Day 28: Entering Yellowstone

The day was still early, but I was nervous about entering the park beneath the overcast sky, afraid of being caught in another storm with no barns to hide in. I dithered for almost two hours in West Yellowstone, between grocery shopping, book browsing, and lunch. It was sprinkling when I finished lunch. The clouds were all headed east, over the park.

I rode timidly to the park gates. I stopped at a log cabin toll booth to pay the park entry fee, and asked the gate attendent if she thought the clouds would blow over. "They always blow that way," she said, pointing east into the park. A placard showed that all the park lodges were full, and most of the campgrounds as well. I asked about campground availability. The ranger told me there were always spots for hikers and bicyclists. I looked at all the vehicles lined up to enter the park, and felt like an honored guest - one of the few souls entering the park in the spirit of its original explorers. I paid up and rode on.

The first miles of Yellowstone looked a lot like western Washington, with narrow, tree lined roads stretching out to distant green hills. Different trees, I suppose, but I'm too much of an ignoramus to tell. In one sense, it looked like a million miles I'd already traveled, but the most amazing thing about Yellowstone was the lack of fences. No individual owns this, I thought. It can't be bought or sold or developed or strip mined for gravel or dredged for gold and left useless. It's protected, and it belongs to all of us.

The road into the park still followed the Madison River, seemingly tamer here than in Madison Valley. Though I was following the river upstream, the road frequently seemed to be descending. I'd seen this effect from Darby to Sula, as well. I wondered if it was just a favorable wind. It made for an easy ride, and I quickly reached the Madison campground, about 15 miles into the park.


Madison River

I took a short break at the Madison campground. I'd made good time, the clouds had swept on eastward, and I had the second (or third, or fourth) wind that I usually get in the cool early evening hours. I decided to keep going, 15 miles on up to the campground at Old Faithful. I cackled, "I'm going all the way!" as I rolled out of Madison campground, giddy with end-of-day endorphins. I remembered what one of my high school swim coaches had liked to say about distance swimming: "It's all GUTS."

And here is where I made a singularly expensive mistake. Perhaps you already have some idea what it was, but if not, I'll just leave you to chew on this ham-fisted bit of foreshadowing.



The road left the Madison River and climbed for a patch of three miles or so before joining the Firehole River, where it resumed its illusory downhill course, and now I was in sulphur country, and the landscape began to change dramatically.



I passed a grassy plain, tall yellow stalks fringed with red. Half hidden in the grass were numerous ravens, alone or in groups of two or three or twenty. I stopped and dismounted to watch them, and dozens of the nearest ones leapt from their spots to glide further out into the field. I wondered why they all gathered there. A moment later I saw the first vapor clouds, not half a mile to the south. I turned back to the raven field, saw that the ground beneath the grass was leached white, realized that the ground here must also be warm, and the ravens were enjoying the ground heat. I was immediately tempted to run into the fields toward the vapor clouds, but I didn't know the rules yet, and I was pretty sure it was a bad idea.

Around the next bend I reached the first official observation point, the Fountain Paint Pot Trail at the Lower Geyser Basin, where a boardwalk wound through an alien landscape. (Incidentally, did I mention that Shadow of the Colossus has a geyser field?)



The odor emanating from the sulphurous pools was one that I associated with good times, and just being around them brightened my mood.



Signs warned visitors not to stray from the path. As I followed the boardwalk, I examined the ground below. It showed animal prints and dung, and the occasional shoe print. Now that I knew the rules, I felt free to disregard them.



I walked out to one of the boiling pools. Beneath its cloak of vapor, the Celestine Pool was intensely clear, its crystalline hues revealing hidden depths.


The Celestine Pool: The most dangerous photo on this blog

Further down the boardwalk, a family pointed at me, and I heard father and children discussing me. I'd tried to time my exploit so that I was out of public view, and now I felt chastened for providing a bad example for the kids, and imagined their trauma if I had been scalded. I was done breaking rules for the day.


Bacteria Carpet near the Silex Spring

I periodically heard the ugly "quark!" of the ravens, and scanned for their perches. I found them throughout the park, perched above the visitors, cawing to let the people know that this is their land, though no one listens to them.

I returned to the road invigorated, and made a few more miles to the next major observation site. Sundown was near, but I was captivated by the springs.



I soon reached the Midway Geyser Basin, where the hot springs from the Grand Prismatic Spring feed dramatically into the Firehole River.


Hot Springs meet Cold River

The Grand Prismatic Spring bubbles up from a bleached white caldera, filling the area with a refractive vapor.


The Grand Prismatic Spring

I was there at sunset, and the spring's prismatic qualities showed themselves in a subtle, but startling way. I was facing directly east into the vapor cloud, trying to avoid photographing my own shadow, when I noticed the double halo around my shadow. Two concentric rings were centered around my shadow's head, the smaller about one foot in diameter, the larger about six feet. In my endorphin driven state, I stared lovingly at my double halo for long minutes. I wondered if this was anything like the effect of watching an eclipse through a pinhole (something I've never done, and don't entirely understand).


I have leashed the sundogs

I had almost lost the sun, and I hurried to leave. On the way out of the observation area, a sign with red type caught the corner of my eye. I thought it said "Dragon Gourd", and assumed it was the name of one of the springs. On closer inspection, it actually said "Dangerous Ground", and showed an illustration of a boy scout in distress, off the trail, his foot gone through a patch of thin crust into a hidden pocket of boiling, acidic water. I silently promised the sign that I would never leave the path again.

The sky dimmed as I counted the last miles to the park's heart at Old Faithful. I rode the last two miles, a confounding loop, in darkness. Signs pointed to lodging and other services. Nowhere did I see signs for a campground, and I began to grow nervous. I reached the center of the loop, where mammoth lodge buildings ringed a sea of parking. I pulled up in front of the closed ranger station to check my map. A young man walked by, apparently a ranger, and I asked him for directions to a campground. "Madison," was what he told me. Fifteen miles back, in the dark. No campground at Old Faithful. The ranger was young and inexperienced, or I might've tried to bargain for a bed in the ranger station. Instead I turned toward the imposing lodge buildings. Sleeping rough was not an option. The park had impressed me with its many "BEWARE BEAR" and "A FED BEAR IS A DEAD BEAR" signs.

I'd seen the "LODGES FULL" sign at the park's entrance, but I knew there had to be some chance of a room. The first lodge was an elephantine log cabin with a steeple roof, towering like some gothic pagan cathedral. The interior was no less imposing, with a three story stone fireplace, and hand carved wooden stairs leading up to a multi-tiered central atrium, capped by a remote belfry, all screaming "MONEY". Just another asset of the Xanterra Parks and Resorts corporation.

I was helped at the front desk by a solicitous clerk who found a lone empty room, and opened a heavy binder to offer photos for my approval. Double queen bed, facing Old Faithful, $220. "I've had 46 people look at this room," he said, "So I had to double check." I didn't know if he was speaking hyperbolically or literally, but I expected the latter. It was no time for hesitation. I took the room.

The lodge's layout confused me. It took me half an hour and three calls for help to find my room. Not until I stumbled into the extra wing did I realize that there was anything beyond the central aerie. I dumped my heavy bags, including my food, in the room. I worried that a bear might come to my room.

I was determined to wring every penny's worth out of my time there. I cleaned, rinsed my clothes, and wandered the halls. By that time the restaurants had closed, and I found that the lodge had no spa. Frustrated and overstimulated from 14 hours on the road, I returned to my room for a fitful night's sleep.