Yellowstone - North End

There was frost on the picnic table this morning - I was certainly cold last night. Greg says that the campground is over 7000 feet in elevation. We got packed up quickly and headed to Mammoth Hot Springs (which we drove through last night). We reserved a campground for tonight so we don't have to go through the same thing we did as last night... plus we get hot showers! We did a little gift shopping in the town (the elk were still there, it's the middle of rutting season) and headed over to the hot springs.

The hike was fascinating - the process of building the limestone terraces. The color comes from thermophiles (organisms), not iron or copper in the rock. The springs smell like sulphur but it didn't smell too bad. The steam was rising even though it was fairly warm (63°) out. At one spot we saw a ranger hat floating in the middle of one of the pools... we joked that our guide had melted away. Right now there is a bit of a drought in Yellowstone so many of the water features are more dry than normal (lots of pools, not a lot of overflow). There were also moss-like objects that were actually millions of the thermophiles strung together in a bundle. The one group of organisms eats the hydrogen sulphide which allow the other organisms to live at the surface. If one didn't exist then the other would die off. There were super small ridges that were being formed by the thermophile excretions. The liberty cap was a large formation that took over 2000 years to form (straight up).

After the springs, we headed over to Tower / Roosevelt to check out the Yellowstone river Narrows. On the way we saw a few buffalo off in the distance. They look like rocks with tails due to the knee-length grass. The fire devestation is clearly evident all over the park. They even sell 20 year anniversary shirts of the fire in the gift shops. The drive to Tower takes you into the open plains region of the park where there is a lot of wolf activity. We didn't see any wolves though. I have been tired and yawning all day... probably due to the higher elevations that we've been staying at (7000ft minimum).

We took a hike from the Yellowstone picnic area upstream along the river along the cliffs lining the Narrows. After a quick rise up to the rim we got out of the trees and it was all open field. There were large rocks (house size) along the trail that were deposited there from glacial activity (30+ miles away). Close to the rim of the narrows there were more trees (due to the mist being blown up from the river that was over 800 feet down). The trees were very twisted and were managing to hold on via large elaborate root systems. We also saw a deer carcass that had recently been picked clean (cartilage was still intact, all the meat was gone).

We started driving down to the main Yellowstone canyon. Along the way we saw more buffalo out in the distance. Right around the corner a coyote was walking along the edge of the road. We later found out that they stuck near the roads to avoid the wolf packs roaming the areas. The coyote was in the road and as we tried to pass he kept cutting us off (he wanted to be the lead dog). He was very healthy looking... evidently there was a lot of food in the area!

Greg bought me some ice cream at Canyon and we decided to head down to our campsite and do the canyon hikes another day. On the drive down we saw 100s of buffalo. There were some brown calves with the herd. One of the big males grunted and the whole heard headed up the river bank using switchbacks. The big ones helped the younger ones which was cool to watch. We also saw multiple bald eagles (including one that was fishing over a stream). The buffalo are rapidly becoming not as exciting as they had been at the start of the day (they are everywhere!). The amount of animal life so far has been spectacular!

Further along the way we saw the sulphur caldera which was a giant pool of boiling acid (slightly less strong than battery acid, ph just below 1). We saw one that was a pulsing caldera which 'wooshed' every second or so while the others just bubbled away. Across the road was the mud volcano. I can't describe how putrid the smell was. Give me sulphur any day. I need a shower! The acidic water liquifies the dirt causing the bubbling mud. Any animal matter that falls in gets broken down and rots (so you have the sulphur and the smell of decay). Think of a boiling port-a-potty. One of the features was called the Dragon's Mouth which was set back in a cave and shot steam out of the opening. Animal tracks were all over the dried mud and we saw a mule deer just feet from one of the pool's edges eating the vegetation. One of the rangers said a buffalo fell in last year and it smelled like beef soup for weeks. All the trees in the area are literally cooked to death. One patch of ground used to have the trail but the temperature is now measured at 200 degrees at that location. The fumes are so acidic that the storm grates in the parking lot are completely eaten away. The organisms in the water are called thermoacidophiles (heat and acid resistant)

Our campsite was in Grant Village (southern end of the park loop). We got in and found our campsite... it was way too small for our tent. We asked for a larger site and they moved us to the RV / large tent loop with a 20x30' space. It was very nice (generator use is banned after 8p.m.). The showers were pay showers and we had to drive to them but it was worth it. They also had a coin laundry which we'll be using later in the week.

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