ranger?  How??  No signal.  We just hoped for the best and checked every car parked on the side of the road for a baby seat.  But, would people that would put their child at risk in a climb like this have a baby seat?  

Next up Firehole Lake Drive where we happed upon the White Dome


We had seen it from a distance just sitting there with some steam coming off it.  We walked up and took some pictures and I turned around to look at something else and I heard a noise and thought, what is that?



Well, that is what it was.  White Dome erupting!  It was very cool.  Seems it does something every half an hour or so.  Sometimes more, sometimes less.  I do wonder how can they keep doing this?  

Fantastic!

We stopped at the paint pots where we saw mud boiling, water so blue it did not seem real.

We saw this:

 
and this


You can start making up your own words because I am running out of them.

It was all other-worldly and again I kept wondering when a big hole was going to open up and swallow us or at least steam clean us.

More next them.



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