Yellowstone (Mammoth)

I can't believe how green it's gotten in just the past two weeks! School is now out and it hasn't snowed yet (don't laugh--we had flurries in June last year), and we are enjoying going places once again. Last weekend we went to Yellowstone and explored the terraces at Mammoth. It was rainy and the sky was dark, which was fabulous for photographing the white terraces.

At Norris geyser basin:



At Mammoth. The houses are where some park rangers live. How would you like these frolicking on your lawn every day?



Black skies at the terraces!







This is sort of a fossil. It's a bacteria colony that has gradually been covered with minerals from the thermal features, and fossilized. There are different designs depending on the kind of bacteria.



If you go out the north entrance at Gardiner, MT, you pass under this gate, dedicated by Teddy Roosevelt himself.



Immediately after that is the Gardiner football field. They are, appropriately, the Bruins. According to my SIL (who did, after all, live IN Yellowstone one summer on a paid librarian internship for Yellowstone), the field is also always covered with elk. Case in point.




Sawtell Peak, coming into Idaho (Island Park) from Montana. I always love this welcome home at the end!

Mesa Falls

Today we didn't go far, just to Mesa Falls. My SIL had never been there, so we had to rectify that. You can just look at the falls, or also take a 1-mile nature walk to a cliff and look down tons of basalt scree. We of course did both.

Snow pole. Since they don't plow the road and snow can get at least four feet deep, I want to know who is coming out here to look at the pole, and how. Helicopter drop??



The beautiful, beautiful Henry's Fork river going over the upper falls (this photo by my husband):



Piles of basalt:



Footprint of an elk, I think. Or a moose.



Ahhhhh. Green!



I took a photo of the same place last fall: