Yellowstone National Park

Mitch in full mullet soon after entering the park.

On a three day weekend, Mitch, Janet, Sophia and I decided to road trip Yellowstone and Teton National Parks.  We left about an hour after getting back for the weekend and stayed friday night in Bridger National Forest in Wyoming, near Alpine.  After driving through Jackson Hole and past the Tetons we entered the park and headed straight for Old Faithful.

Old Faithful erupted in minutes after we walked up.  I've never seen a dog so politely excited and so thoroughly ignored.  It was the only dog around a thousand people and no one cared.

She blew about two minutes after we arrived.  Feeling up on our luck, we pranced around deriding all the other tourists.  Many instantly dispersed back to their lodges and RVs after Old Faithful erupted.  Others stayed to peruse around to other geysers.  They had saved up their life's earnings to get an RV with which to visit all the great highway-accessible sights of the continent.  Yellowstone is built for that tourist and that tourist was getting his money's worth on this day.  Still others were awkward adolescents and showed up with their parents for Roadtrip Cringefest 2011.  Our favorites were the few who possessed an unquenchable sense of wonder.  Overheard on the matter of the steam coming out of hot springs: "Does the heat make it rise?" "Yep." "Ooh."  A close second were those tourists with checklists, who would cruise right past hot springs like the one below without even a glance as they rushed on to their next destination.  I like to think these tourists needed to use the restroom.  I mean who is legitimately blasé about forbidden hot springs?!?  Not even a glance??!?  We hiked the half mile out to Solitary Geyser (which is so ridiculous and appropriate for Yellowstone) and saw it practically blow us off the mountain.  We waited the 5-8 minutes for another in order to take a picture, but it just so turns out that the first eruption was the biggest in the last 15 years and the lil' bubbler for which we waited was grossly underwhelming.

Superheated sulfurous death, but still tempting.

After Old Faithful we drove on through to the Madison campground.  As expected it was packed, but after dinner we walked to the Purple Mountain Trail.  It was evening and it was dark for most of our descent back down the 8,433ft hill.  We did not see a single person on the trail, which, given our location as a haven for cougars, grizzlies, wolves, moose, etc, was as troubling as it was refreshing.  Yellowstone is advertised as and feels like a safari through a time portal into a fictitious version of North America in 2,000 BC.  It is primal and manufactured at the same time.  Still, it is incredible to get on a trail, be alone, and see the prodigious growth amid the still apparent wreckage of the Fires of 1988.  The place almost feels like the heart of the continent given its location on the continental divide, its geothermal activity and its high altitude for a flat area. The mosaic of young lodgepole forest and soft meadows adds to the feel of a newly forming territory entirely distinct from the nearby Tetons.

Yellowstone from the slopes of Purple Mountain.  Washed out in afternoon sun, but all the standing dead from the fires of 1988 are still visible amid the regrowth.

The album cover for Mitchell Fosnaugh: The Album.  A lazy sunday afternoon on our way back to Teton National Park.

We often lunched at picnic areas.  The Sunday picnic area bordered a huge grassy field that was great for relaxing, digesting, and listening to music.  Mitch has taken to calling his guitar a shirt, as this seems to help him get around those "no shirt, no shoes, no service" regulations.