Vacation Day 8 – Old Faithful and Grand Teton

We finally made it down to Old Faithful and the surrounding area, along with a quick but fun trip down to Grand Teton National Park.

Today we were trying to finish up the main attractions that we wanted to see in the parks. After leaving camp we headed south in Yellowstone, stopping first at Firehole Canyon Drive. Right as we turned onto the road we saw a snowshoe hare off on the side grazing. Continuing on, our first stop was Firehole Falls, an picturesque little waterfall.

Next was a swimming area where you could park and walk down to a calm spot in the river for a dip. Since it was still in the 50s at the time we decided to pass. The final point along this road was Firehole Cascade, a section of white water. When we stopped here, there was a small herd of elk blocking the access. When Stacie got out to take a few pictures, the elk decided to move on – right toward and around Stacie.

Back on the main road again, we spotted a coyote hunting in the field next to the road. After some pictures we continued on to the Fountain Paint Pot area. This is a half mile trail that you can view all four types of hydrothermal features in Yellowstone: geysers, hot springs, mudpots, and fumaroles. We also saw some fascinating bacterial growth in the streams of runoff.

After seeing all of that area, we headed on down to Old Faithful itself. We were early enough in the day that there was plenty of parking, and we arrived just a few minutes before an eruption.

After watching the eruption we walked two miles around the upper geyser basin and were lucky enough to see a few more geysers erupt as well as some of the interesting hot springs. By the time we got back to Old Faithful, it was just in time to watch it erupt again. This time we were standing on the windward side and got sprayed with the geyser water. By the time it hit us it was already cool, so it was a refreshing experience.

We left Old Faithful and turned in to the next picnic area we found, which turned out to be a ways down the road. After lunch, we continued south to Grand Teton National Park.

GTNP has some of the most awe inspiring scenery I have seen in any park. The glacier carved mountains and lakes are just incredible. Unfortunately we did not have much time to spend in the park, so we only got to do a couple of things.

The first thing we did was drive to the top of Signal Mountain. This was another one of the twisty, narrow roads throughout the parks that lead to interesting places. From the top of Signal Mountain we had a tremendous view of the Teton range as well as the eastward view of the basin.

We then drive down to Jenny Lake. We originally had the plan of taking the shuttle boat to the far side and hiking to Hidden Falls, but it was late enough in the day that we were afraid of missing the last shuttle back so we took the scenic boat cruise instead. This ended up being an excellent choice. We cruised around the lake for an hour with a guide who lives in the area and has hiked, climbed, and skied just about every trail, rock face, and colier in the Tetons. He told us about the history of the area, identified the various peaks we could see, taught us how they were made, and told us mountaineering stories. He was incredibly knowable about the region and just plain fun to listen to. It was one of the best “scenic tours” we have ever taken.

After Jenny Lake, we had to head back to camp. It was disappointing to miss out on so much in Grand Teton, but the drive back took three hours and we didn’t get back to camp until 10:30pm.