Taking photos on vacation is one of my most favorite things to do. I’m learning patience when taking shots. (I could be the most impatient person on the planet!) Basically, if I don’t take time I’ll end up with loads that are blurry or slightly off centre or just not right. While I’m not stellar, I do enjoy taking as many shots as I can. They’re getting better–trust me! (Besides, I didn’t take photos professionally for 15 years of my life like Jon did.)
Luckily, Yellowstone is a living photo shoot. Everything is moving and colourful. From the massive hillsides of burnt trees, right down to the small things like stripes of cyanobacteria in water, or steaming blue pools of water, there were so many things to take photos of.
The park covers 8980km² which is about 2.2 million acres. In 1988 almost 800,000 acres burned. Thousands of fire fighters and 380 million litres of fire retardant were used for one of the largest fire fighting efforts ever, and still it was Mother Nature that eventually squelched the fire with fall rain and snow.
Yellowstone, and the National Park Services have a natural burn policy–as long as a fire is caused by nature (ie: lightening) and isn’t threatening human life, park structures, natural resources or areas of cultural importance the fire is allowed to burn. Obviously fire is important to the ecosystems of the park; I can appreciate that. Allowing 36% of the park to burn in 1988 certainly affected the landscape we saw. One can’t help but wonder what the deforested areas would have looked like had there been no mass fire. It isn’t as though we’re strangers to the scorched earth landscape left behind by wild fires–BC is always on fire. Always. On the positive side, the 20 year old trees appear to be thriving and green where they’re growing back.
Another tree oddity on Cooking Hillside–“Shake then Bake”. From one of the sign posts: “Covered by dense forest until 1978, this hillside changed dramatically after a swarm of earthquakes struck the area. In spite of being jolted again and again, the trees remained standing, but met their demise soon afterward when ground temperatures soared to 200°F or 94°C! Roots sizzled in the super-heated soil and trees toppled over one by one as steam rose eerily between the branches.”
Some more park facts for you:
Yellowstone Lake is one of the largest high altitude lakes in North America at 2557m above Sea Level. (Or, 7733 feet.) Yellowstone Caldera is the largest super volcano in North America. We crossed the continental divide several times while in the park. Most of the park is in Wyoming, but also there’s 3% in Montana and 1% in Idaho. This Map shows the Caldera, the Continental Divide as well as all the roads and other normal map components. It is almost identical to the one given out at the park entrance.
Moving from flora to fauna, in 1926 Wolves were nearly exterminated in the park. By the 1970’s the Wolf was on the US endangered species list. In 1995, and 1996 there was a successful Wolf reintroduction program. To promote bio-diversity, 32 wolves were imported to Yellowstone from BC and Alberta. Word is that the wolves “were back” when we were in the park. Loads of people with spotting scopes were at pullouts in the Lamar Valley. One couple we ran into (who said we had Canadian accents, and that they aspire to be Canadian because “we’re so civilized”–so funny!) had been successful in their viewing that morning. They have lived near the park all their lives, and were super excited to share information with us.
Once they had been watching a small wolf pack for days (can’t remember the pack name, but they knew exactly who they were), they saw the wolves take down a bull Elk, and then a Grizzly came and stole the carcass. They said they whole thing went on for about 3 days until loads of people showed up with scopes and binoculars to watch. We did not see anything even close to that, but then again, we didn’t have days to sit in one spot in hopes of seeing something with binoculars.
I did manage to spot some things with my eagle eyes, and thanks to my new camera I did get photos. These shots were taken from super far away, but you still get the gist. ps: I love the little goat peeking out from his leafy snack a top a cliff in the middle of nowhere.
We arrived about 15 minutes before an eruption of Yellowstone’s famous Old Faithful. Eruptions occur anywhere from 65 to 91 minutes apart with a 10 or so minute window either way, so we were lucky we didn’t really have to wait. Word is that if the eruption lasts less than 2.5 minutes the next one will be in 65 minutes or so, and if the eruption is longer than 2.5 minutes the next one will be in about 90 minutes. So clever those scientists making a schedule for everyone!
Old Faithful is totally the “Mona Lisa” of the Yellowstone. You can’t really visit without seeing it, but it isn’t the most beautiful feature. And, it is by far the most touristed. There were hundreds of people waiting to see the show–half probably on bus trips to see one or two things in the park and then off to their next destination. Oddly, when we were getting our info at the Yellowstone Association, the two guys who were behind us said, “We have 3 hours–what do we see?” How about a whole lot of nothing!
Surprisingly, even though it is most famous, Old Faithful isn’t the highest or largest geyser in the park. Steamboat Geyser (video in previous entry) takes that title. However, unlike Old Faithful, Steamboat is unpredictable with major eruptions from 4 days to 50 years apart. Old Faithful is usually around 145 feet high, whereas Steamboat has been up to 300 feet high. Last huge Steamboat Geyser eruption was in May 2005.
Here are the Old Faithful photos. Imagine you have a flip book.
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I’m sure the Old Faithful Inn and Visitor Info Centre go through periods of boredom and super busy insanity every 45 to 91 minutes. There was mass exodus once the eruption was over. Obviously, it was worth seeing, but not the most spectacular thing we saw in the park.
There is so much to see in the park that is isn’t funny. At each turn of the roadway there is another rock formation, another geothermal feature or another site to see. From Mammoth Hot Springs through to Madison on the 57km section there was a lot going on.
Sheepeater Cliff is a formation of basalt columns that formed over 500,000 years ago. When the lava cooled it formed the columnar joints. You don’t see rock like this just anywhere. There are also Obsidian Cliffs (that we weren’t able to stop for photos at the time) that has loads of actual black obsidian rock all shiny and glistening in the sun, again formed that way when that lava cooled.
Sheepeater Cliff
We stopped at Roaring Mountain which is rather bizarre. The steam vents in the mountain are sometimes barely heard, and at other times they create a roaring sound that can be heard several miles away. Sadly, the photos just look like a lump of normal mountain, so they’re not included.
Emerald Spring
As we continued South, we ended up at Emerald Spring and Steamboat Geyser. Emerald Spring is almost 30ft deep. The green colour is due to the high sulphur content. It smells bad, but is quite pretty. Again, be thankful you can’t smell the photo.
Steamboat Geyser was the first actual geyser we saw in the park. I took a little video that would be much better sans commentary provided by the couple beside me that would not stop talking. The next leg of the trip was from Madison to Old Faithful. Ooooo, be excited for upcoming entries!
When I set out on vacation, I don’t normally have a list of animals I want to see. I’ve seen several Yellowstone animals–deer, mountain sheep, bears, elk, coyotes, eagles etc, just from traveling and living in BC, so it wasn’t as if we’re coming from somewhere where these animals don’t exist. The one thing I was most excited to see in Yellowstone was definitely Buffalo, perhaps even more than Old Faithful! Second on the list – Antelope. And, of course, we’d take a Grizzly or two just for good measure! Who wouldn’t?
Approximately 200 visitors a year are gored by buffalo. That’s one every two days. There are ample warnings to “Stay Safe! Stay Away!” And, Elk will charge people, and damage vehicles. Google it up, you’ll find video for sure.
The Yellowstone Association near the North Entrance to the park has an electronic map that tracks where animals have been recently sited. While there, we asked the staff for some tips, best viewing locations etc, and luckily we did see a lot of animals. However, not one single bear, and not one single antelope. At least the buffalo were everywhere. I like them as much as I like Llamas.
On the drive from Yellowstone through to Cody we saw thousands of Pronghorn Antelope. They were just roaming around farmer’s fields. The irony is that the second time we visited the Yellowstone Association we asked if there were recent Pronghorn sitings, and if they were mapped. Apparently the Pronghorn are spotted so frequently through out the park that they aren’t even tracked. There is even a one way dirt road that is basically where your guaranteed to see them–nope, not even one. And, we were out at all times of day, all over the park.
ps: I love my new camera. The zoom is awesome, but the digital zoom makes for some fuzzy photos. Most turned out ok, and I had been forewarned that I wouldn’t like the digital zoom results.
Adventures of a couple seeing the world 2 weeks at a time.
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