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For our second consecutive day trip outside of the Yellowstone park boundaries we headed south this time for another of Wyoming's national parks, in fact its only other one, Yellowstone's little sister, the buxom Grand Teton National Park. Technically separated by 10 miles entrance to entrance, the two parks are connected by a narrow strip managed by the National Park Service to bring about a sense of continuity, since both national parks and the surrounding forest parks form the gestalt Greater Yellowstone Ecosystem.

At least a quarter of the size of its older sibling, Grand Teton National Park was established in 1929, breaking with the age old American tradition of putting big business first, in recognition of the need for further protection of the surrounding environment. It was named after the tallest peak of the Teton Range, a sub-range of the Rockies, a mountain range that extends 3,000 miles from Alaska through British Columbia in Canada to New Mexico, southwestern United States. The Teton range takes its name from the tallest peak in the area at 4,200m (13,800ft), Grand Teton. Early French-Canadian voyagers exploring the region named the three neighbouring peaks overlooking Jenny Lake "les Trois Tétons", meaning the Three Nipples, owing to their apparent breast shape. I don't quite see it myself. Exploring in the nineteenth century must've been very lonely.

A few hours after setting off we reached our destination of the east shore boat dock alongside Jenny Lake in Jackson Hole. Standing on the bank of the lake looking over at the three towering Tetons was one of those moments when you get caught up and, for an instant at least, truly believe that this is all you need from life, to be with your friends and loved ones by the side of a gorgeous lake in the pristine forested countryside surrounded by thriving wildlife under the watchful eye of the dramatic Rocky Mountains.

We set off on a trail that would take us north around the lake to the mountains over a couple of hours. Despite this being a very popular walk, many people have seen grizzly bears along the trail, but sadly the best we saw were a load of chipmunks. We met a few fellow hikers along the way but the further from the start of the trail we got the more thickly forested it became and the less people we saw. At the northern most tip of the lake, where the mountains start to dramatically leap from the ground, the neighbouring String Lake feeds into Jenny Lake via a small river that we had to cross to continue the trail. A few felled trees, akin to a beaver's dam, conveniently linked the two sides of the river just past its mouth in the forest. We were unsure of the structural integrity of such a makeshift bridge, so while the others looked for an alternate way across I tested it to see how easy it would be, successfully too. However, when they returned we all decided that, since our campsite was a few hours drive away, and we were at least a couple more hours walk from the car, we should probably head back.

A short day compared to the others we'd spent in Wyoming and Montana, but after a week of hiking in the mountains and whitewater rafting, we felt we deserved a more relaxing day. We set our alarms for the crack of dawn and got an early night, for in the early hours of the morning on our last full day in Yellowstone we were on the lookout for one of the park's most elusive citizens, the grey wolf.

Wolves were completely wiped out in Yellowstone for 69 years. The wolves' success had led them further and further away from the park and they became a thorn in the side for cattle ranchers and natural gas miners, who were free to kill them. By 1914, it was decided that they were an undesirable predator even within the park boundaries and so their extermination began and finally ended in 1926 when the last two pups were found and shot. However, what is obvious to us now wasn't particularly so in the early 20th century, and, as ecosystems are very fragile things, the conditions in Yellowstone drastically declined within a few years as elk began to take over. The coyotes weren't big and strong enough to be able to manage the elk population and numbers began to soar, directly affecting the flora and fauna of the area negatively. Pronghorn antelope and beaver numbers dropped dramatically as well as many sustaining plants and after 30 years, the park was in such dire condition, calls for the reintroduction of wolves began.

It wasn't until the 1990s that calls were heeded. In January 1995, 14 grey wolves were captured in Canada and released in Lamar Valley. The following January a further 17 were released and within 6 years a stable number of wolf packs were thriving, usually around 150 wolves in 14 separate packs. Scientists and ecologists believe that the re-introduction of the grey wolf in Yellowstone has been a runaway success and plant and animal numbers, including the beaver who almost completely disappeared during the wolves' absence, have levelled out once again to become a more sustainable situation. Today, ranchers outside Yellowstone generally work with scientists who have collered the wolves and no longer shoot to kill but to scare away.

Winter is the wolves' time. As it gets cooler the wolves get stronger and the cold weakens their prey. This season, that can last up to 6 months and reach temperatures of -40°, is prime wolf spotting time, not the middle of August, so we were prepared to not see any but more than willing to try. The best place to spot them is in the Lamar Valley but we didn't have time to drive the 3 odd hours to get there so we tried our luck in the Hayden Valley. At sunrise we departed Grant Village and headed north, spotting an absolutely stunning elk by the side of the road on the way.

When we arrived at Hayden we were happily surprised to see other wolf watchers looking out over the valley, giving us our cue to park up. I suspect they worked for the Park Service as they had a lot of expensive and professional looking gear with them and were talking amongst themselves about particular wolves. They were incredibly friendly and gave us tips on what to look out for and even very kindly let us use their equipment for a better chance of spotting a grey. Eventually we did manage to spot a lone wolf in the distance walking across the valley. It was just a little too far off to get a good picture but it was still exciting to get the opportunity to see even a glimpse of this majestic wild Canis lupus.

Other less commonly seen predators include the mountain lion, lynx and wolverine. The mountain lion has an estimated population of only 25 in Yellowstone, but the lynx and wolverine's numbers are not accurately known. After a cold morning looking for wolves we carried on north along the Grand Loop Road for another couple of hours to Canyon Village to get some lunch at the restaurant and send some postcards from the visitor centre. We then drove west along the Norris Canyon Road for another couple of hours towards Norris Geyser Basin, the hottest in the park. Unlike most of the other geyser basins in the park the water here is acidic rather than alkaline, meaning that different types of bacteria thrive here and thus making for a different colour palette. Norris Geyser Basin also contains Steamboat Geyser, the tallest active geyser in the whole world, which like I mentioned in a previous post, isn't as famous as it's smaller sibling Old Faithful simply because of it's erratic eruption times (it can be up to 50 years).

Norris Geyser Basin periodically undergoes a large-scale, basin-wide thermal disturbance lasting up to a few weeks. Water levels fluctuate, and temperatures, pH, colours, and eruptive patterns change throughout the basin. I think the last one was in 2003, when changes at the Norris Geyser Basin resulted in some trails in the basin being closed. New fumaroles were observed, and several geysers showed enhanced activity and increasing water temperatures. Several geysers became so hot that they were transformed into purely steaming features and the water had become so superheated that they could no longer erupt normally. This coincided with reports of the bottom of Yellowstone Lake's structural dome being uplifted (where the supervolcano is!).

From 2004, earthquake activity in the area has steadily increased and on April 30th 2007 sixteen small earthquakes with magnitudes up to 2.7 occurred in the Yellowstone Caldera for several days. Then, in December 2008, over 250 earthquakes were measured over a four day span under Yellowstone Lake, the largest measuring a magnitude of 3.9! In January 2010, another 250 earthquakes were detected over a two day period. Considering scientists believe that Yellowstone is overdue for its next mega eruption, this seems kinda freaky. But who has time for such worries when you're surrounded by the beauty that is Yellowstone and the wonders therein, such as at the back of Norris Geyser Basin's two and quarter mile loop trail the Green Dragon Spring, a noisy, gurgling cave that spits out boiling green sulphuric water.

For a final treat of our last day in Yellowstone we drove southwest from Norris Geyser down the Grand Loop Road to Madison and the Firehole River, the second of Yellowstone's two safe and legal hot spring soaks. The tall cliffs along the Firehole River surround a deep warm water pool between fast-flowing rapids. You can get in the river under a small waterfall and float down the warm current into a calm pool where it gets much cooler. This time I was joining in the fun and we relaxed in the natural hot water and had fun in the rapids taking you down stream. A highly recommended August detour from me.

Sadly this was our last evening in Yellowstone. We had almost a week and it was definitely my favourite part of our 6 week tour around America; a childhood dream come true.

The pictures that either Clare or I took are labelled R&C. The pictures that either Seth or Melinda took are labelled M&S.

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