7/17/14

Monday afternoon we went on a 2-1/2 mile hike to Mystic Falls, near the Old Faithful area. The walk starts out at Biscuit Basin, where you walk along a boardwalk loop and see hot springs and small geysers.

At the top of the loop there is an off ramp that puts you on the trail to Mystic Falls. The trail follows path to the falls travels through fields of flowers and around interesting rock formations along the Little Firehole River, until you get to the falls.

 

 

 

 

Once you get to where you can see and hear the falls, the climb begins. You get to walk up rock stairs to get a better view of the falls.

  

 

Then you get to walk up a couple switch backs to get an even better view of the falls and the work it has done over thousands of years.

 

At that point, you get to decide whether you will go back the way you came, take the loop route back to your car or continue on to Imperial Geyser. Since it was after 6 p.m., we decided to go back the way we came, so we could get back to our car and home before dark. We were also getting eaten alive by mosquitoes, even though we had liberally sprayed ourselves with bug spray.

On the ride home, it was getting on towards sunset so Penny took a picture out the windshield, while we were on Firehole Lake Drive.

 

 On Tuesday morning, we got up early and went on a hike to Fairy Falls with our coworker neighbors. This hike starts at a trailhead just south of the Midway Geyser Basin. Being early in the morning, the geysers were putting up a lot of steam.

 

It was somewhat foggy and there was a lot of dew which made for some interesting and somewhat eerie sights.

There were an incredible number of spider webs in the bushes and trees, where they had collected a great deal of dew, making them standout and look particularly interesting. There were webs from Funnel Web Spiders

And others from spiders we couldn't identify.

 

There was also and interesting fungus growing on a dead tree.

The hike to the falls didn't follow a river this time, it went through heavily burned, Lodgepole pine forests. These forests were burned during the 1988 fires that consumed over 30% of the park. Fortunately, the forests are recovering, though it will take decades more for the trees to reach the height of the ones that were burned. The fires left some interesting stumps.

With the bark burned off, you could see where the bark beetles had been doing their business before the fires.

After walking through narrow paths between trees, across small creeks and through clouds of mosquitoes, you finally get to where you can hear the water fall. Then, a little farther down the path, you get to where you can finally see the 200 foot high falls.

After climbing over some fallen logs you can actually get to the base of the falls and look up at the brink of the falls. 

  

 

Here, again, you get to choose whether you walk back the way you came or continue on. Since the continuing path would take us miles further away from our car, we decided to go back the way we came.

As we were leaving, a friendly little chipmunk found a bite to eat near us.

 

Interestingly, some of the trees killed in the 1988 fires are not nearly as weathered as most of them.

Near the beginning of this trail is a hill that overlooks the Grand Prismatic Spring. Since the path up the hill is very steep and requires you to climb over a lot of dead trees, we decided to consider doing that climb at another time, having already hiked 5 miles.

On Wednesday we took another of the company provided bus tours. This time to the Grand Tetons. We had to catch the bus at the Old Faithful Inn at 8 a.m. Travelling down through the geyser basins that early on a damp morning really shows the amount of heat being generated in the area.

The bus stopped at Grant Village to pick up more employees, on the way down to the Tetons. There were 12 of us in all. South of Grant Village, the bus stopped at Lewis Falls, on the Lewis River.

 

This river drains the Lewis Lake into the Snake River.

 

Since we already showed photos of our earlier trip to the Grand Tetons, we won't repeat them here. They did take us to a few places that we hadn't seen before though.

On the southeast side of the park, next to the Snake River is an old ferry - called Menor's Ferry, that still operates for part of the summer. They were filling the pontoons with water to get the planks to swell, so they could put the ferry in the water when we were there.

It operates by turning into the flow of the river to cause a side load to be applied to the hull, which causes it to move across the river, guided by rollers running along a cable stretched across the river.

 

There was also an old store there that operated in the early 1900's.

We ate lunch in the town of Moose and stopped to look at Mormon's Row. It was a settlement of people that moved here in the 1890's, during a drought in Utah and homesteaded this area of the Jackson Hole. 

The views looking west at the Tetons, across the Snake River were phenomonal.

  

At one of the stops on the way back to Yellowstone, we picked up an extra rider. We believe it was a Pine Bark Beetle.

 

We got home about 6 p.m.

 

 

7/9/14

Penny went with some of our co-workers to a 4th of July parade in the town of West Yellowstone on Friday. We both had to work on Saturday, so we didn't stay up late enough to go see the fireworks display in West Yellowstone. Saturday evening Penny was able to go on a bus tour called Twilight on the Firehole. It was one of the free tours that the company provides for employees throughout the season. It started at the Old Faithful Inn, where everyone met at the fireplace.

 

She got to ride in one of the old 1930's open top yellow busses.

 

They drove and walked around some of the thermal features near Old Faithful, like Grand Prismatic Spring.

 

Then the drove north along the Firehole river where they saw pelicans.

 

There were just enough clouds to make for some good sunset photos.

 

On Tuesday, our next door neighbors (and coworkers) went to Mammoth for a five mile hike on the Stage Coach Road to Gardiner.

Looking south at the Mammoth Hot Springs, at the beginning of the hike.

Looking north east across the Gardner River and the North Entrance Road.

 

We need to get a book that will tell us what the flowers are, that we are taking photos of

 

We had a couple of critters show us the way down the path, near the crest of the hill.

 

This is looking north towards the town of Gardiner.

 

Along the way we saw the remains of what we think was an elk.

 

Though mostly dry, there were a couple of water features in the hills along the hike,

 

and more flowers we haven't yet identified.

 

Although this looks very much like a dandelion seed pod, these are about 50 times larger.

 

In one of the lakes, there was a bird sitting in the tall reeds.

  

There's also quite a few prickly pears along the path and they are starting to bloom.

 

 Another flower we can't identify. The bee seems to be enjoying himself.

 

Still more unidentified flowers.

 

Near the end of the path.

 

On the drive home, Penny saw a pair of geese with their gosslings

 

This morning, we drove down to a turnout only 1.5 miles from the campground and hiked into Harlequin Lake, a one mile round trip. Along the way we saw more flowers we can't identify.

 

The beginning of the hike, before we disappeared into the forest.

 

The lake has quite a few Lilly Pads growing on it and they are in bloom

 

There was also a duck preening herself, with six ducklings, near the lake shore where the path meets the lake.

This is a shot looking out of the forest, back towards where we parked.

 

Our calves were sore after two days of hikes, so we took it easy the rest of the day. Back to work tomorrow.

It looks like we will have a volunteer position in Shedd, Oregon this winter, at Thompson's Mill. It sounds like an interesting position. In addition to giving tours of the mill and working on restoring it, we will also control the flow of the river during the rainy season.

With the limited bandwidth they have up here for internet service, I have to download the blog before 8 a.m. or it just can't be done in a reasonable period of time.

 

7/3/14

Monday evening Penny and I went for a drive after work. On our way home, we saw an interesting bird in the meadow just west of the Lower Geyser Basin. I haven't figured out exactly what kind of bird it was, since I haven't had internet service since the photo was taken, but it was a large bird, standing over 2 feet tall.

Tuesday we made a grocery run to Bozeman. There's quite a bit of road construction going on, so we had to take a round-about route to avoid most of it.

Yesterday we drove around the grand loop and stopped at Mammoth to sign up for the employee 100 mile hike club. If you keep records of your walks and hikes and it amounts to 100 miles or more during your stay at Yellowstone, you get a tee shirt, pin and a backpack.

Between Dunraven Pass and Tower Falls, we ran into a bear jam that took us 30 minutes to get through. People were stopping right next to the sign that says "No Stopping or Standing".

  

Just to get a picture of a black bear cub, that you could barely see with binoculars.

 

We are told we will be having a 4th of July barbeque put on by Xanterra. Free food is always good.