Cell phone service is limited and wifi is practically non-extistant at Yellowstone. With the exception of being able to write a blog post, we were ok with that. Its nice to just not have to worry about checking your phone or social media because there is “No Service” throughout most of the park. So for two days we hung out with our friend Kelli who took drove us all over and made sure we didn’t miss a thing.
The first thing we did was drive up to Canyon to meet her for breakfast on Thursday. On there way there (and several other times throughout our stay in Yellowstone) we got caught in a Bison jam they walk along and into the road way. And they are not moving! You have to respect how huge and powerful they are, yet they are cute! Danielle got giddy every time we saw one, especially when they were close to the car.
Thursday was a day full of hot springs, geysers, wolves and bears! Our first stop was at the Artist Paint pots. These are stinky little holes in the earth that have beautiful colors and shapes.
We headed out of the West entrance not before we stopped to see another little waterfall. Then we proceeded out of the park into the town of West Yellowstone, MT. We headed there to check out the Grizzly & Wolf Discovery Center. This place has wolves, bears, and raptors that were injured or for some reason can no longer survive in the wild. It was not a zoo, you could tell that this was more of a refuge for these animals. They have two packs of wolves and a center staging area where they let bears out on a rotating basis. While we were there we got to see “Sam” a 1,000 pound bear. He was huge and his ears were adorable.
They also had some large birds of prey (golden eagle, bald eagle, horned owl, etc). They were cool to see but none of them spread their wings while we were there. The center is also adding an otter area which should be done in the next 5 years. They also had a little ground squirrel area that was new. The money from your ticket and gift shop sales go to help run the center, along with donations. It was a great place to visit.
Back to Yellowstone we went to continue our hot spring and geyser tour. We headed to the Midway geyser basin. This is where the Grand Prismatic is. It is a huge hot spring/pool that has just amazing colors, lots of steam, and expands so far. You often see this on postcards and prints. The only down size is you really just get to see it eye level, but you can walk all around it and the surrounding area. It was also cool to see bison footprints in the area. This water and bacteria is way too harmful for humans, yet the animals don’t seem to mind it!
Next we headed over to the iconic Old Faithful. They have a sign with when the next eruption should be, give or take 10 minutes. We were only about 20 minutes away from the next eruption so we got a spot. It was only about 4 or 5 minutes off from the predicted time, but Old Faithful likes to trick you. It bubbles up a little, and then a little more, and then finally the big eruption. It was pretty cool to see it in person, however you just can’t get very close to it.
After the eruption we were hungry so we headed inside of the Old Faithful Lodge to eat. We ended up going to the deli/snack area but the lodge itself was awesome.
After we ate we walked the geyser trail (maybe 2.5 miles round trip) to see more hot springs and geysers in the Old Faithful area. The highlight was the Morning Glory pool at the end of the trail. Like the Grand Prismatic, it has beautiful colors. But since it was small enough you could see the entire thing and it was like looking into the center of the earth (or so I would imagine).
On the way back we got to see the Grand Geyser erupt. It seemed to last longer than Old Faithful and since you get closer to it also, it made for a great experience.
We started to make our way back towards Canyon and stopped at a few things along the way. Dragons Mouth Spring was a cave like structure that bubbled and boiled water out of what might look like a Dragon’s mouth. This was close to Mud Volcano, which as the name accurately describes, was like a volcano erupting big bubbles of mud.
The night ended with the drive back to our camp site with a view of some elk along the way. Friday we are planning a hike and exploring more of Yellowstone. Its so big and there is a little bit of everything for everyone, however this is the only park we have found that has all of the geyser and hot spring activity. So we were defiantly glad to get the opportunity to check about all of those!
Dietz Summer Road Trip 