Upper and Lower Falls

Time to check out Upper and Lower Falls.  We were disappointed to learn that both Uncle Tom's trail and the trail to the base of Upper Falls were closed.  Man, Covd strikes in weird ways.  We made the most of our visit anyway and tried to find as many overlooks as we could.

Look how impressive those colors are on the canyon walls.

Simple stunning view from Artist's Point.

We could at least go to the top of Lower Falls and hear the rushing water from there.  There is so much power in the water!

Hayden Valley

As we left Mud Volcano and drove up through Hayden Valley, we were not disappointed that we were stuck in a bison jam at all.  The kids all thought it was so awesome seeing the great beasts up close.  We rolled down our windows to listen to them, and they make a really deep moaning sound. I had no idea.

 

Mud Volcano

Remember how I said we didn't have much time in Yellowstone?  Well, get ready for a whirlwind kind of day.  First stop, mud volcano.  I had hoped that the kids wouldn't complain too much about the smell of sulfur because of their masks and because bubbling mud pot are cool.  Not so.  The masks helped, but they couldn't wait to get away from the mud volcano area.

Sour Lake.  Even though nothing was growing in this area, it still had a sort of surreal beauty to it.

I thought this was a fun stories.  The boys ran by so fast I didn't get a chance to tell it to them.  At the end of the trail they dashed back to the car and also didn't see Dragon Mouth's spring.  The sounds like came from inside of the cave totally sounded like a dragon's lair!

Churning cauldron.  This is where they really started going crazy about the smell.  HA!

A view over mud valley.  At least you can see Kelton's smile!

I am no geologist, but isn't this cool?  Nature is pretty amazing.

Kepler Cascades

Not knowing how long we'd be gone, we had packed our dinner.  Now all that remained was finding the perfect picnic spot.  We stopped at Kepler Cascades and they were absolutely stunning!  The sunset light just made everything glow.  The viewing platform was very high above the river and I was just hoping none of my kids had any crazy ideas about climbing on the outside of the fence.  Jeremy did...but luckily he didn't act on that.  

The cascades were a perfect picnic spot except for the lack of a table or seating area.  We found another picnic pull-off further up the road and this looked just right.  We pulled out our stove and food, and sent the kids scavenging for firewood.  They definitely found some great stuff!  

Just like the rest of the day, this was not going to be a peaceful dinner.  The mosquitos were out in force!  We were being bitten so frequently that I gave in and just told the kids to eat their dinner in the car.  We could not get out of that picnic area fast enough!

 

Old Faithful

Since we didn't have very many days in Yellowstone, we decided to hit Old Faithful very first.  Just like our trip to the hot springs, it was a trip where everything went wrong.  When we pulled into the parking lot we realized that we had just missed Old Faithful's eruption.  The parking lot was packed with people trying to leave, so instead of fighting that we thought we'd just stick around for another 94 minutes until it erupted again.  The girls were thrilled to finished off their license plate game and dashed off to catch the cars before they left the parking lot.  (I'm pretty sure we ended up seeing 46 states in 24 hours).  Daxton was napping in the car so Jeremy stayed there to wait for the girls and allow Dax to catch some zz's.  Kelton, my mom and I went exploring.  

I hadn't realized that the lower geyser basin was so accessible from where we were at.  We had an hour and a half to explore, so we set off on the boardwalk to look at the hot pools.  Kelton wanted to be the cameraman for the evening, and took pictures of almost every spring.  The ones that didn't have official names, he named himself, like "Little Bubbles."  

Castle Geyser

Lion Group

"Little Bubbles"

We were about fifteen minutes into our walk when Jeremy called to say that McKenzie wanted to meet us.  I wasn't sure if she would find the right path and thought she'd probably take the trail that led right back to Jeremy.  I tried to watch for her, but didn't see her.  We kept on walking down the boardwalk when Jeremy called to say that he had lost Cambrie and McKenzie hadn't come back.  We were on the far side of the basin and couldn't really get back quickly, so we just kept going.  I hoped the girls were smart enough to find Jeremy who was waiting at the Old Faithful viewing platform with a sleeping Daxton.  When we finally made it around the loop and found Jeremy, we realized the girls were still missing.  I went down to the Castle Geyser where we had started our walk and was relieved to see McKenzie walking back with a ranger.  She was as chill as a cucumber.  She waited right where she knew we had been, just not realizing it was a loop.  One girl-found!  Jeremy had last seen Cambrie at the car so I headed to the parking lot.  Sure enough I saw her sitting on top of the car just waiting for someone to come find her.  It had been nearly an hour and she was a little upset with tears brimming (especially for her).  I was just happy that we had found both of them.  We walked back to Old Faithful only to realize that we had missed it again!  

Well, at this point we had our whole family, we had time, and we decided to walk the boardwalk together while we waited for Old Faithful to erupt again.  

(Maybe Liberty Pool)

(Maybe Chromatic Pool)

Looking across Upper Geyser Basin with Giant Geyser in the distance.

We made it farther down the path this time and saw some pretty great geysers: Grotto geyser and Riverside geyser.  

I was starting to get nervous that we were too far away and would miss Old Faithful again so I took Cambrie and Kelton and started walking/jogging back to the viewing area.  We had a rough estimate of when it would erupt again so I was shocked and surprised when we were still about .25 miles away that it erupted again.  What?!  It was nearly thirty minutes early!  Cambrie and I made a mad dash towards the geyser and tried to enjoy it from afar.  

We made it back to the viewing area as it was calming down, so we sat down to watch it anyway.  

What a crazy chaotic visit!

Lewis Falls

After only five minutes in Yellowstone we could tell that it was more crowded that we had experienced in the Grand Tetons (or maybe we just happened to be in the middle of rush-hour).  We made our first stop right after entering the park, at Lewis Falls.  It was a beautiful waterfall and felt good to get out to explore a bit.  We even had our picnic lunch on the side of the road like a good ol' fashioned 1950's family road trip.  

It was a beautiful river and falls.

Jeremy took some of the kids off trail down to the river and they splashed around a bit.  

The view from up on top.

While we waited for them, Daxton found a perfect wading pool for him.  Unfortunately we didn't pack our lucky charms this day and he tripped over a log and fell completely.  One soggy Daxton coming right up.  As you might imagine he was anxious to get to the camp site to change into dry clothes.  At least we had smiles before the tumble!

 

The hotsprings that weren't meant to be

One of the camp rangers shared with us one of their favorite little spots, Huckleberry Hot Springs.  They gave us precise directions on how to get there and said we'd love it.  The water was so cold in the lakes that Kelton especially was looking forward to these warmer waters.  We put on our suits and made the short walk to the springs.  Well, it turned into a comedy of errors.  We weren't sure we found the right spot.  The water was hot, really too hot to enjoy.  Horse flies started biting.  We walked further downstream to find slightly cooler waters but all we found were more horse flies.  

Everyone, pretend you're having fun!

As some walked downstream, I walked upstream determined to find this perfect spot we had been told about.  As I tried to cross the stream, the log I was stepping on spun around and I fell hard on the bottom of the river.  My knees were scuffed, the towels I was carrying were soaked, and the water was so hot that I felt myself roasting a little bit.  I climbed out of the water and examined the blood trickling down my knees and from the palms of my hands.  All sorts of stories about flesh-eating bacteria immediately came to mind and we decided to ditch the hot springs even without enjoying a nice soak.  Maybe next time we'll research when is the best season to avoid the horse flies.