Lucky Bastard Adventures: A day in the park.

I finally got to visit Yellowstone National Park, yippee and it was good. The weather was near perfect, bright clear blue sky, virtually no wind, bright sunshine and virtually no other tourists. It is the off season now and things are closing down, if they haven't already. There is virtually no accommodation in the Park, all closed and very limited anything else open. Even some of the major roads are closed and more will close over the next few weeks. Yellowstone has two seasons, Summer (Jun to Sept) and Winter (Dec to Mar). In the breaks between seasons, most businesses or park operations simple close. It is the same for the towns that surround Yellowstone.

Today we drove lots of miles and tried to see a lot without trying to see everything. We left West Yellowstone about 9.30 and there was still a little ice about from the night before. This caused a little bit of fine fog to lift from the rivers and the roads. By 10.30 it was almost all gone and it was Blue sky and sunshine. We drove past several geothermal areas and stopped at some and walked around and at others we only had a quick 5min stop. We wanted to get to Old faithful and have a look as the road beyond Old Faithful that meets up with the main North South Road was closed, so we knew we would have to back track and do a loop of about an extra 80 mile to get back onto the road south to Jackson, where we had accommodation booked for tonight. All up about a 300 mile trip and in Yellowstone Park, the max speed limit is 45mph and often only 25 mph. With stops and Bison blocking the road occasionally, we knew it would take nearly all day. Which it did as we got to Jackson about 5.30pm.

When we got to Old Faithful, about 11.30 pm, we are told it goes off about every 90 mins and the next was due at 12.31pm +/- 10 min. Sure enough at about 12.29 it started to gush and lasted about 5 mins. It lives up to it's name of Old faithful.

The other interesting thing is that both Joy and were feeling a little off yesterday and we now realise it is the altitude, last night it was over 2000 m and tonight is bit less and most of the park today was probably a bit higher. You certainly feel it when you walk up stairs. I guess my conditioning in Tibet has worn off. I also learnt today at the Visitor centre at Old Faithful that the huge Magma chamber that sits under the Park is only a few mile down, given that the whole place is about 2km above sea level, the Magma chamber would nearly be at sea level or just below it. That would be a scary thought if the Park was at a lower altitude.

Here are lots of Pics and a few Vids. I did cut them down considerably and left out Joys pics altogether.

Red Sprouter ( a real fizzy one)