After enjoying a mushroom omelet we took off for
Yellowstone, which we have visited three times before. Entering from the west, we took some
different roads in the park and saw some different areas that we had never seen
in our previous visits. We also saw the
well-known ones that everyone comes to see.
Yellowstone, the first National Park was established in
1872. It is the world’s oldest and
perhaps the most famous and most visited national park.
Many millions of years ago huge volcanic eruptions
occurred here. The latest spewed out 240
cubic miles of debris. The central part of what is now the park collapsed,
forming a 30x45 mile caldera or basin.
The magmatic heat powering those eruptions still powers the park’s
geysers, hot springs, fumaroles and mudpots.
The park has 150 geysers and the bubbling mud pools, hissing fumaroles,
and hot springs act as pressure valves, releasing the heat and steam that build
up below the ground. Together they make
up the world’s largest geothermal system (75% of the earth’s geysers are found
here!) New Zealand and Iceland are known
for geysers, but nowhere are there as many as in Yellowstone, and we saw many
of them today.
Our first off-the-main-road adventure was Firehole Canyon
where we saw beautiful water falls. There
was even a swimming hole where there were quite a few people trying it
out! Everywhere in the park, you have to
be lucky to find parking. Otherwise you
are out of luck and don’t get to see much.
You can see geysers from quite a distance. Up close some are VERY small, some are
huge. Some you can’t see down at all and
others you can see are very, very deep. Sometimes
you could see the bubbles forming and rising if the geyser was clear, and then
it would ‘pop’ at the surface.
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| Waiting for Old Faithful with a few of our friends |
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| Thar she blows |
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