“He always had felt at home outdoors. It was as if the land and sky and wind were friendly, and no need for a pack of people about to make him easy. The wind had a voice to it, and the land lay ready for him, and the sky gave room to his eye and mind.” (Guthrie’s The Big Sky, 356)
I get up early to make the short drive from Grand Teton to Yellowstone to secure a campsite. I stay at the southernmost campground, Lewis Lake. From research, the nicer campgrounds are in the northern part of the park, but I don’t intent to spend much time on site, so I don’t mind. Besides, I get a very nice campground with lovely neighbours who end up helping me make a fire, the one time on this trip that I can’t manage to keep one going.
Yellowstone is vastly different from Grand Teton, despite the proximity of two parks, and as soon as my tent set up I’m back in the car, eager to explore. It’s just gone 7am so the roads are still mine to play on.
I don’t have a plan for the day – I’ve glanced at the map and have a vague idea of the loop I think I can manage today, but I aim to stop and do what I want, when I want. There is no rush and I want to enjoy my time here. I intend to linger.
My first stop is Old Faithful. Already the massive car park is filling up. This is likely the most popular area of Yellowstone where you can see an ornate display of a geothermic pools and exploding geysers. Old Faithful explodes fairly regularly – a sign informs me that an explosion is predicted in the next 30 min. Conveniently, there are benches set up around the geyser and I find a spot in the sun – today is chilly and my fingers are still stiff with cold from having set up my tent and I enjoy the rising sun’s warmth on my back as I focus on the geyser.
Even when not exploding, Old Faithful steams – it’s calming to sit and stare at the steam as it continually changes shape and evaporates into the sky, constantly replaced by more steam. The explosion last for about 4 minutes, the geyser gurgling, showing off it’s power. Spectators around me ‘uhhh’ and ‘ahhh’ and I nod my head in agreement – I, too, am in awe. Earth is spectacular.
Yellowstone has several Geyser Basin areas (including the most popular West Thumb, Norris and Mammoth) and I visit them all. The geysers have different shapes, colours, contours. The pool’s colours are vibrant and diverse. The build up of sulphur creates an array of shapes around the pools. And although some people complain of the sulphuric smell, I like it (it reminds me of Japanese Onsen.) Each pool is aptly named: Jewel, Artist’s Paintpots, Sponge, Spasmordic, Spouter, Grotto, Rainbow, Vent, Depression, and Whistle, for example – you have to see the geysers to understand how well they have been named. The geothermic landscapes feel like sets from Tim Burton films.
I love being on the boardwalk and listening to the excited children who read the information plaques, tug on a parent’s hand and eagerly share the new information, gasping with awe and shrieking with excitement when a geyser begins to play, spewing steam and hot sulphuric water into the air. I walk the trails with a goofy smile on my face.
To see wildlife and avoid the traffic, I continue to start each day just before sunrise, in the car as the sun begins to rise. There are many other people who do the same, but this is a different kind of traffic – we’re all united in our love of nature and desire to be up in the morning or evening to enjoy it before and after the tour buses fill the park. Bison, elk, pronghorns, prairie dogs and a multitude of birds greet me. As the sun rises over Yellowstone River and burns through the morning fog, a again a goofy smile settles on my face and doesn’t leave until the sun sets and the chill sends me back to the campsite where a fire warms my bones.
“…his chest filled sometimes when he came to a rise and looked over the country or how his heart turned just at the smell of camp smoke or the lonely voices of the wild geese that had nested along the river. He would know then that good things awaited him, great things that he couldn’t put a word to or set out in thought.” (Guthrie’s The Way West, 98)
The northern part of the park is spectacular and I enjoy it more than any other part of the park – mountainous, with sharp curves, and a still that makes a body easily transform from a chaotic bubble of anxiety into one of solitary and calm stillness. A storm, in all it’s majesty and force, arrives and I drive in and out of the rain as the road ribbons around the mountains. Many of the turnouts along the north eastern part are empty and when the spot is dry I stop, find a comfortable rock to perch on, read my book, gaze up from the novel (I’m now reading Eldrich’s Love Medicine), relax my muscles and be.
I also love driving along the Yellowstone Canyon. I find a very steep and narrow path down to the Yellowstone Gorge and my heart beats fast on the climb back up, but it is all worth the effort.
The park has over 1000 miles of hiking trails, and I stop to hike here and there. I manage to walk maybe 2% of the trails, all of which are divine.
I am comfortable here and enjoy the present moment without a thought to rush to the next one.
