Just doing another quick note here, partly to see if I can even post to blog with the 3G they have at the visitor center areas (rest of park has basically zip). I was able to sent a photo via text but video failed. Weather channel app works but sluggishly. I left the hotel at 6:30 am and got to West Yellowstone entrance to park at about 10:30, I filled gas tank and checked the geyser website that said Old Faithful had just gone off giving me an hour to get there (it goes off every 70 minutes plus or minus 10 minutes). The drive was amazing. Sun rising over snow capped peaks, huge cattle ranches, rivers with a few fly fishers. I saw a bald Eagle (3rd in 2 weeks after the one in my backyard and one in Olympic NP). At entrance to Yellowstone their was an Osprey on an artificial nest platform and I saw several flying over the thermal pools. I crossed the continental divide, 6700 ft. It also goes through the park and there is one lake that flows out both east and west so it’s waters eventually reach both Atlantic and Pacific. I listened to a podcast for a One Day visit to Yellowstone. Even though I will be here two days I knew the weather would be good only early today. About 20 miles before the park I reached Earthquake lake which was frozen still. Shortly after that I had to stop to let a small herd of bighorn sheep cross the road. I pulled off the road and got some photos with my real camera as I was a few hundred yards past them by then. A few minutes later I saw a small herd of 🦬 walking on the road (some on the shoulders already as a car had just passed them) I slowly drove past and took some photos out my car window, I definitely could have reached one of the horns but knew better). Once in the park it was a gorgeous 45 minute drive to the Old Faithful area. I passed large thermal areas with steam rising from the clay baked earth and a few more bison in the distance. I only had to wait 10 minutes for Old Faithful to erupt. It was great. Only about a hundred people there versus the thousands in the summer. I then checked a handy info sign (U R Here) and saw I could get to Grand Geyser before it’s 12:45 “predicted” eruption, it only goes off every 7-10 hours but is twice as high as OF and erupts for longer, OF never more than 5 minutes. I walked there partly on a bike path and then on long boardwalks through the thermal fields past hot pots, hot ponds, smoking geysers and the sulfur smell I remembered well from Iceland. There are more thermal sites in Yellowstone though than in the rest of the world combined. Grand Geyser was Grand!!! It was still erupting after 10 minutes when I felt the first drop of rain and did a quick walk/jog back to Van where I collected my umbrella and raincoat and got into the visitor center before it started raining. It has a big science area about volcanoes, geysers, etc. one day Yellowstone will erupt lava and destroy half the state. I spoke with a helpful ranger who confirmed that only one small campground inside park open before May 1 and that it was full (as I discovered when tried to reserve a slot on line a few days ago) but he told me about a small campground in the National Forest just 10 miles outside park that would have spots. He also told me the 2 other visitor centers that are now open so I can visit those when too rainy to do much else. The drizzle changes to rain and then wet snow which is sticking to cars but not ground since still 40 degrees. The enormous and historic Old Faithful lodge also doesn’t open to May so I just got a photo of it. OK! Enough for now. Need to crack open the guidebook and see best plans for rainy afternoon as I work my way to North end of park. Will try posting this but won’t add any photos in case that overwhelms the 3G.
If you’re still in the Yellowstone area, I suggest feasting on trout at some of the restaurants in the towns immediately outside the park. The trout is incredibly fresh, as it gets pulled right from the rivers in those towns, and the chefs really know how to work with it.