North to Alaska: West Yellowstone, MT

Today started and ended with rain but in the middle was very nice. We drove from Butte, through Bozeman, and into the edge of Yellowstone. It was fascinating to see the cities I’ve read about in westerns. The road bringing us across the edge of Yellowstone ran pretty much parallel to the Gallatin River. This is a pretty river with some rapids. We saw several rafts going down the river. We also saw a lot of fishermen. We had to stop and wait for a pilot truck to lead us through construction and luckily were right beside the river with a nice view.

I took a few pictures of the scenery we drove by but as Danny said, the mountains and trees are pretty much beginning to all look alike. For that reason we probably will not go to Grand Tetons Park.

One of the best decisions we made on this trip was to buy a national park pass. For senior citizens, the cost is $10 and that covers the member and three other people. I bought the pass which covers both of us. We have not had to pay an entry fee at any other parks. This has much more than paid for the cost of the membership. I would advise anyone planning on visiting several national parks to get that park pass.

We are staying about two blocks from one of the main entrances to the park, in West Yellowstone. After we checked in to the hotel, we headed for Old Faithful. The park encompasses 3,472 square miles. Ninety-six percent of the park is located in the state of Wyoming, another three percent is in Montana, and one percent is in Idaho. We went into Wyoming and are now back in Montana.

In 1988, there were bad forest fires in Yellowstone. Some regrowth can be seen among the dead trees. It’s amazing to see tree trunks that have been there all this time. We drove by the smaller geyser basins and saw a lot of steam. We got to Old Faithful with about 40 minutes to spare before her next expected eruption. The rangers compute the expected time of eruption based on the length of the previous eruption. At our viewing, she was about 20 minutes later than the ranger had predicted. While we were waiting, another geyser, Beehive, erupted within view of Old Faithful. After several false starts, Old Faithful finally blew. The eruption lasted about four minutes. I don’t know what that means to the time for the next eruption. Apparently, she blows around every 92 +/- 10 minutes.

While we were waiting for Old Faithful, we could see storm clouds brewing. The wind was blowing and it was cool. When we left the parking lot, it was 62 degrees. A few miles away, it started raining fairly hard and the temperature started dropping. By the time we got back to the hotel, it was 48 degrees. We have heat on in the room. We’re staying here two nights. West Yellowstone is a neat town built on an “Old West” theme. I want to ramble some and we want to visit the other geysers and see more of the park tomorrow.