Yellowstone and Glacier National Parks -- July 2022
Lower and Midway Geyser Basin and Yellowstone Lake -- July 21, 2022
We got up early for our second day of exploring and ate breakfast in the car. We wanted to visit Lower and Midway Geyser Basin's Grand Prismatic Spring before the crowds arrived.
At Lower Geyser Basin, we lucked into Fountain Geyser off and the full time that we were there/we watched for a while. Travis with Fountain Geyser from a distance.
A pool on the same trail, which had additional geysers and pools.
Midway with Grand Prismatic Spring. This trail was pretty and had some other attractions, but Grand Prismatic itself was very hard to see early in the morning and at the same level. It had steam above that obstructed most of it. Later we hiked up to the overlook, and it was awesome -- so pictures when I get there.
Opal Pool was very pretty in the morning.
At this point, I went the wrong way to the Grand Canyon of Yellowstone, continuing toward Old Faithful, around the lower loop South and then East. So, we decided to focus on the West Thumb, Yellowstone Lake, Mud Volcano, and Hayden Valley. We decided to do the hikes in the Grand Canyon area early the next day. This way, after Old Faithful and before Grant Village, had road work with some stops for one-way traffic. While waiting, I tried to get a picture of one of the Continental Divide signs but did not do good.
We arrived a Grant Village, visited the visitor center and restroom. I wanted a 2023 Yellowstone calendar. They had one here, which was nice, but not quite the pictures that I wanted. In the afternoon, I found one at Canyon Village, which had pictures like I had imagine and on lighter paper, so it will still hang on the fridge later in the year.
West Thumb was right behind the visitor center. We took a quick look; the lake was very pretty against the trees in the background. The kids went down to the water, and I took got a picture of the duck family.
We drove to and hiked West Thumb Geyser Basin Trail that Travis found on his NPS.gov app. I have a non-official one, both offer good suggestions on hikes, most that we pre-planned but needed an idea here because I went the wrong way. This area was cool to see the geysers and hydrothermal features right next or IN Yellowstone Lake. In the parking lot, we also inquired about a jeep with German plates. He said it was shipped over. Maybe they were doing a full USA tour; I did not get much information besides shipped. However, they were still planning/looking over a map on the jeep when we finished the hike, which seemed odd.
One with the lake and pool
Bison and elk in Hayden Valley. Hayden Valley did not have the volume of bison with bison jams like when we visited before. We just saw one animal at a time mostly; Joel was very good at spotting the animals. Now if we could just have gotten him to watch fewer shows and movies on his phone and looked more. Travis wondered if the Park Rangers were trying to keep most of them in Lamar Valley, which was closed to cars and people due to the flood, due to some animal/people incidents this year.
Bison at the Yellowstone river; we got a view from an overlook on the other side of the road.
LeHardys Rapid beside Hayden Valley.
Mud Volcano
Dragon's breath
We made it up to Canyon Village, went to the visitor center, and had a snack that we packed (ice cream was a good price at a grocery store near Old Faithful, but all the food was very expensive at the grocery store here). Then we headed back West to Norris and then to Madison Jct. This road and direction (North side of upper loop) had lots of potholes to dodge. I guess the winters are very rough on the roads.
We did another hike in the evening to Harlequin Lake; this was west of our campsite toward West Yellowstone. There was a bear warning sign here, and with all these trees right by the trail, I was very nervous about bears. We never rented the bear spray or have a bell; I did the "hey, bear" and came up with some different songs. We did not see a bear.
Harlequin Lake
Back at the campsite, we had dinner and played some Uno.
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