Day 4 - Yellowstone

I forgot to mention that on our drive here we drove through a rather interesting area -- the Madison River Canyon. In 1959, it was struck by one of N. America's largest earthquakes causing over 80 million tons of rock to tumble in to the canyon obstructing the river flow. Lake Earthquake or "Quake Lake" as the locals call it, was formed. It's a busy resort area now. And something in town that made me smile. They have these roads with 45 mph signs posted and then a sign saying "No wheeled vehicles"?? And I am wondering what this road is for?? What goes that speed with no wheels!!??

okay -- I get it. It doesn't take long to discover that this is a very popular ski-do and Nordic ski destination. There are rental shops everywhere. This a.m. we woke up to -2C and a frozen water hose. Plus our truck tire was low again!

This made for a slight delay in our tour, but the hose thawed quickly and a $10. tire stem from the tire shop took care of the slow leak and we were off our our GPS Tour!

What a GREAT way to go!! It's all pre-programmed, we could plug in to our FM radio and as we drove through the park, the various narratives were 'triggered' and we learned so much about all the points of interest. There was a lot of interesting facts, some trivia and even an occasional joke. I would highly recommend this tour for anyone. You can go at your own pace and stop as long as you choose. (We were over 10 hours and only covered 1 of the loops!!) We have the GPS 'rented' for 2 days and will head out again tomorrow and do the 2nd loop.

The park? It was MOST enjoyable! It's so amazing to see all the geysers, hot springs, and 'mud pots', all mixed in with the forest, waterfalls and of course the animals. We didn't see any grizzly on this trip, but lots of buffalo, elk, deer, and coyotes. It was a busy park with all the tourists (gray hairs!), and all the fishermen out fly fishing. It turned out to be a perfect/beautiful day, sunny & 21C.

We got to see "Old Faithful" erupt twice. And, Yellowstone Lake was interesting. It's a huge body of water and very cold even with all the hot springs and thermal beds that surround it. Our GPS guide tells us that in some spots along the lake you could catch your trout, drag it across the shoreline and have it cooked before you took it off the hook!

Many of the streams and lakes are extremely warm and would be great to swim in though. And then there are some that are deadly. Skin would dissolve immediately in the acidic water. One of the geyser pools had the same Ph level as battery acid. There have been more deaths from the geysers than from the bears in the park.

                                                               "Old Geezer" errr... Old Geyser

That's it for today's events.  We are looking forward to tomorrows travels!