We slept in today! I slept until about 7 and read for awhile. Chris got up a little after me. We took our time, ran the generator, made coffee, eggs and bacon on our Coleman grill from Uncle Kenny, Aunty Karla and the girls-works great :)
We enjoyed the cool weather and lack of humidity. The nights have been about 45 for the low and days get up to 75-80 with zero humidity. I've been able to wear sweatpants and a sweatshirt by the campfire at night. I could live in this type of weather!
Chris and I left around 11 to take a drive around part of the loop in Yellowstone. Chris figured this would be the best way to see the park since we didn't have a lot of time. Our first stop was at the Canyon area in Yellowstone where we checked out the gift shop and bought a coffee maker for the campfire. We saw more buffalo and even a huge bull elk! We learned the difference between buffalo and bison, too. They are one in the same but bison is the scientific term and buffalo is the layman term. We saw ground squirrels, too. We stopped again at Yellowstone Lake and ate lunch in their cafeteria where we could look out over the lake.
Our next stop was Old Faithful again. We went to the Visitor’s Center and read about the underlying volcano and how the geysers and hot springs formed. There seems to be a huge event every ½ million years in the Yellowstone area. The next “event” should occur within the next 10,000 years, if the trend continues. There was a massive volcano near Yellowstone 640,000 years ago. When the volcano erupted, it spewed magma over an enormous area. The ground at the center of Yellowstone collapsed and fell on top of the molten lava. The heat has been trying to escape for 640,000 years and has created all these hot springs, hot basins, vent holes and geysers to help release the heat underground. I had no idea something could stay hot for so long.
We got to see OF erupt again and then we drove around the Geyser Country section of the park. We saw many, many different geysers, hot springs and basins. Some were crystal blue-like sapphire and some were more yellow/orange from the microbes/minerals in the area. The water is over 200+ degrees in certain areas. I wanted to see the Paint Pots because I thought the name was cool. The site was pretty neat. It looked like a bunch of mud gurgling and bubbling and the minerals created some different colors around the edge. The strangest thing we experienced took place as we walked up to Yellowstone’s largest spring which was like a big lake(Prismatic Spring). There was a large amount of mist coming off the lake and it surrounded you and felt like you were in a sauna. As soon as you got through that section of mist, you were smacked with the cool mountain air. When you got through the cool patch, it was right back into the steam bath…very, very strange! We also passed a crevice (Red Sprouter)that was steaming and making a noise like a freight train, or, as Chris said, it sounded like a gas leak he experienced on a call one time :-)
Around 7, we got back to our campsite. We made pie-iron pizzas(my favorite) on the campfire. We sat out by the campfire and drank a couple Salmon Fly beers before packing up and heading to bed!
When you get to the pictures below, the name of the site comes after the pictures!
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