Last bits of Yellowstone

The Artist Paint Pots, above, are usually the first place we go when we hit Yellowstone. We always go in the evening when the crowds are thinning out and we have the place mostly to ourselves to listen to the endless bloop-bloop-blooping of the mud (and we say stuff like "remember last time/two times ago/three times ago when it hit Abigail?").

We went to Old Faithful this year (pictured below) but we stayed waaaay back in the trees about 100 feet from the boardwalk. It was cool and shady there and people were absolutely PACKED in together on the boardwalk benches. One interesting thing we noticed is that everyone who was not speaking English was wearing a mask, and less than a third of the people who were speaking English wore masks. Six months later, it's pretty telling to look back at that as a microcosm of the way the US approached the pandemic vs the rest of the world (note: all the NPS staff wore masks). 

We went on the new-to-us spur trail from Fairy Falls that overlooks Grand Prismatic Spring. This was part of our "avoid the crowds" effort but gosh it was the best view of the spring!! One to stay on our list for sure. The trail itself was VERY boring (old access road IIRC) but we were thinking that we would continue on to see Fairy Falls, which is supposed to be pretty cool, but just past the overlook spur was a sign saying the area was closed due to bear activity (and we found out later that two grizzlies had mauled a solo female hiker). Like I said, the wildlife was pretty intense this year. 

Most crowds usually stick to the geyser basins, but we've really grown to love the boardwalks that go along the lakes. The seismic activity there isn't as spectacular, but the juxtaposition of vast lake with boiling water that sends steam drifting out over the lake is really beautiful.



Nathan got super into kayaking last year when we were at Lake Anna (um, another thing I guess I should blog about) and he watched the kayakers with great intensity. Later on at Glacier we decided that we will buy a blow-up paddleboard for future trips of this sort because dang it looks SO fun. 

It was a beautiful day! Pretty hot inland from all the geysers (in contrast to the mid-30s nights we'd been shivering through) and then chilly with the wind blowing off the lake, so your temperature varied wildly based on whether you were standing closer to the land side or the lake side of the boardwalk. 



One day we went on an evening hike past Sheepeater Cliffs. We cooked dinner at the picnic area, then went on one of the most beautiful little walks I've ever taken and it felt amazing to be SO alone at Yellowstone! I think we passed one other person the whole time we were out there? 

The rock is SO cool. It's columnar basalt and it's all hexagonal--it looks like it was just poured out in perfect molds down the side of the cliff. The kids were in heaven clambering around on it.

 I was SO worried about snakes, but the only wildlife we saw there was marmot colony after marmot colony, singing and whistling so loudly that at first I thought it was Nathan, Isaac, and Abigail whistling! 

As we started hiking we passed a few more formations and more and more marmots. Nathan couldn't stop laughing in joy. It was really lovely.

Eventually we left the cliffs behind and the trail started winding along the riverbank.

And then along to the cascades. I was *pretty* sure that I'd read that there was a great waterfall on this path, but with the very limited WiFi I was going off memory (for our last trip to the Smokies I wised up and screenshot everything), so I was relieved when we started hearing the river's gentle flow turn into a thunderous roar.

 We do best with hikes that have some kind of cool destination. :-)

Abigail was really hoping to be able to swim, so we started looking for a route down, and after another mile or so we found a (precipitous) path.

When we got down to the river, it was still moving really quickly, so we decided against swimming (much to Abigail's dismay...she was pretty cranky the rest of the evening). 

Cut to the next day--we went back to the canyon and hiked along the rim. We were hoping to go down on Uncle Tom's trail, which has been closed EVERY time in my entire life that I've ever gone to Yellowstone with hopes of taking it, and guess what?! It was closed again.

This was the morning that we got the news that my grandfather had died, so I was pretty emotional. Neil decided to take Matthew back to the car (he was being pretty crazy) and  Isaac opted to go with him and drive down to Artist's Point to park there. Abigail, Juliet, Nathan, Luke, and I hiked along the east rim of the canyon to meet them. I'd never gone on this route before and it was really beautiful and really wonderful to have some quieter time to just process some of what I was feeling. 

These two are SUCH good friends despite their big gap in age. 

Just some really good time with the kids and with my thoughts. 

And looking at this beauty the entire time. 

Eventually we met up with everyone else, drove around to the other rim, and hiked down to (I think?) Red Rock Point. It's the trail that basically just DROPS into the canyon and is a total beast to coax kids back up. But gosh it's a great view!!

At some point in those five days we went to Mammoth. It was really busy so we didn't stay very long. And it was hot!! Everyone was pretty cranky. My poor children, I have given them my hatred of summer heat by excessively pushing outdoor activity when it's temperate and then just hiding in the basement in our workout room complaining about the heat during the height of summer. 

Did you know that the buffalo calves are called "red dogs" by the park staff? We saw SO many calves this year and it was pretty exciting. Lots and lots of videos of baby buffalo swishing their tails against the fenders of our car!

One night we stopped and watched a pack of wolves slink around the Hayden River watching the elk on the other side. It was VERY EXCITING considering it was a bunch of dots slinking around some longer dots. 

And one night we went back to the Firehole for some wading, and Matthew of course stripped down like everyone else really wanted to (Jackson Lake skinny dipping for everyone under the age of 11! Another trip that never made it onto the blog). 

And I've saved the worst for last! A few years ago we hiked to Mystic Falls and it was just magical and the BEST TIME. Loved the falls, loved the easy hike, loved that it was away from all the people. We decided to do it again since there was a loop to the trail that climbed up above the falls that we hadn't done at the time because the kids were so much littler. 

So we set out happily on our hike. I read one notation on AllTrails saying "bugs were pretty bad" and promptly forgot about it. Certainly did not grab one of the 4 cans of bug spray from the car and toss it into my pack. 

When we hit the woods, the mosquitoes were awful. So awful. We could hear them buzzing; we could see the clouds, we were convinced that if we just got out of the shade we would be away from them and on to the beautiful falls. 

You guys, I've never been so miserable in my life. I was literally sobbing by the time we got to the loop part; I couldn't look at my phone long enough to see which route we were supposed to take to get back to our car because I was so busy swatting mosquitoes with both hands, and everyone was yelling or crying. Matthew, who had been asleep, was doing a masterful job of keeping Neil's neck safe from "the bad moss cheetos," but everyone else was COVERED with bites that of course they scratched all. summer. long. and have now scarred. 

Everyone posed for a picture at the waterfall (this is when the mosquitoes were bad but not yet apocalyptically bad) and you can see the misery setting in. 

Paid such a price for these pictures!

I stopped taking pictures after this (can you see Abigail slapping her arm) but man it was awful. We finally just started running as fast as we could down the trail yelling to everyone we passed "TURN AROUND IF YOU DON'T HAVE BUG SPRAY NO SERIOUSLY YOU WILL REGRET IT!" 

And there you go, ending on a (high buzzing droning mosquito-y note) for this post. Ta da! The end! And I submitted final grades so the big question is will the blog posts continue?!!!!