Wyoming Sky

I spent most of February this year in Wyoming. My mom had a bad fall and broke her arm. I went to help out while she recovered.

Northern Wyoming is beautiful - vast, wide open places, rivers, mountains and skies that are endless and constantly changing.

This was the view one morning from in front of my mom's house. Mornings were often like this while I was there. (if you click on the pictures they should open up to a larger image)

A few days later I saw the beginning of a beautiful sunset out her back window. I drove about 1/2 a mile north of her house, found some large, empty fields and captured this sunset.

I think I stayed there watching the awesome light show for about an hour.














Meanwhile, in the east this was happening...

 

My first trip up the North Fork was on a very cloudy day. Highway 14 from Cody leads to the east entrances of Yellowstone Park which, unfortunately, is closed in the winter. It was very cold and windy that day so I wasn't outside taking photos as much as I wanted to. On this drive I only got as far as Elephant Lodge before I decided to turn around. 

I could see these clouds were dropping snow and I have NO experience driving in the snow and it was moving toward me. Best to go back.

The snow followed me. There were light snow flurries around me by the time I got back here to the Buffalo Bill Reservoir.

I did go back up the North Fork at the end of the month, almost my last day there before I came home. This time I made it all the way to the park entrance. As you can see, this was a MUCH different day - nothing but blue skies.

Hopefully I'll be able to go back in the winter another year and take the snowcoach tour through the park. I think that would be pretty amazing.

And my mom has recovered nicely from her fall.

More Yellowstone

This mound is the result of years and years of mineral layering from the water bubbling up through the ground. This is in the same general area of the Travertine Steps but I don't think it's is actually part of it. It's amazing how different areas of the park are in the vegetation, even relatively close areas. This isn't all that far from the other photo I took that looked like a winter scene with dead trees, but look at all the grass and trees growing up right next to this mound. The water coming out of it is still very hot and very acidic. These plants must have learned how to adapt.

Yellowstone is such a beautiful place and I've only seen a tiny bit of it. I can't wait to go back again.

Yellowstone River

Water is the most corrosive substance on earth. Given enough time it can erode anything. And we drink the stuff every day! I think maybe water is the most versatile element on the Earth - we drink it, wash with it, water plants with it so they can grow and we can eat them. We mix it with other stuff to make other, other-stuff. We literally could not live without water, which is why they're trying to find it on the Moon and on Mars.

[Note: According to NASA they did find lots of water on the Moon when they smashed a rocket into it the other day. They just released their findings this week. 11.15.09]

Grand Canyon of Yellowstone

I have a bit of a fear of heights, so this was one of those occasions where I had to screw up my courage to walk out to the edge to take a photo. Of course there are rails all around where I was standing so I would have really had to try hard to fall in. It was VERY windy the day I took this photo - VERY WINDY!!!! That also was very scary, I felt like I was going to get pushed over the side any minute by a gust of wind. But I did stand out there for a little bit and take in this amazing view. My mom told me later when we were walking back to the car that there was a ledge below us on one side where there were all these hats that had blown down there. Maybe next time I'll get that photo!

That's the thing about fears and phobias - we almost all have them and it's what we do in spite of them that makes us who we are. If I let my fear of heights (or small spaces) stop me, I would miss out on a lot of wonderful opportunities. I don't think I will ever have the courage to go sky diving. I think I could enjoy the experience of hang gliding (not sure about that one yet) but I definitely would go up in a hot air balloon and take pictures from up there. I think that would be great and I could probably be OK with the height thing, since I'm in a basket and reasonably safe from falling overboard. Not, big, brave things, I know, but I think life is about doing things in spite of your fears and not letting them stop you, cause most of the things we're afraid of aren't real anyway.

Stark Beauty

Looks like a winter scene, doesn't it? Nope. This is in an area of Yellowstone Park called the Travertine Steps. All the trees in this area are dead. The water is boiling hot and the ground it highly acidic. Step off the boardwalks here and you will be scalded before you know it.

But there is a beauty here all the same - in the graceful shapes of the bare trees, in the myriad colors of the algae that lives in the hot acidic water and the colors of the mineral deposited by the water as it runs across the landscape. It's a breathtaking landscape and a reminder that we exist on the surface of this spinning rock at the whim of nature. If we think we are in any way in control of it, we're only deluding ourselves.

What must our ancestors have thought as they traveled from east to west in search of new beginnings when they came upon places such as this? Scalding water and mud bubbling from pits and pools and shooting miles into the air? What an astounding sight this must have been for them. Is it much different now, from what they saw then - set aside and "preserved" as a national park, a place for city folk to come and "experience nature" that isn't created from steel, chicken wire and concrete in an amusement park?

I'm sure a lot of people will view this scene (either here or in the flesh) and think, 'how sad that it's all dead' and completely miss the beauty and life that is still there. Beauty is in the eye of the beholder.

Travertine Steps

This interesting feature is located in Yellowstone Park. It's in a location called the Travertine Steps. The colors you see in this photo are cause by different kinds of algae that grows in the hot water that runs down the side of this mound. The mound was created by mineral deposits left by the hot water, sort of the same way lava shapes a volcano.

There are so many interesting places in Yellowstone! I specifically wanted to see this area because I had a calendar once that had a photo of the "steps" with water running down it and it was so beautiful. Since that photo was taken the water activity on the steps has changed and they are mostly a bleached white now. No water, no algae. Still, it's a beautiful place to go. I'd like to go back when I have more time and to walk around and explore.

Yellowstone Tree 2

Do you see the face in this tree? This has the most wonderful colors and textures. I see faces and animals in trees all the time. This was on the path from the parking lot to the "Lower Falls" in Yellowstone. What an amazing place - so many interesting places to explore! The sound of the fall in this area pretty much drowns out anything else. In other places it's so quiet you can hear the blood moving in your ears. Something of everything is here in this park.

Yellowstone Trees

Even burned out, trees fascinate me with their textures and shapes. It also amazes me how some trees survive fires, lightning strikes and other devastating acts of nature. The trees in this particular area did not survive the fire that swept through here, but they are still standing and have a kind of chilling beauty.

Yellowstone Lower Falls

I'm pretty sure this is standing above the "Lower Falls" in Yellowstone's Grand Canyon. As pretty as it is, this picture just can't convey the beauty and depth of this scene, one of the most beautiful places I've ever been. Like the commercial says "some things you just can't download". This is definitely one of them!

07-18 Yellowstone Trees

I went to Yellowstone National Park a few years ago. What an amazing place! It was so beautiful, so open, so BIG! So many different ecosystems there - from bubbling mud pots in beautiful colors to forests to waterfalls. I could go back again and again. We're very lucky to have these wilderness areas set aside and protected. These are some great trees I saw. They're so big and twisted and have so much texture and character.