Morning at Mammoth

One of the advantages of living so near Yellowstone is that whenever I feel like it, I can take a quick run up the Paradise Valley and spend a few hours in the park. This morning I had to drive to town because in my absent-minded way I had left something important behind at the soup kitchen where I cooked yesterday. I really hate driving the truck to town on a day when I have nothing planned there, so I turned it into a good thing by heading on down to Yellowstone Park after I retrieved my goods. I have an annual pass, so it cost me nothing but gas and the time spent cruising the scenic valley.

The advantage of this kind of spontaneous visit to the Park is that you can just pick one area and really hang out there for awhile. Most people visiting Yellowstone are doing one of two things: 1) Driving from amazing site to amazing sight, trying to get to all the highlights in one long drive with only short stops to walk the boardwalk and take pictures. or 2)focusing on some goal-oriented recreational activity like hiking a trail or fishing a river. But if you have the privilege of being able to visit whenever you want, and you only want to spend a few morning hours, you can just choose one amazing thermal feature, or one gorgeous waterfall, or one herd of bison, and just stay there for a few hours and see more than the poor, exhausted tourists.

I chose Mammoth Terrace because it is close and I wanted to get to know it again. I have loved it in the past when Canary Spring was bright yellow and Minerva Terrace was a multi-colored mirror of flowing water. But the last few times I'd been there, I learned that the water has moved, as it does, so that those familiar beauties were dry (although still beautiful in a new, all-white way) and there were new springs and terraces and flows. I wanted to see them and take enough time to get a feel for what has changed.

I walked around the boardwalks for a couple of hours and joined the crowds of tourists gawking at the fabulous travertine formations.
Then I strolled on up into the hills where the wildflowers and trees and grass were stirred by the wind, and no engines could be heard nor bright colored tee shirts seen. There were peek-a-boo views of some of the terraces, and it was pleasant to skirt the area in a relaxing way.

In the town of Mammoth, the "tame" resident elk were browsing on the lawn - a bachelor herd of young bulls with antlers in velvet, and a smaller group of cows with a few calves trotting along behind. Watching busloads of people surround each elk snapping pictures was entertaining all by itself.

Then I drove home, where I still had the rest of the day to do laundry, hike the ridge, and barbecue chicken for dinner. What a fine day.