Happy Independence Day!

Today was our 2nd full day in Yellowstone, and once again it was great. Given a tougher day yesterday with heat and altitude, we throttled back a bit today. We saw some amazing things, but the fact we continue to learn about this park - it is just enormous. I see at least week at this park in our future, but as far as our Big Trip stop, we just scratched the surface of two sections. We had some free time in the afternoon that we could have utilized for some sights, but in order to get to a substantially different part of the park would probably have involved 4 hours of driving and that wasn't something we wanted to tackle.

So - we did all things geothermal in the basins in and around Old Faithful and the surrounding area. We hit Old Faithful early since it is so popular (especially on a holiday weekend) and it did not disappoint. It is what it is, everyone knows what it looks like, but the sap in me really liked seeing something so iconic on July 4th.

After that, we walked around the area and saw a lot of hot and bubbly things. We had lunch in the Old Faithful lodge and then drove a little farther. More hot and bubbly. And drove a little more. You get the idea. Lots of variety, lots of cool stuff, all of which seems like you are on another planet. And really, who can get tired of discussing different types of hot sulfer eating microbes, right? Yeah. I'd be lying if I didn't say that we are not a little geyser'd out...

Back to our cabin, changed for a nice dinner in the stately old Lake Yellowstone Hotel, a walk to get ice cream and watch a 4th parade put on by the park staff and then back to the cabin to start packing.

Yellowstone, you're awesome. We will be back. Tomorrow we're headed back west. We will have another of those very long driving days. We won't get all the way west tomorrow, but we will be there soon.

I hope you had a Happy and Safe 4th. Sleep well.

- Jim