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May 10 - United States: Gardiner, Montana (Yellowstone National Park)

We woke up to snow.  Huge flakes were flying around Gardiner, and it looked like the entire day was going to be overcast and snowy.  But we decided to head to the park anyway.

Yellowstone National Park

It snowed for our first twenty minutes into the park, and then - out of nowhere - the sun came out!  We stopped by the Information Center just past Mammoth Falls and chatted with the Ranger about where to see the best stuff.  He told us that there were two bear cubs out on the plains last night, which is just where we saw the crowd of people.  But the bears were gone by then.  Unfortunately, the Ranger also mentioned that they're predicting 4-7 inches of snow tonight, so we may end up staying in Gardiner an extra night if we get snowed in.  

Old Faithful

Our first stop for the day was Old Faithful.  But because of our somewhat late start and the two-hour drive south, we didn't get there until 1:30.  The next geyser eruption was predicted at 2:30ish.  (Contrary to popular belief, Old Faithful does not erupt every hour.  So we went back to the car and made lunch of turkey and cheese sandwiches until 2:00.  Then we sat in front of the geyser and waited with the rest of the small crowd.

Old Faithful actually went off at 2:25, and the eruption lasted for about 3 minutes.  What happens, apparently, is that steam and water clogs up the spout until the pressure becomes too much.  Thus, the Old Faithful eruption.  Anywhere between 3,700 to 8.400 gallons of water are expelled, depending on the length of the eruption which ranges from 1.5 - 5 minutes.  It was pretty extraordinary, and I half expected the crowd to applaud at the end.   

Old Faithful Erupts

In Front of Old Faithful, Post-Eruption

We spent about an hour and a half walking around the geysers surrounding Old Faithful.  There are quite a few smaller geysers and tons of hot springs.  Yellowstone is the site of the world's greatest concentration of hydrothermal features, with approximately 10,000 including more than 300 geysers.  So that's a lot of steaming springs and a lot of sulfur smells.  It reminded us of Rotorua, New Zealand.

Driving Lessons

We drove around the south side of the park, past Yellowstone Lake and up to the Canyon.  Because this half of the park is at a higher elevation, there isn't quite as much wildlife as in the other parts.  Nor are there as many cars.  So I had a go at driving the car, which is a stick shift.  I've known how to drive stick since I was a teenager, but I've never had the need to practice it.  In fact, I've never actually owned a car before, if you don't count the one we owned briefly in Australia.  This is a whole new experience with me.  Jon was very patient with me, and kept his cool when I once accidentally shifted from first gear to fourth gear.  (Don't ask).  So I drove for an hour or two until we got to the Canyon.

The Canyon

The Canyon is on the North-Eastern side of the Yellowstone loop, and has been carved out by the Yellowstone River.  We drove to "Artist Point" for a lovely view of the falls.  The falls are around 300+ feet, and are surrounded by thermal springs.  It's incredible to look down and see a crisp, cool river surrounded by steaming spouts from underground hot springs.  And the canyon has some gorgeous colors on the rocks that were caused by this thermal activity.  

The Falls and the Yellowstone River 

'Daaaaa Bears!! 

On our way back to Gardiner, we left the Yellowstone loop and headed up the north road.  As we rounded one corner, we suddenly found ourselves among a few cars and some serious photographers.  Jon said, "What is it?"  and I saw out in the distance - the bears!  We pulled over and grabbed our cameras.

The two bear cubs were about 1/2 mile out in a field playing in the snow.  They were romping around and wrestling with one another, and really looked cute.  Of course, that's because they were 1/2 mile away.  We sat on the edge of the road, snapping photos and watching them through the binoculars.  One of the photographers told us that they are grizzly cubs, and their mom just "kicked them out of the den" yesterday.  Apparently, these photographers just follow the bears around the park and burn film.  They all knew each other and spent time swapping film acronyms and war stories.  And suddenly, they all picked up their tri-pods and backed off.  The two cubs were headed our way.  And these two fuzzy bears weren't slow about it, either.

They spent some time playing around and digging in some dirt not far from us, but then decided it was time to cross the road.  We all scampered back behind our cars and watched them stroll by.  It was incredible!  For two bear cubs who are, we're told, in their third season, they weren't small!  You can tell from the picture below how big they are in comparison to these cars.

The Bear Cubs - Out Cruisin' 

Once they crossed the road and walked up the neighboring hill, Jon and I decided it was time to move on.  An hour of bear-watching had done us in.  And we figured that we wouldn't be able to top the bear interaction  we just had.

About five minutes down the road, we saw two more bears.  They were also about 1/2 mile out in the field, and they were much larger than the bear cubs.  One of them was definitely a grizzly, but we couldn't figure out if the other was a grizzly or a black bear.  But they were wandering away from us, so the longer we deliberated the harder it was to figure out.  And then we hit the road and headed back to Gardiner.

For dinner, we drove around town and found three places to eat.  One was too expensive, and the other two were scary looking.  So we went to Helen's Corral again instead.  And the burgers were just as good as they were yesterday.

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