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Old Faith in the Dawn Light |
How to get Geysered Out in 3 Days
I apologize for being largely out of touch and late
with this posting. Susan and I are into our eighth day of our western trip, and
we have been out straight trying to pack as much as we can into the short time
we have in each location. This all started with an invitation to the wedding of
our good friend’s daughter, Katherine, in Hood River Oregon. Of course, we took
advantage of the event to take a couple of weeks to get there, visiting Yellowstone
and Teton National Parks in Wyoming on the way.
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Great Fountain Geyser |
We flew to Salt Lake and then drove to Yellowstone,
staying in a cabin at the Old Faithful area. Our 3 days in Yellowstone were
wonderful, but completely inadequate for the exploration of our nations largest
park. We got up early, and came back late, exhausted. I have had time only to
upload, location tag and label my images. I have, at this point, processed just
a few of the pictures to share but I’m sure I will be working on these for
months to come.
I feel quite nervous about sharing my observations of
Yellowstone since Gustav W. Verderber, a fellow New England Photography Guild
member, literally wrote the book on the topic. Gustav’s beautifully illustrated
guide “Photographing Yellowstone National Park” was a great help on our trip. I
have just a few observations to share about our experience.
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White Dome Geyser |
First, Yellowstone is most famous for its thermal
features, especially the many geysers and hot spring. One of our first stops on
entering the park was at the Firehole Lake Drive where we were lucky enough to
wait only an hour before the impressive Great Fountain Geyser erupted. This
geyser erupts only twice daily at irregular intervals, but just a couple of
hundred yards down the road the White Dome Geyser blasts more frequently and we
were able to catch the double feature. Of course Old Faithful Geyser lives up
to its name erupting every 60 to 90 minutes to the delight of the vast crowd
encircling the scene. The geysers are unique and dramatic examples of nature’s
power, but after the first day I began feeling a bit geysered out. I began
looking for different ways to see the eruptions, and we increasingly
appreciated the park's many other attractions.
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Old Faithful Dawn |
Being so close to Old faithful, I had the opportunity
to try a variety of approaches to this classic. On two mornings I crawled out
of bed for sunrises. The clouds on the horizon
were problematic and the eruptions were a bit later than I would have
preferred, but I got some interesting images. On the first morning I shot with
the sun in the background. On the second, with the warm light illuminating from
the side, I was able to get the plume to standout against the dark sky. On our
last night I got out on a remarkably clear night to record the eruption with
the Milky Way in the background. There was enough faint artificial lighting
during the 45 second exposure to make the geyser brilliantly visible.
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Milky Way Faithful |
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Firehole Spring |
Geysers are not the only thermal attractions at
Yellowstone. The steaming fumaroles and bubbling mud pots were interesting,
but, photographically, the hot springs were the most beautiful. The deep
emerald pools were intensely inviting, with the colors varying depending on the
temperature which affects the level of thermophilic bacteria. I almost wanted
to jump in, but reminded myself that these natural hot tubs would boil my skin
away in a few seconds.
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Bison on the Ridge |
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Falls at Grand Canyon of Yellowstone |
Getting away from the geysers we explored Lake
Yellowstone and Yellowstone's grand canyon area. The "Grand Canyon of
Yellowstone" was spectacular but the trip there through the wildlife rich
Hayden Valley was even more exciting. We saw Elk, Deer, Coyotes and herds of
Bison. The bison in particular caused traffic jams as they unconcernedly
meandered across the road.
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Yellowstone Elk |
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Mystic Falls |
Despite our short time in the park, we were able to get
away from the crowds on a couple of hikes into Yellowstone's back country. A
fairly short trek from the Biscuit Basin area took us along the Little Firehole
River to the lovely Misty Falls and on our last full day in the park we took a
longer hike through beautiful woods and an expansive meadow to pristine Cascade
Pond. After all the bustle of the parks popular locations the quiet isolation
of this spot was a welcome relief.
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Susan Lost in Cascade Lake Meadow |
One of the best part of this experience has been that
our daughter Abigail and her boyfriend Grayson have joined us for parts of the
trip. At times they split off to do considerably more aggressive hikes, but
last night in Jackson Hole they actually paid for dinner. Parenthood has
finally paid off!
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Abby and Grayson Waiting for Old Faithful |
I could go on about this portion of our trip, but we
just finished our stay in the Tetons and I have many more images that I'm
anxious to process. More later.
Excellent post, thanks for sharing! I visited the Tetons and Yellowstone with my dad and brother a few years ago. The wildlife was what really blew me away there. That was before I got hooked on photography, so I might have actually been able to enjoy it a little more/differently. Know what I mean? haha.
ReplyDeleteGreat shots as always. So many years since I've been to that area. I especially liked Old Faithful against the Milky Way and the shot of the Elk.
ReplyDelete