Yellowstone

The first few days in Idaho we went into Yellowstone to sightsee.

As we kept getting closer and closer to Old Faithful, C and I kept smelling "stinky water" as M helped us call it.  Even along a beautiful river, was a hot spring.

Even with all the "stinky water" in the area, the hot springs were beautiful to look at.

 

We finally made it to Old Faithful.

We made it with about 10 minutes until it was "scheduled" to blast.  While we waited patiently we sat and ate our lunch.

 

20 minutes later we got to watch the show.  M thought having to sit a little further back was actually good because you got to see it from the base all the way up.

After Old Faithful we walked around the other hot springs in the area.  What interesting sights.

If you look closely, you can see Old Faithful going off again in the background.  Watching two geysers at once was fun.

As we passed the Castle Geyser, it was starting to act like it was going to go off as it was spouting steam and some water.  This is a geyser that erupts only twice a day.  So we decided to wait a few minutes to see what would happen.

 

It was pretty incredible and in a way because my rare than Old Faithful was actually the highlight of the day. We sat and watched it for about 10-15 minutes.  When we left it was still going strong.  I guess it typically lasts 20-30 minutes each eruption.

As we left Old Faithful, we got some excitement in the parking lot as they had cleared it out for an emergency helicopter landing and our cars were in the last row.  We decided to not stick around for that as the blast from the rotors would be very strong.  As we were leaving, it appeared that they may actually have called off the helicopter as all the rangers left their posts and were heading back to the ranger station.

As it had been a busy morning, C fell asleep in the car and woke well we were in a traffic jam.  As she woke and looked out the window she kind of started as out her window was a huge buffalo.

In addition to the buffalo, we saw a ton of elk in the park.  We also passed a grove of trees close to the road where people were parked and heading off into the woods.  When M asked what animal people were going to see the answer was a grizzly bear.  M&D both decided that as much as a bear was the one animal they wanted to see, they were not willing to get OUT of the car and hike into a forest to see it.  Bear wasn't worth that risk!
The second day we heading a little west to Earthquake Lake before heading into the park.  This was an earthquake in 1968 that in only 20 seconds slide one side of the mountain canyon all the across to the other side and in the process formed a lake behind it..

The power of nature...the rock with the memorial and the rock in the background were both boulders pushed across the canyon.

We then met up for lunch with cousins at Mammoth Hot Springs.

Heading back to the cabin, we passed some of the remnants of the Yellowstone fire from years ago.  We heard that night, from cousins who stopped at Nellis Hot Spring that one geyser in that area erupted that day for the first time in 8 years!  It was a very busy area once word got out about the eruption.  Quite exciting for the park.

Our final sightsee tour was south of our lodge to a very incredible waterfall.

Quite a powerful surge of water over a steep drop.

After seeing the upper falls, we hiked a mile to see the lower falls.

As we left early Sunday morning for the drive back to CO, we drove along the back side of the Grand Teton range.  What remarkable mountains.  Even coming from CO and seeing mountains daily there is something majestic about the Tetons.

Even in early August a little bit of snow on top when we passed through Jackson, WY.