Firehole River at Biscuit Basin
It didn’t rain over night, but was still cloudy this morning, though it didn’t look as heavy as yesterday. As we drove towards Old Faithful the clouds were low so we drove through fog, but as we came off the continental divide the clouds lifted, and the sky was quite sunny.
We got to the visitor center just after the eruption of Old Faithful was finished. We were planning to see Grand Geyser, but we had a couple of hours, and we didn’t want to hang around for 90 minutes to see Old Faithful, so we walked through the geyser basin, taking many pictures and video. When we got to the Morning Glory Pool, we decided not to go back to Grand Geyser, but instead to continue on the trail towards Artemisia Geyser, which we hadn’t seen before.
Along the Artimisia Trail
It was amazing that once past the end of the boardwalk trail the crowd immediately was gone. We saw only a couple of others along the whole trail north for a couple of kilometers. There were no big geysers, but many hot springs, and since there was no boardwalk, you could walk up quite close to the edge — within reason of course as they are full of boiling water! It was a much more pleasant experience than the huge crowds around Old Faithful.
We crossed the highway to the Biscuit Basin and ate lunch. Then we walked around the Biscuit Basin, which doesn’t have very spectacular hot springs or geysers. One geyser did erupt about every ten minutes, and just as we got there, it stopped. We walked about halfway around the boardwalk, and it started again, so we started walking back towards it. You could tell it was going to stop soon, so we turned back, finished the boardwalk, and waited for it. It erupted for a couple of minutes, but the steam was blowing towards me so badly that I doubt if I got any good video of it.
Gem Pool
We walked back along the Artemisia trail, and found a couple of mud pot hot springs that were really boiling. As I turned to go between them, my foot caught in a small hole (or I may have broken the crust) and I stumbled, but regained my footing. You wouldn’t want to fall into the boiling water!
A room in the Old Faithful Inn
Old Faithful was just erupting as we got to the Old Faithful Inn. We decided to go into the Inn, and a tour was just starting as we walked into the lobby, so we joined it. The tour guide told us a good deal about the history of the Inn, how it was constructed, and its architectural features. We went into one of the rooms, which are very small, and cost over $100 per night — no shower or bathroom either, they were down the hall! It makes our $15 per night for our trailer campsite seem rather reasonable.
It started to sprinkle rain just as we walked out of the visitor center to go home. We were lucky, as the forecast was for rain, and we ended up having a very nice mostly sunny day.