Yellowstone Lake
The Yellowstone lake is vast, and we knew we wouldn’t be able to see it all on our schedule, so we targeted “West Thumb”. As we drove to the lake we went up in elevation and the air became cooler, we even saw patches of snow in areas of shade. As soon as the mountains started making an appearance we knew we were close. We arrived at the lake and needed our coats. This was encouraging; we had been trying to escape the heat of Texas the whole time. West Thumb was back-dropped by snow capped mountains and pine trees, the view was nothing less than spectacular.
I wanted to stay, I wanted to kayak! Yes! They had kayaking on the lake. Note to self, remember to stay longer. Though it was very windy again today and not the best conditions for getting out on the water, I still would have. The water, by the way, is crystal clear, and if I had a cup, probably would have tasted it. Walking back to the car we saw our first Yellowstone Park Ranger. Seriously, they are as scarce as big foot out here!
The Grand Tetons
Had I known, had I only known that The Grand Tetons were so magnificent I would have allotted more time. I couldn’t take my eyes off them, they were so amazing. The weather wasn’t the best for taking pictures; some clouds had moved in and were obscuring the tops of the three namesakes. We finally found a place to pull in called North Jenny Lake Junction. Lo and behold ANOTHER park ranger! We couldn’t believe it! This ranger was showing skins/furs from the animals native to this area and answering questions about the park. My parents started talking to him and found out that this time last year there was still four feet of snow on the ground! Glad we came this year. The current weather was delightful in my opinion, though as I mentioned before, not great for pictures of mountains. The temperature was around 68°F, breezy with light drizzle. Loved it!
You know those moments when you know you’ve stayed longer than you meant to but really don’t want to leave, this was one of those moments. The air here is different, probably because it’s clean. I kept taking deep breaths, not wanting it to end, not wanting to ever forget how the air smelled fresh and clean. “NERD ALERT” It reminded me of a character in the Lord of the Rings trilogy, Treebeard, and he was an Int or a living tree. He told a story about an area of his forest where he could spend a week just breathing, I understood.
I didn't want to stop taking pictures, I couldn’t stop enjoying the view, I couldn’t stop taking those deep breaths of clean mountain air. I wanted to stay, I wanted to stay forever!
We headed for the park exit; my dad fared the worst having to keep his eye on the road, mine was fixed on the mountains. One last stop before we left was the Visitor Center. I have a tradition of buying pins from places I visit and affixing them to a NASA hat I got when I was a boy. While leaving the Visitor Center something familiar caught my eye. It was a Cooperative Observer site, maintained by NWS Riverton. I had to detour and check it out.
On the far left you have the 8-in rain gauge; the funnel is removed when snow is expected. In the middle is the Cotton Region Shelter. This houses the Max/Min thermometers, and possible a soil thermometer. Finally, the far right you can see the snow stick. This made me stop and rethink wanting to live here. If the stick is that tall it means they need it to be that tall so they can see it...when it snows...a lot!
Wyoming
I learned an important photography lesson while on this trip. When shooting from a moving vehicle, because you really want to get to your destination and don't want to stop, open your aperture as much as possible and crank up the shutter speed to at least 1/600 sec. They may require additional post-editing to correct for being underexposed, but you’ll at least have a good shot. Here’s two examples. The first is taken at 1/200 sec, and as you can see there is still motion blur at the bottom. The second was taken at 1/800 sec, and has no blur. If you have the sunlight, use it!
The road through Wyoming goes on and on and on and on and on! We learned a few thing on our journey. 1: The northwestern portion is most likely the prettiest it’s going to get. and 2: They have no trees anywhere else!! This made for an uneventful trip to Rawlins. Mile after mile we’d see these fences that were perpendicular to the highway. Turns out, when they received the mountains of snow every year, these fences prevent the snow from being blown by the wind and becoming hazardous to the roadway. I suppose they act like sand bars for the north. Finally, we made it to Rawlins, comforted by the fact that Colorado was less than a days drive away.
For more photos of The Grand Tetons Visit my Google+ Photo Album The Grand Tetons
For more photos of Yellowstone visit Yellowstone!
When you visit Yellowstone it’s said that visitors often see less than 1% of the park, and I believe it; Yellowstone is so large you can fit New Jersey and Rhode Island inside its borders with room to spare! This excited me since there would always be plenty to see, but I was saddened by the lack of time I had to do it.
At the entrance of the National Park my excitement was palpable; I’d wanted to visit this park for some time now and couldn’t believe I was here. With my parents and my trusty gnome Fiddlesticks, we commenced our journey.
We entered through the western gate, as this is the closest to Ol Faithful. Unfortunately, back in the late 1980s a forest fire ravaged over 2500 acres and the devastation was still around to be seen. Dead and rotting wood just lying around, whole trees scattered here and there waiting for time to finally remove the memory of them. Yet amid the ruin of this once lofty portion of Yellowstone, beauty could be seen. Like a child on Christmas morning, Creation was peaking through the rubble. Pine trees, some no higher than my knee, others cresting ten feet, were making a mad dash for the Sun. Though dispossessed of this catastrophe would have be best, seeing the transition from death to life hits rather close to home for Christians.
The river, of course, faired much better as it simply continued to snake through this beautiful park, causing its occupants to gaze in wonder. Pulling back and forth across the landscape, we found it difficult to stop taking pictures whenever the river made an appearance. One of our unmet goals was to catch a fisherman in his natural habitat, gleaning the fruit of this river. Then there was the sound, THE SOUND, it’s amazing. Rushing water, babbling water, lazy water, had I days on end to sit and listen it would not be enough to satiate my soul of this ballad.
The geysers seem to be everywhere, and if you’ve never seen one before, you just can’t take your eyes off them. The first one we stopped at was Lower Geyser Basin; one of the smaller geysers but still cool to see. A major problem we ran into was the 30-40 mph winds. I never thought I would feel vulnerable and unstable on a 5 foot wide deck, but I did that day! It was nerve racking to say the least, you did not want to fall into that slime! Though, the wind interacting with the geyser made for cool pictures.
Midway Geyser Basin was the largest geyser in the world, with eruptions up to 300ft. That was back in 1880 and did not erupt again until 1985, only reaching heights of 20-30 ft. It was at this geyser that we noticed the spike in humidity. This large pond of steaming water brought the Relative Humidity from 20% to 60%, and constantly fogged up my glasses, not to mention stunk up the place with the sulfur. We thought, at first, that the wind would be an irritant, but it turns out that the high winds swept most of the steam away from the hot springs, revealing the most amazing blue, cavernous well you’ve ever seen.
Finally, we arrive at THE geyser to see, Ol Faithful. Ol Faithful goes off about every 45 to 90 min. They say ‘about’ because it does sputter before it really gets cranking. You’ll know when the geyser is within 20 min of going off; the crowd multiplies from about 30 people to over 100. We got there early enough to get a good seat. What’s more a little chipmunk trotted over and started nibbling on flowers. This little guy became the center of attention, they are quite cute. And then it happened, the geyser started sputtering and within seconds shot over 150 ft. We were there late in the day and the sun was at the perfect angle, lighting the stream of water for a great dramatic effect.
After the great geyser went off, my parents and I wondered around to see the other smaller geysers in the area. There seems to be hundreds if not thousands of these small hot springs just bubbling up everywhere. After awhile you feel like once you’ve seen one hot spring you’ve seen them all, so we headed back. On our return trip we did get some good shots of the river and drift wood, and general landscape, though sadly no otters.
There are several species of animals in Yellowstone, chief among them, or at least the most popular, are the bison. On our way back to the hotel the traffic came to a halt for no apparent reason, little did we know this was code for: there’s something to take a picture of and everyone is stopping to do so. It seems a bison was wondering across the road destination: unknown, speed: that of a turtle! These creatures, so fierce in appearance, are passive in nature. We watched in amazement as the bison strode right next to a vehicle without even a hint of aggression. Don’t let that fool you, visitors are strongly discouraged from interacting with these great beasts.
I you do get a chance to visit Yellowstone make sure to drive around at sunset. The orange light will catch the steam off the hot springs making for some great photography.
What I remember most from day 1 are the colors, the deep greens, and the blue of the geysers and pools. You need at least a week or two to really enjoy that 1% of Yellowstone.
