Day 9 - West Yellowstone, MT - Yellowstone - Jackson, WY

Sorry for the late post guys, when I got to the room and tried to get the internet running it asked for a password; of course, the office was empty so it had to wait til the morning. So I'm not dead, no matter what Alexandria says.

Anyway, yesterday was something that I'll never forget. Any of you reading this, if you EVER have a chance to see Yellowstone and this part of the country in general, don't hesitate. I feel amazingly fortunate that I've been given the chance to see America at its wildest and most impressive (so far anyway). Honestly, I was expecting but so much. The girl at the snowcoach tour company should be fired, because wow did she underpromise. When I asked her where the tour was going to go, she just said 'Old Faithful.' When I asked her if it just went there and back, she said yes... So I was honestly guessing that they'd drive us to the geyser, and drive us straight back, almost like a greyhound with treads. But I was already there, so even if it was just that I'd pay to say I'd been.

At 8am, the snowcoach pulled up to my hotel. It really was an interesting engineering feat, again a place where people have learned to adapt to their environment. Apparently if I lived around there or in the Dakotas, it wouldn't be anything new or exciting. We still had to pick up a few more passengers, 8 in all. I figured that I'd be the guy from the furthest away, but we had three Germans and an Italian (and three from Minnesooootah). We headed into the park within five minutes saw wild elk and bison. These creatures are really impressive, especially to see them in the wild. Yellowstone, especially at this time of year since its mostly empty, does feel like a time capsule of America thousands of years ago. I figured after seeing these animals, that that'd be it for the day, that we'd just lucked out. After a while though, they almost became commonplace (almost mind you). We must have seen hundreds of elk and bison, along with coyotes, bald eagles and wolves. Our guide explained how the animals interacted and how each one impacted the entire environment. For example, how the success of the wolf population has lead to increased songbirds, see if you can figure that one out. It really was awe-inspiring to see such abundance of life even in what seemed to me like a hard winter.

Apparently I just don't know hard winter, it was about 40 degrees when I was there, so not crazycold. Our guide was talking about January temperatures often not getting above -20 degrees...and people STILL snowmobile all around. I can't even imagine cold like that, its like saying you have a kajillion dollars, I don't even know how to believe that that much cold exists. As we headed along the road, we stopped at the 'lower geyser basin.' Yellowstone's real claim to fame isn't wildlife, but these things called geothermals. Basically, 3 or so miles underneath yellowstone, there's molten rock. Usually this would be 10+ miles down. Because of that difference, this causes geysers and hotsprings in the thousands. Now when I say hotspring, I mean 190+ degrees hot. So even though it looks real inviting, you'd never make it out alive. You can regularly see animal bones in the springs too, from falling in. These springs though are amazingly beautiful. Bacteria live all around an in them, and they're specifically suited for different water temperatures. For example, the orange that you are seeing is a specific bacteria that can only live around 160 degrees, so as the water flows out and cools these guys grow. The green is another bacteria that needs degrees slightly cooler so you'll see it downstream. The blue is basically just devoid of life, since theres nothing in it, the sunlight makes us see it as blue.

Finally we got to Old Faithful. It was as impressive as its said to be, about 120 feet high and really violent. They can actually predict within ten minutes each eruption, about 90 minutes apart. The whole area around it was other geysers, mudpots (hot springs that have mud mixed in, makes these plopping sounds) and fumaroles (natural steam vents that you can hear for miles). These features almost don't seem real when you're there, nature in Virginia is so quiet and calm in comparison.

Eventually we headed back after a pretty full day, I didn't get back to the car until 5. Then it was off to the next destination which wasn't too far, Jackson, WY. Right now it's a skiiers town, kinda ritzy but with a log cabin motif going on. There was a really neat place that I had dinner and a drink or two called the 'Million Dollar Cowboy Bar.' It's big stuff around here, the only big nightspot. They had a great band playing, and the mix of people was really interesting. There were a bunch of the spoiled rich kids bumping up next to the real life cattle ranchers. Anybody else wearing hats and boots like that would have looked pretty silly, but they're not posing and you could definitely tell.

Anyway, today's schedule is to see the 'other' park in the area Grand Tetons. Everyone has seen pictures of them, they're some of the most photographed mountains in the world. Think Matterhorn and you've got an idea.