The Upper Loop
Day 2 we tackled the upper loop! Holy smokes we hit the pavement and didn't stop until 10 p.m. that night! We walked 9 miles of board walks!!!! The kids did great and never complained!! Except for poor Kiki towards the end she said her side hurt and she was too tired to walk, so we took turns carrying her, Zach taking her the most!
Terrace Spring
Our first stop of the day! Though it was nothing extreme it was a good first stop and way to break the kids into the board walk hikes!
Gibbon Falls
We absolutely love water falls, the sound, the feel, everything! The kids loved that the path lead them from above the falls to down past the falls so they could see it at different angles.
This was the kids first experience with the awe of Yellowstone. All the different colors, geysers, mud pots, ect. They were pretty fascinated by it all! We did the full 1.6 mile hike around and the kids did great!
Because this hydro-thermal area is on a hillside, the highest ground is different than the bottom. As you rise above the boiling pools, the hydro-thermal features have less water to work with and mud pots are created. Sulfuric acid derived from hydrogen sulfide gas that is emitted from an underground source, breaks down the surrounding rhyolite stone into grey clay. The muddy pools bulge and burst as gas bubbles erupt on the surface. Mud can spit several feet up into the air.
They thought this pool looked like a dinosaur foot print
Traffic Jam in Yellowstone
Norris Geyser Basin
We put about 2 miles of walking on our belts here. The kids liked this stop a lot! They loved the wide variety of geysers, mud pots and pools. They also liked that this hike was not just board walks but in the mountains too! This hike started to get a bit hard for Keagan, she was such a trooper for only being 4 she walked so much!!! The kids did have a bit of a hard time because the pictures that explained the different geysers, pools ect would show pictures of them at their biggest but since the earthquakes in the late 80's-mid 90's and the last big earthquake at Norris Geyser Basin in 2014 several of the geysers and pools are not as big as they once were. However, due to the same earthquakes there are other pools and geysers that were not there before.
So everywhere there was signs saying hot water, thin crust, stay on boardwalks or trails, This area is always changing, it's unpredictable, clear pools can become muddy and boil violently or temporarily become geysers. So basically just stay on the trails for your own safety, we were constantly reminding the kids of this; which they did great, but then what do we see.....a grown man jump the barriers and take 3 large steps closer to a pool to get a picture! I was so mad that an adult was showing my kids such a bad example and that he could have gotten hurt or even killed right in front of our kids for his lack of respect.
Steamboat Geyser and Cistern Spring are actually linked underground. When Steamboat use to have major eruptions Cistern Spring would empty.
This might not look very exciting but this vent was so cool, you could hear it rumbling
Porkchop Geyser
Porkchop was once a small hot spring that occasionally erupted. In September of 1989 Porkchop exploded, throwing rocks more than 200 feet.
Mammoth Hot Springs was fun because as always there was Elk all over the town. We ate a late lunch at a nice little sandwich shop before hitting the trails. This was by far the killer of the hikes. It even says "This strenuous trail is not recommended for people with heart, lung or other health conditions. Consider driving to the Upper Terrace for an alternative view. This trail includes steep boardwalks and several hundred stairs." But we did it, with only a few breaks : )
Can you spot the little bird?
The Lower Terraces are beautiful and the kids were fascinated by them.
These kids were such troopers with all the hiking!!! This was by far the hardest of the hikes, there were a lot of stairs!!!
Minerva Terrace activity shifts dramatically around this terrace. The cascades of the travertine beside the boardwalks were formed in the 1990s. Some years the are dry others they are wet.
I spy another little bird
Driving
On the drive to our next stop we had several adventures. First up was the bridge going out of Mammoth. There was about 4-5 buffalo and 1 baby at the other end of the bridge. For some strange reason a car bumped into the Momma buffalo (I don't know if they did it on accident or were trying to push the buffalo along or off the road, who knows) anyways this ticked off the buffalo and sent them running down the bridge towards us! Once we saw the buffalo we had rolled our windows down to take pics and just as we saw the car bump the buffalo Keagan twirled her necklace on her finger right out the window into the road! So Keagan and Kabree both start crying over the necklace and by the time the buffalo get to our car the male is really mad and honestly we kind of thought he was going to ram us in the front bumper! This made the girls more upset thinking he was stomping their necklace because he was mad. But lucky for Keagan as soon as the buffalo passed Heather jumped out and saved the necklace!
Along the way we also saw a Mommy black bear and her cub!!! Seriously I LOVE bears and this made my entire day!!!
More buffalo
White tail deer
Petrified Tree
Tower Falls
Tower Falls
Keagan wanted to try out Mommy's hat
Day 2 was a LONG day, but everyone did great and had fun. We did 9 miles worth of hiking and didn't get back to the cabin until 10 p.m. then did some quick showers and a couple loads of laundry so we could hit the sack my 12:30 a.m.
No comments:
Post a Comment