Team Breitmann World Tour: Yellowstone!

Where O' Where has our summer been?! We are lovin' it! I took this picture as we were preparing to depart from West Glacier, Montana. This was around 10 am.

Q.O.T.R. (Queen Of The Road!) Or as I like to refer to Stacey, "Queen of my double-slide!" Stacey takes the wheel as we make our way through the roads less traveled en route toe Yellowstone. We took two days of driving thru the "Big Sky" State. You can see out Stacey's window at the spectacular views we had during our journey.

As we were about to make our turn off of Mountain Hwy 83 and onto Hwy 141, I took this picture to the Northwest. It is of a massive wildfire deep within the Lolo National Forest. I had never seen anything like it and at first I thought it looked like a volcanic eruption or a massive explosion. While we were pulled off the road taking pictures, a US Forest Service worker also pulled off beside us to take pictures. We asked him what we were looking at. He explained what it was we were looking at (wildfire) and the white portion of the plume is actually ice crystals forming as the smoke cloud is pushed far up into the freezing level. That should give you some idea of how hot the fire had become! He said that it can be particularly dangerous to firefighters, when the weather conditions become such that the center column of cool air collapses downward and blows the fire out in all directions. This usually occurs in the afternoon. This particular fire was so far away that we were entirely unaffected.

A view out the front window as we drove towards the Helena National Forest. We ended up staying the night at Fort Harrison, just outside Helena, MT for one night. Fort Harrison is a Montana Army National Guard facility and they happened to have a Family Camp that was built just the past year. The next morning we took Hwy 287 south out of Helena then Hwy 12 (Lewis & Clark Hwy) to 89 South to Livingston and then on into the North Entrance of Yellowstone. Along the way, we saw lots of cattle and prong-horn antelope on the stretch of 89 from Mineral Springs to Livingston.

Here it is! The North Arch entrance to Yellowstone National Park!

The whole Team and the dog (Molly) at the North Entrance to Yellowstone! Did you know that Yellowstone was the first National Park to be establish ANYWHERE in the world?! President Ulysses S. Grant signed an act that made it a national park in 1872. The park is 2.2 million acres in size and ranges portions of the States of Montana, Idaho and Wyoming. Getting around the park is relatively easy utilizing two inter-connecting North & South "loop" drives. The park has three distinct areas: the Lake area, The Tower-Roosevelt area and the Mammoth Hot Springs to Old Faithful area.

We camped in the Lake Area on the shores of Lake Yellowstone at a place called "Fishing Bridge". This is a picture taken from the bridge of the same name. The area right around Fishing Bridge is the spawning ground to the Cutthroat Trout. Ironically, Fishing Bridge is closed to fishing due to past years over fishing practices during spawning season.

Heidi takes in the beautiful view of Lake Yellowstone. The lake sets in the southeast corner of the Yellowstone Caldera (more on that later). The lake is North America's largest high-altitude lake (7,333' elev.) and is 20 miles long by 14 miles wide, offering 141 miles of shoreline. The average August surface temperature is 60 degrees and bottom temps never rise above 42 degrees.

All this high-altitude stuff makes us hungry! One of our "house rules" is that the cook does not do dishes...therefore, it dawns on Hailey...hmmm....maybe I'd better give this cooking thing a try! So, here she is cooking us spaghetti! She did awesome! Oh, and she was so over joyed to not have to do dishes!

Across from our campsite, Hailey and Heidi construct an Indian Tee pee. Here you can see Hailey, as she took one of our camp chairs and has made herself "at home" in Yellowstone! She is reading a book about an Indian girl, which she read in a day and a half!

Hailey examines all the different butterflies under a stereoscope. I pulled a wide range of them from the grill on our "assault vehicle" that accumulated on our trek to and through Yellowstone!

Remember, I mentioned the Yellowstone Caldera? Well, much of Yellowstone we see today is remnants of a massive volcanic eruption, leaving a HUGE caldera, measuring 30 by 45 miles! Now, that is one big volcano! In fact, much of the driving loop and Lake Yellowstone lie within that old Caldera. The Yellowstone volcano is still very active 3-miles beneath the surface, where molten magma still seethes. The magma underneath results in Yellowstone having some impressive geothermic features ranging from fumeroles, geysers, boiling mud pits and hot springs with temperatures over 199 degrees!

Hailey poses near a crystal blue hot springs. Why is it so clear? Well, it's so hot that nothing can live in it! Anyone care for a dip? It would be your last!

An impressive fumarole. A fissure in the ground spews out super-heated steam and sounded like an old-fashioned steam locomotive.

A small hot spring that isn't quite a geyser that is just roiling with heat and steam! Sure hope this boardwalk holds up!

Hailey and I pose near "Spasm Geyser". We actually got wet from this geyser and it was still very warm from this distance! We ended up smelling like sulphur! Yellowstone has more geysers than anywhere else in the world and is home to more than half of all the world's geysers. Hailey says: "Smells kinda like you, Dad, after a good Mexican meal!" Nice.

Boiling pits of mud! These geothermic features are very acidic in nature and along with micro-organisms, as well as limited water supply, decompose the surrounding rock into clay & mud. Weird! The picture can't capture the rank smell akin to rotting eggs.

The Grand Prismatic Spring. It is the largest hot spring in North America and is named because of it's striking coloration of blue, green, yellow, orange, red and brown and are like the dispersal of white light by an optical prism. Additionally, when the sun is at the correct angle, the light passing thru the rising steam also causes a prismatic effect. So, there is a prism on the ground and above the water. Simply stunning and hard to capture on film. And who says God doesn't have an original, artistic touch!

The gals pose for a picture over Yellowstone's Firehole River. The river is surrounded by geothermal features, which empty water into it and in certain areas raises the river temperature to as high as 86 degrees. Early trappers named the river for the steam that rises from it making it appear to be on fire.

Runoff from Excelsior Geyser into the Firehole River. It is dumping 4,500 gallons of 199 degree water per minute into the river!

Here we are at the world's best known geyser. Old Faithful, faithfully erupts every 40 to 126 minutes. We stuck around to witness two of them.

Old Faithful...there she goes! Eruptions can shoot up to 8,400 gallons of boiling water to heights up to 185 feet!

We attended worship service at the Fishing Bridge Amphitheater. The service was conducted by volunteers of the organization called; "A Christian Ministry In The National Parks". Check them out here: Ministry in the National Parks

Hailey poses with her "Flat Ariel". You've heard of Flat Stanley? Well, this is Flat Ariel, with whom she is spending time with and documenting her travels with us. She will send back "Flat Ariel" to her friend whom is also a part of a "full-time" traveling family. Hailey sent a "Flat Stanley" to her friend to do the same.

The caution on this sign was NO JOKE! It was more of a vertical challenge than our short jaunt on the Bright Angel trail in the Grand Canyon! Way to go Heidi, as she was the leader on this hike!

Along the Uncle Tom's trail, we came across this mule deer that seemed to pose for me.

Halfway down Uncle Tom's trail and a view of the lower falls of the Yellowstone River. The roar and the constant rainbow were awesome to behold.

At the lower falls with Flat Ariel!

Firehole Canyon Falls. Photography does not due this justice, as I could not capture the sheer canyon walls.

Looking the opposite direction down Firehole Canyon. Due to the geothermal runoff into this river bringing the temperature up to comfortable swimming levels near here, there is a designated swimming area . Too bad we did not have our swim suits with us!

An impressive view from Artist point of the Yellowstone River Upper Falls in the Grand Canyon of Yellowstone. It is one of the most recognizable and most photographed spots in Yellowstone...for obvious reasons!

Beauty among beauty! How can one man stand it?!

Hayden Valley. Home to bison, mule deer and elk.

A close up view of a large North American male bison. You can tell it is a male from not only the size but also the tell-tale black face and head. Females also have horns, by the way. Bison were nearly hunted to extinctions by the time of 1871 with only 23-100 remaining in the National Park from a peak of 20-30 million! Today, the park boasts a wild herd of 4,000 head and nationally, the USA has around 250,000, mostly in the hands of private ranchers for commercial consumption.

As we rounded the corner coming back from Lamar Valley, we are faced with this large male bison! Excuse me, Mr. Bison can you please pick a lane!

Lamar Valley. Home to the wolves of Yellowstone that were successfully reintroduced in 1995 and continue to thrive here! We had hoped for a sighting but, no luck. We did see coyote, a fox and elk.

The Breitmann sisters take a lunch break with us outside the Northeast gate of Yellowstone in the town of Cooke City, after our drive through Lamar Valley. We dined on bison burgers here!

View of the North Absaroka Mountain Wilderness from the town of Cooke City, WY.

Hey, look..a grizzly bear! We spotted this guy across the Yellowstone river from us. I only had my iPhone to take this picture, unfortunately. However, I did have a nice pair of binoculars to view him with. While watching him, a park ranger shows up and informs us that he is familiar with this character. He is an eight year old black grizzly and is dining on a bison carcass that had floated down the river to this point. He also told us that the bear could easily swim over to our side in short order but, not to worry due to his preoccupation to the meal at hand. Likewise, we were at a safe distance across the river to not pose a threat to him. Thanks, Mr. Ranger! Also, like something out of a National Geographic special, a large American Bald Eagle comes swooping down the river right in front of us! Wow!