The Dimmed Glory of Morning Glory Pool

Saturday 12 June 2010

I thought we might go and have breakfast and then check out of the hotel, but J said we should just check out and eat breakfast at the store, which he had noticed had omelets on the menu. He likes them better than scrambled eggs. So we packed up and he made two trips to the car with luggage, and I went down to check out.

Luggage Boy

I asked the man at the desk if there was a map of the trails and he said there was but it was 50 cents. So I bought one. I mean - I can afford 50 cents.

Trail map

I asked where the temporary Visitor's Center was and could I drive to it and he said no but it was just 300 yards. But when J. got to the car (after taking more pictures of Old Faithful)

Old Faithful

he said that there was a parking lot right next to it. So we drove over there

Sign outside the Old Faithful Visitor's Center and Map

Old Faithful explanation

Dangerous Ground signs are ubiquitous

and I got my passport stamped. I also got a newer version of the document they give you that shows all the locations. She didn't want to give it to me because she said that there was only one to a family. There were dynamic exhibits for all ages about hydrothermal features. There were geyser eruption predictions including for Old Faithful eruptions. It would have been nice to have had that.

J wanted to go to Morning Glory Pool (I had showed him my dad's photos), but it was a 1.5 mile walk to get to it, and then of course he'd have to walk back. Just then, they said that Beehive Geyser (larger than Old Faithful - he has a picture of the little beehive part when it wasn't erupting) was going off and J ran out to get pictures of that.

Beehive geyser from the Old Faithful Visitor's Center

When he got back, we tried to find our way to the Store to have breakfast, but we were confused by the signs and found ourselves at Black Sand Basin instead.

Black Sand Basin sign

Steam coming off hot water

I asked him if he was hungry and he said, "not really". So we found a parking place after circling the lot twice. There were a lot of fishermen parked there. We parked by one of them and I asked them if the thermal springs that drained into the river made it warm, and they said no it didn't - that it was still cold. Snow melt I guess.

Grandson taking a photo

J went up to see

Danger Thermal Area

Cliff Geyser

Cliff geyser

Iron springs creek

J crossing Iron Springs Creek

Bubbling mud holes

Emerald pool

Emerald Pool

Emerald pool bubbling

and

Rainbow pool

Rainbow Pool

Green spring

Opalescent pool

and I just went as far as the bridge

and took pictures of the river and the

Field of yellow monkey flower

The plants at Yellowstone, in addition to the three kinds of trees include various paintbrush type flowers (which we either didn't see or didn't photograph), and the

Yellow Monkeyflower (Mimulus guttastus)

Tiny flowers

Leaving aside the question of whether bacteria are animals, plants or something else, the colors that one sees at the edges of the hot springs where they run off are caused by mats of bacteria. These bacteria can live in water that is almost boiling although the deeper water is clear. If I see colors on the banks of rivers,

Colorful bacteria as hot water flows to the river

I know that that is bacteria in the water where there is hot water run-off.

Then I stood in line for the bathroom.

From the Black Sand Basin parking lot

There was a trail there which (on the map I bought) looked like it would go down to Morning Glory Pool and J really wanted to see that. He would start at Old Faithful and end up at Black Sand. I wasn't too sure about that, and I certainly wasn't going to let him do it without breakfast, so we went back and ate.

My breakfast (left), and His {Cheese omelet, sausage, hash browns, toast $8.15}

I bought J a book on the thermal features with pictures and the descriptions done by early travelers.

He said he would take him about a hour. I said he had to take the maps - he didn't think he would need them, but I insisted. His photos from the trail:

Lion geyser group eruption

Castle geyser eruption and run-off

Grotto geyser steaming

Grotto geyser

Spa geyser

Steam from 3 geysers

Mortar geyser

Spiteful geyser

Morning glory pool in 2010

Comet geyser

Punch bowl spring

Bacteria mat

Elk track

Black sand pool

Path

I hung around the Old Faithful area a little bit and then went back to Black Sand Basin to worry about whether he would find his way there. About an hour later he came down the path and got in the car. He said that there was one place he had needed the map where there was a fork in the trail, but otherwise it was clear which way to go. He had seen Spa Geyser and Spiteful Geyser and of course Morning Glory Pool.

I have a lot of memories of the western trip we took in 1948. One of the most outstanding of memories was of Yellowstone, and one of the places that I liked best was Morning Glory pool. The pool was named by Mrs E. N. McGowan, wife of Assistant Park Superintendent, Charles McGowan in 1883. She called it "Convolutus", the Latin name for the morning glory flower, which the spring resembled.

Morning Glory pool 1948

In those days, we were told that if you threw a dirty handkerchief (a cloth one - not a Kleenex) into the beautiful clear blue pool it would come out clean and white.

My grandson's pictures show that it is surrounded by an orange and yellow bacteria mat. Several entryways have been clogged due to objects being thrown in by tourists, reducing the hot water supply, and in turn altering the overall appearance of the pool. So it is probably as well that I just have my father's pictures to enhance my memory, and didn't go see it this time.

Our next stop was Midway Geyser Basin where we had not stopped at the day before.

Midway Geyser Basin

Steam from a distance

He went up to the Grand Prismatic Spring that the guide had told us about.

Turquoise pool

Opal spring

Streaming trails

Grand prismatic spring

Excelsior geyser

Rangers

Rangers from my perspective

I kept calling it Charismatic Spring. Here again, I just went to the bridge.

Trees with white bottoms

Bridge abutments

The previous day we had been on Firehole River Drive. So today we drove along Firehole Lake Drive

Along Firehole Lake Drive

Firehole spring

A hot blue pool

We saw

Surprise Pool

Black warrior lake

and then there was a big group of people parked for something, so he went over there to photograph that.

White dome geyser

White dome geyser

Coming back after photographing White Dome Geyser

Great fountain geyser

Steady geyser

Hot cascades

On the way out there was a sign that said Keep Left

Keep Left

which he thought was amusing. We saw some more bison and then there were elk that were close enough for me to photograph.

Elk

Elk wading across the river

There was a sign about a trumpeter swan nesting area

Trumpeter Swan sign

and sure enough there were swans,

Trumpeter Swan

and also a great blue heron.

Great blue heron

We came out of the park after two days without computer access, and checked into our motel - one of three Best Western Motels in West Yellowstone.

Front of the Best Western

They had free wi-fi. We dumped our stuff in our room. I wanted to get something for lunch where I didn't have to get out of the car. So we went through the KFC drive-through and got some mac and cheese (comfort food) ,

KFC's Colonel

and then went back to the room

Back of the hotel and our room's No Smoking sign

and immediately to reading email (me) and posting photos (my grandson).

Inside our room

As far as I can remember, I have never been to the state of Idaho. So I wanted to make a little jaunt over there, just so I could say that I had been. From our hotel it would only have been about 9 miles down US 20 to the state line. Our rental car even had an Idaho license. Some of Yellowstone National Park is in Idaho, but it is the southeast corner and not accessible by road from inside the park. But in the end, I didn't go - no time and especially - no energy.

Flowers outside the room

Town street

Finally about 7:30 I decided that we should go to dinner. I drove around the restaurant area and finally said - the next parking place I see, we will eat near there. And I found a parking place in front of the playhouse and went to eat at the Old Town Cafe across the street.

Restaurant and Drawing on the menu

This was the only place not on the map and not mentioned in the AAA book. In spite of the lack of recommendations, the food was good.

Old Town Cafe and Inside

Huckleberry BBQ sauce

I had the soup and salad bar and huckleberry ice cream.

My salad bar and Huckleberry Ice cream

My grandson also had the salad bar

and a

Giant Chicken fried steak

I ate some of his green beans which he didn't care for.

Then back to the motel to do more picture uploading and email. I was going to mail some stuff home, but realized it was Saturday and tomorrow the PO wouldn't be open.

Sunday, 13 June 2010

We had breakfast about 7:30. There were hot breakfast biscuits, cold cereal, and various pastries and beverages.

Breakfast

Breakfast buffet

My grandson thought this was a funny sign

Do Not Put Eggs in Microwave

We left the motel about 9 to get gas in the car and go to the airport. Horror - I can't find my Visa card. I paid for the gas with the Master card - I went 166 miles and it took 5.1 gals of gas. Then I tore the car apart looking for the card.

Not there.

So I got out all my receipts and saw that I had paid for dinner last night with the card. Maybe I had stuck it in my pocket and it fell out. So I had my grandson call on his phone to the number on the receipt and they said it was in the safe. So we went and she gave it to me although she asked me for a photo ID first to be sure it was me.

Old town cafe

Whew!!

Mountains from the airport

Yellowstone airport

Airport doors and sign

Turned the car in at the airport and decided to check two bags because they are such a nuisance to drag around an airport. Since I bought my tickets some time ago, it was $20 each.

The airport is so small that we checked the bags and the TSA security people were right there next to us.

Machine to scan pax

My grandson went and took pictures of a little Army plane that was flying around.

Private plane

West Yellowstone’s airport is THE closest airport to Yellowstone Park. WYS is the 8th largest of Montana’s 121 airports. It is one of the ten smoke jump bases for USFS Interagency Fire Control. Primarily the airport serves private pilots.

Airlines logos

Blue Angels poster

grandson looking at a map

Our plane was to board at 11:10 and get to SLC after 1300, and they would not give us anything except peanuts, so I thought maybe we should get lunch. There was a little place there called the Smoke Jumpers Cafe (named for the Smoke Jumpers)

Smoke Jumper's Cafe

and he said he was still doing breakfast, but he could do mozzarella sticks or hamburger. So I had the hamburger and my grandson had the cheese.

Parmesan sticks

We just barely finished when they started boarding the flight.

Gate sign for the only gate

One gate at the airport

Boarding ladder and Airport vehicles

Our plane

On the landing Strip

Meandering river

Trees

On the way out, the pilot did a flyover of the park

Flyover of the park

and we went right over Midway Geyser Basin. It was a little hard to keep the camera steady to take photos, but we got some.

Midway Geyser Basin

Closeup of Grand Prismatic Spring

Grand Prismatic Spring on the left

Another of Grand Prismatic Spring

Road and a lake

Even my grandson was interested - he didn't like flying and was not happy with the bouncy little plane, and slept some on the flight (which was pretty smooth really except for the take-off over the mountains etc.)

Even though we were late leaving, we landed in SLC on time about 1300. They got me a wheelchair and the wheelchair man pushed me out gate E and up the elevator to the main level. There were three wheelchair guys - one from Russia, one from Mexico and one from the US having a conference about it.

The electric cart came for me (and my grandson too) and we went all the way from gate E to gate A to get the AA flight.

They left me there at the gate. We had a considerable wait - 3 hours before we were to board. I gave my grandson some money to go get something to eat. He tried Quiznos which was right there by the gate but he couldn't get orange soda and they didn't have meatball subs, so he went farther afield. He came back and said there was S'barro and a pizza place and what did I want to eat. I said cheese calzone or something like that. He went back down there and said they only had spinach and sausage.

J's drink

In exasperation, I said just to get me something and I would eat it. He came back with two pieces of cheese pizza.

There was free wi-fi in the airport so I used the computer and then I saw a plug under the window so I went over there and plugged in, but the light was too bright from the window for me to see the screen.

When it looked like there was a person behind the counter at our gate, I went and asked him something, and he changed our seats from 25 to 7. I did not know it, but 7 was the bulkhead row. This was NOT good as I was counting on having a seat in front of me to put my computer bag under.

AA plane

I didn't hear them calling our flight, but we got on right at the end of the priority and first class. Not only were we in the bulkhead row, but over us was the emergency medical equipment so we had to put our stuff in the bins across the aisle. However we did have a 12V plug.

Taking off from Salt Lake City

When we took off, I ate an apple that I stuck in my pocket from breakfast and put the core in the barf bag in the hard pocket on the bulkhead, but the plane bounced and it bounced out and rolled back behind us embarrassing my grandson.

The flight attendant gave me cranapple juice and I bought a cookie, but she charged me for 2 cookies. I would have said just to bring me another cookie, but she was off to give me a credit before I could say anything.

When the seat belt sign went off, I got my computer down - I did have the 12V cord. I didn't do email - I just edited photos.

We landed pretty much on time, and the wheelchair person picked us up and took us to baggage claim. My grandson didn't recognize his bag, because his pink neon thing he had on the handle was gone, but it still had a Delta name tag on it. My daughter picked us up and we went home.

After we got back from the Yellowstone part of the trip (June 9-13) we re-organized for a few days (and did laundry) and I unpacked the cold weather stuff, and unzipped the lining from my coat, and repacked with the snorkeling and warm weather stuff.

I also downloaded a lot of stuff from Ancestry for Phyllis (my grandson's other grandmother) and gave it to her along with what we found in Salt Lake