"Dancing on the Volcano" - Last spin on the dance floor in Yellowstone NP

After a restful night in our comfortable lodge, where the motto was: "less is sometimes not more", a trip to the toilet in cuddly 5 degrees, which is already an improvement on the night temperature of 2 degrees, we had delicious bagels again (we wonder when we will look like a bagel ourselves after frequent consumption? ... well, we already have a hole in our stomach 😉 ...)

Freshly strengthened, we set off around 8 o'clock to explore the rest of the national park, because we wanted to see a few more highlights. We wanted to be clever and grab one of the rare parking spaces at the Grand Prismatic Spring, a top highlight of the national park, early in the morning. Unfortunately, we hadn't taken into account the nature, because 'as you can see, you can't see anything': Due to the cold night/morning temperature and thus the even greater temperature difference to the geyser than during the day, so much steam developed that the entire area was enveloped in mist and you wouldn't have seen anything without light on the car, let alone the Grand Prismatic Spring... So, change of plan! Our first stop was therefore the Biscuit Basin ... here you can find several hot springs and geysers, which were steaming even more than usual in the coolness of the early morning and 'obscured' our view a little. Nevertheless, we got to see great springs and geysers. We were most impressed by the Sapphire Pool. The clear blue water, through which you could see into the depths, was fantastic. But the other pools and geysers were also worth a walk through the area on the walkways early in the morning.

By the way, the Biscuit Basin is part of the Upper Geyser Basin, where 25% of all geysers in the world are located. With the many other geysers we saw outside the Upper Geyser Basin, it felt like 80% of all geysers are located in Yellowstone. It is said that there are about 500 geysers in Yellowstone. Not entirely unlikely, even if we didn't count them.

Our next destination was the West Thumb Geyser Basin to the south. Again, beautiful, colorful hot springs located directly on the shore of Yellowstone Lake. The bubbling interior of the earth flows directly into the huge lake in colored streaks.

That there are not only clear pools, but also less beautiful, rather 'Muddy Pools', was shown to us by the Mud Volcano Basin. Here, the geysers bubble with dirty and gray liquids. Completely surprisingly, one of the gray pools was occupied by a bison, which made itself comfortable on the edge and served the visitors as a photo model.

On the way to the Canyon of the Yellowstone, we drove through Hayden Valley, where we saw the promised herds of bison. In the canyon itself, there were impressive views of the Yellowstone River, which plunges into the canyon and has found its way further. Impressive coloring and rock formations in the canyon itself ... a must-see.

Our highlight of the entire stay in Yellowstone was now waiting for us: the Grand Prismatic Spring in the Midway Geyser Basin. We knew that it is ALWAYS difficult to get a parking space here, but the attempt is worth it... and indeed, we got a spot on the side of the road. Always a risky endeavor, because the ground level from the road surface to the roadside is no problem for the American fat normal cars, but with a limousine, the distance between the ground and the underbody is quickly too small. Anyway, it worked without scratching and now off we go.

Some beautiful but less spectacular springs lead to the highlight. The Grand Prismatic Spring is the largest hot spring in the USA and the third largest in the world. About 2000 liters of 70-degree hot water flow from the source. To see the beauty of the approximately 75 x 90 meter lake with its coloring, you have to walk about 1 mile from another parking lot to a hill. From there, you have a brilliant view of the Grand Prismatic Spring.

We ended the day with a visit to the "home geyser", the Old Faithful Geyser, a magnet for all park visitors. The special thing about this geyser is that you can predict its eruption time fairly accurately, which is not possible with other geysers. Fun fact: The Old Faithful even has its own Twitter account 😊. So, at the appointed time, many visitors armed with a camera gather around the 'eruption site' and it looks like being on the red carpet in Hollywood. The length of its eruption time varies, averaging 1.5 to 5 minutes. The fountain is about 60 meters high.

We arrived early at the meeting point and the Old Faithful was almost on time. It was set for 19:10, and it started at 19:05. However, the old one only spouted for about 2 minutes, then the show was over. But if you didn't have enough, you could watch the show again about 1 to 2 hours later.

With the eruption of the Old Faithful Geyser, our exploration of Yellowstone NP was also completed.

My/our summary for visiting Yellowstone National Park:

Yellowstone NP is by far the most beautiful, interesting, and diverse national park in the USA for us. Over the years, we have visited so many national and state parks and have come to this conclusion. The two days were full of beautiful experiences, but also absolutely exhausting. One must consider that Yellowstone is located at about 2500 meters, and hiking in the thin air is an additional effort. Even though we didn't go on explicit hikes, we still walked more than 15 km every day, up and down the mountains. From geyser basin to geyser basin or to the many hot springs or whatever else there was to see.

But parking in the park is also exhausting and nerve-racking. About 4.5 million people visit the park every year, which is only half the roads accessible due to the weather, e.g. in winter. There is far too little parking space available for all these people and their cars. You may have to wait a long time to get a parking space.

What we noticed is that here - in contrast to many other national parks - we did not notice any German visitors. Besides Americans, there were many Chinese and Indians. We assume that it is not so worthwhile for foreign/European visitors to travel here. Although the park is also beautiful, it is always 2 to 3 day trips away from a major city with an international airport, and there is nothing else special to see besides Yellowstone NP.

And if you can only rely on your annual vacation, you will surely think twice about it.

Fortunately, we don't have to adhere to such a tight schedule 😉