Well, the title sums it up. We got an early start today, heading out to the Lamar Valley before dawn to try to see more wildlife. Word was that predators were out at that time. As we drove towards a sky filled with lightning, we saw lots of bison crossing the road in front of us. They seem to move up into the hills at night and then back to the river meadows during the day. Around dawn must be the prime time as virtually all of them were crossing the road when we got there. More bison up close and personal. We didn't try to touch any.
After clearing the herds, we came across a group of cars with people with telescopes standing around—a sure sign that something is to be seen. There was no room to park so we moved on to the next turnout and parked. Sure enough, they were looking at a bald eagle sitting in the top of a dead tree along the river. We were actually much closer than the other group. A man with a camera and long lens started walking down towards the bird and probably got within a 100 yards, before the eagle took off and flew down the river ... show over.
When we got almost to the end of the valley, we came upon another cluster of telescopes at the stock trailhead. This turned out to be a daily cluster of wolf watchers. According to the ranger who was there, a wolf pack of seven adults and five pups has a den up in the hills across the road. The pack moves about in the area early in the morning. Several had been seen, including one crossing the road right near the trailhead, but we missed it all. After spending about 15 minutes, looking intently in the direction of the den and where the last wolf was seen, we concluded that we were just a few minutes too late.
We turned around and drove back up the valley to a turnout with a bison view and finally stopped for breakfast.
Time to be off to Geyserland. We drove back over the Dunraven Pass (third time), took a right at the Canyon Village intersection and drove directly to the Norris Geyser Basin Campground. After finding a site and registering, we, once again, left the bikes behind and went in search of geysers and other hot stuff. The Norris Geyser Basin was first, as it was just down the road. This is supposed to be the hottest area of the park and the boardwalk trail through the basin passed through lots of steam. The geysers were small but many and the hot springs were boiling. Steamboat Geyser, purportedly the world's tallest spouting geyser is here, but it doesn't go off very often—the last time was 2005. Needless to say, we were not there at the right time. We didn't tour the whole basin as it started to rain a bit and we had no protection for the cameras. We cut it a little short and went down the road, escaping the rain and stopping for lunch at a stream-side picnic area along the Gibbon River.
We headed south along the Grand Loop Road, detouring through Firehole Canyon and stopping at the Lower and Middle Geyser Basins to see the Fountain Paint Pot and its associated hot springs and then the Grand Prismatic Spring, which was almost rainbow-colored as the red thermophilic bacteria along its shoreline gave way to deep green and, finally, turquoise blue, steaming water. This was just above the Excelsior Geyser Crater, which was spewing hot water at about 500 gallons per minute down into the Firehole River below it. It took a while to get into the parking lots at these sites. If it wasn't lack of parking, it was the bisons walking along the road, tying up traffic.
At this point we turned back towards camp, with a side trip along the Firehole Lake Road where we passed the large Great Fountain Geyser, which was not doing much as we passed it, but we did see the White Dome Geyser spout. It wasn't a giant, but the only classic geyser we saw all day, sending water about 30 feet in the air and steam at least twice that.
Our final stop was the Artist Paintpots, which was a walk around a series of colorful hot springs, then up a hill that overlooked the springs, to an aerial view that provided a great perspective. The trail then passed a series of big bubbling mud pots before going back down the hill to the springs and Speedy.
Our final stop was in a traffic jam as a bull elk grazed on the other side of the river and people, including us, scrambled to take its picture.
It was back to camp, just in time for a hailstorm, dinner and the evening ranger talk. Because of the rain, it was moved to the Museum of the Park Ranger, which is on the edge of the campground. It is a log building that was the original Army post which housed a small detachment that patrolled the Norris area in the early days of the park. It became a ranger station and then finally a small museum. The talk was about Truman Everts, a member of one of the earliest expeditions into Yellowstone in 1870, who got separated and spent 37 days lost in the late fall, living with virtually nothing but a couple of small knives and a pair of opera glasses (?), before being found.
Tomorrow it is off to Old Faithful and the Upper Geyser Basin to get our final fill of geysers, then southward to Yellowstone lake for a couple of days of recuperation from sightseeing.
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