Yellowstone - Part 2 Geysers

The best is first in the blog..... the picture above is of one of the beautiful hot spring pool. The next lot of photos are of the best and biggest geyser of the Yellowstone National Park. It is called the Grande Geyser and errupts farily often, about every 12 hours or so. There is a plaque in front of every geyser givng the approximate time of next eruption. They said the show at teh Grande Geyser would be on at about 4 pm and a large crowd gathered and sat on the walk way and waited. It was nearly 5 pm and people were getting fed up and thinking of moving along. We thought maybe this is not going to happen and we should leave as well.

Just then it started bubbling fruiously. There is a little spout on the side and it goes off like a kettle boiling and whistles. Then the main spout goes off and its beautiful. The roar of the steam and heat from it as well as the strong sulhur smell with it was a show stopper. It spouted steam for a good 20 minutes. In fact it stopped and people thought that was it and started movign and it erupted again and again.










There are also so many small geysers and all have names too. I found these two I snapped really good. They are small but for some reason the droplets that are thrown up sparkle like diamonds and make you feel as it the geyser is laughing and dancing. There is such joy coming from these dancing drops of scalding hot water.






These are the photos showing the Old Faithful which is erupting every 90 minutes of so. While there is a grandstand for people to sit and watch this geyser the distance from which you see it a lot more than some of the geysers. It is most famous but to my mind and from teh phots you will agree that tis the Grande geyser that takes the prize!!!







Now this geyser below I do remember clearly. It is called the Castle. It erupts regularly and one just has to sit and wait by the side or lean on the wall opposite. The height of the steam was fairly impressive but nothing compared to the pictures you have seen of the Grande Geyser.








I just cannot remember the name of this geyser.. do you blame me? there are so many of them there and we sat and watched most of them blow steam. The smell of sulphur in the air was actually not too bad as it cleared my sinuses and dust and hay fever.




The next few photos are near I think Steam Hammer the largest of the geysers but it just kind of bubbles but its bubbling is nearly as powerful as an actual eruption of the some of the smaller ones we saw. There was a lot of talk about there being increased activity all around the park and there was an alert that a major shift of earth was expected and this would leave a huge hole in large part of western USA. Well we are a few years down the line and have yet to see any such disaster.




The beautiful colored hot spring pools dotted around the geyser park are truly awesome. I have never seen anything like this. The depth of the color in the clear water is amazing. We did spend a fair amount of time gazing at these sites.











These pictures below are the Monmouth Springs in Yellowstone. The colors were beautiful in the lake and the stalactites and stalagmites. The steam rising made the air warm and humid. The park has all these walkways built so people can get much closer to various geysers. The river apparently had changed course and so certain parts were closed.

Yellowstone - part 1 animals

-->I have been to so many places over the years that it is very difficult to actually know from where start. Then I realized that doing a travel monologue of each trip would be extremely boring and similar to what others put up on their websites or blogs. So I thought it might be better to do snippets of my travels - things I remember most along with some of the photos that I have collected.

In the last two weeks there has been a documentary series on BBC1 core of the Yellowstone. I have been watching it and reminiscing on my own experience of Yellowstone a few years ago. The visit to Yellowstone was part of a package trip that included the Tetons, Canyon lands and Moab. In fact this was my one and only camping trip. We stayed at a huge campsite when he got to Yellowstone. We were travelling in a minivan, with some other British travelers. A strange bunch we were, they will as a science schoolteacher, an art dealer in his wife, mother and daughter, the daughter was a PE teacher, there was another young man who was into taking in the walking, and couple of other people who I have forgotten. On the way to the camping site we came across these big herds of bison.

The first sighting of these huge animals was quite amazing even though it was at a distance. I had never seen animals of this size in real life. The van was stopped by the roadside and everyone jumped out eager for a good look at these magnificent animals. The countryside was green with rolling hills and a meandering river. The bison were gathered by the water with their young ones.

While we were exclaiming over the bison by the water suddenly a couple of them came up towards the road where we all were busy clicking the cameras. It was difficult to imagine that they could move at such speed.

One of them moved in even closer. Right next to our bus was a camper van with the Japanese couple and their baby in a stroller busy taking photographs. The bison seemed interested in the stroller but it came up to the road and walked across the board in front of our bus. Everyone assumed that it would carry on to the other side of the road. However it walked back and went past the camper van. The Japanese couple had just managed to grab the child out of the stroller and rush into the camper van, just as the bison came around the back of the camper van and stood right next to the stroller. From the photograph you can see the awesome size of the bison, the huge powerful shoulders with a couple of tons of weight that can do a good deal of damage to a baby in a stroller. It gave us an opportunity to see the animal at such close quarters.

After the first few herds the novelty wore off and we were on the lookout for other animals. We did see some herds of deer grazing peacefully in the afternoon heat.

The next animal we saw was a mother moose and her calf grazing in the long grass alongside the road. I had seen a large moose on an earlier visit to New Hampshire but had never seen a calf that young. As usual the bus stopped and everyone jumped out to take pictures. So many people talking and walking towards them made the mother nervous and she moved in front of her calf to protect it. Because the tourists kept surging forward she turned around and took her baby further into the undergrowth.

As we moved along we saw in the drying grass some antlers of deer sitting in the grass. Again it was nice seeing these animals so close and it seemed that the number of tourists passing through have made them comfortable with so many people wandering about.

The other scenery we passed on the way to the campsite was beautiful with hills covered with trees and a few waterfalls. Here are a couple of pictures showing the beautiful landscape.

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After a very busy day of seeing animals and the awesome scenery we made our way to the first night at a campsite. This was the first time I learnt to put up tent. It was demonstrated to us by our driver and we only had to follow the instructions. The first point was to choose the site where we would like to put a tent and spread out the ground sheet. In trying to be away from others we felt proud of picking the patch we did. In fact we had no trouble getting the tent up right. Then a stroll around the campsite was necessary to find out where the toilets were and what was being sold in the local shop. It was only when we lay down on our inch thick air mattress that we realised our folly. We had set up our tent on a slope. As we lay down it kept sliding to the lower end of the tent. As you can imagine it was not the most comfortable of sleep we had. The tiny pebbles under the mattress was another reason to have our sleep. We chose the next tent site it much more care.