For the Journey


Any day spent with you is my favorite day. So today is my new favorite day. ~A.A. Milne

"You crown the year with Your goodness, and Your paths drip with abundance." ~Psalm 65:11
We were up early and headed back into Yellowstone because we had a full day planned.  We were on our way to Mammoth Hot Springs, but we spied this beauty and had to stop.  This is Gibbon Falls.  It drops 84 feet.

I was most excited about visiting Mammoth Hot Springs because this was an area that Seth and I didn't have time to see on our first trip.  We walked the entire boardwalk and trail of the main terrace and upper and lower terraces.  This area was absolutely fascinating to me!
We came to the Mound and Jupiter Terraces first.  A network of fractures and fissures from the plumbing system underground allows hot water to reach the surface.  The heat sources for Mammoth Hot Springs is still somewhat of a mystery, as scientists have proposed two difference sources.





We began walking around the Upper Terrace until we came to Canary Spring.

The different colors here were just amazing.

As we headed back south on the Grand Loop, we stopped at Roaring Mountain.  Do you see the steam escaping from the middle of the mountain behind Mason?  That's a fumarole.
We had visited Artist Point on the south rim of the Grand Canyon of the Yellowstone the day before, but I wanted to go back and hike down to the Lower Falls on the north rim. 
The hike was literally straight down for a half mile.  And, what goes down must come back up.
But once we got to the bottom, it was totally worth it!



The hike back up was exactly like I thought it would be, but I was so proud of the kids.  They did it!  See the look on Ellie's face?  That's exactly what I felt when we finally got back up to the top of the trail.  We stopped to rest for a minute and then continued walking a bit farther.
The grandeur of the Canyon is just overwhelming!

I mean, look at this!

We finally left the falls and slowly made our way towards Old Faithful.  But next up was the Lower Geyser Basin.  We saw the Fountain Paint Pots, fumaroles and several geysers.  This hydrothermal area is full of colorful hot springs, mud pots and small geysers.
The geysers were quite active while we were walking along the boardwalk.


Our next stop was one I couldn't wait to return to.  Before our first trip in 2015, the Yellowstone feature that most caught my attention was the Grand Prismatic Spring.  You can find tons of beautiful, bright pictures of the oranges, yellows, greens and blues of this hot spring.  But I was so disappointed when I saw it "in person."  It just wasn't the vibrant hues that I'd seen in all the pictures.  After our trip, I continued seeing all of these beautiful, bright pictures so I was convinced I had missed something.  First of all, the sky was very overcast that day, and it was misty and rainy.  I read that the brightness of the sun oftentimes magnifies the colors of the spring.  And, second of all, this area was very crowded when we visited so I felt hurried.  Needless to say, it wasn't busy on this trip.  And the weather was absolutely perfect with the sun brightly shining.
You come to Excelsior Geyser first.

We were finally getting closer to Grand Prismatic.
And oh. my. goodness.  It nearly took my breath away!  It was just like all the pictures I'd seen but hadn't experienced the last time around.  (None of the pictures I've posted have been edited with a filter.  They are all exactly as we saw them.)

Grand Prismatic is Yellowstone's largest hot spring at more than 121 feet deep and up to 330 feet wide.
By this time, the kids were pretty tired of all the pictures.  But they didn't complain not once.

After we left Grand Prismatic, we went to Old Faithful.  On our last trip, we drove around the massive parking lot for 30 minutes looking for a parking spot.  It was a miracle Seth stayed because he isn't the most patient person in the world.  But I told him was absolutely had to wait as long as it took because when in Yellowstone!  Seth asked me if I remembered what it was like the last time.  I told him I did and that it didn't matter.  We'd drive around for 30 minutes again if we had to.  Because WHEN IN YELLOWSTONE.  When we rounded the curve into the parking lot at Old Faithful, we didn't have to wait even a minute for a parking spot.  The huge lot was only a quarter full, and we had our choice of parking spots.  So we parked and then got a front row seat to wait on Old Faithful's eruption.  We had about a 30 minute wait.  We hadn't been there very long when another geyser across the way began to erupt.  One of the park rangers came running over and told us that was the Beehive Geyser and that we were really lucky to see it erupt because it wasn't predictable and didn't even erupt daily.  So that was a fun treat.
And Old Faithful is as faithful as ever!


By this time it was late in the afternoon so we began the drive out of the park to our accommodations in Jackson Hole.  We came alongside this big fella on the way out.  He was so close I could nearly reach my hand out the window and pet him!  Our second day in Yellowstone was so very full and one of the best days I think we've ever had!