Wednesday, July 13, 2011

07/12/2011, 21:25 EST

Today we toured Yellowstone National Park.  Despite the rain, I enjoyed myself immensely for the most part and I think I can say the same for the rest of us.  We started by visiting Old Faithful, of course.  Although the actual geyser was really cool, I had a sever misfortune.  Since Old Faithful ran 15 minutes late, my memory card ran out just as it began to erupt for real!  So much for videotaping every minute of it.  I fact, I had only 6 seconds of video when it started.  I was, however, able to hurriedly delete the bummer video and take some still shots of the water falling back to earth, well after the peak.


After that we went to a cool spot with some small geysers and colorful pools.  I think that this might have been my favorite part, but I can’t decide.  Unfortunately, the rain that started while we were watching Old Faithful increased in intensity, and we began to get rather wet, despite our rain jackets.






After that and a few other stops like it, it rained so hard that we decided to just drive around the park instead of getting out and accumulating moisture.  While we were doing this, I photographed this huge geyser base from the car window.


To complete our Yellowstone experience, we visited some mud pots, including the Painter’s Pots, which were really cool.  Although I did take some movies, which were much more impressive, I don’t think I’ll be able to upload them with hotel internet, so you’ll have to make do with these photographs I took of this small, but especially vigorous mud pot.


At lookout point, we also saw an Osprey nest, and I snapped a few pics through my scope.  Although it is hard to see, there are chicks in there (trust me, I could see them moving).



While I’m on the topic of animals, we also got a fantastic look at a male Elk and a much less fantastic look at a Bull Moose.



Over-all, this was a great day, especially since the rain cleared up later in the day.  The wildlife here is pretty cool, and there are neat animals all over the place.  I didn’t see any new birds today, but since we’re hiking tomorrow, I hope to have some links for you tomorrow.  Yet again, our hotel doesn’t have internet, so my apologies for the late posting.  Hopefully I won’t have as much backup as I did for our two nights at the Grand Canyon.  I also hope that our next hotel will have internet, because it is outside of Yellowstone.

P.S.  I think I forgot to mention yesterday that I saw a Gray Jay for the first time at Grand Teton National Park.

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