Yellowstone National Park - Day 2

We woke up the next morning, ready to tackle a new adventure.  Much to Tatum's delight, we were not attacked by a grizzly bear in the middle of the night.  She did spend much of the morning reading the Yellowstone brochures and has educated us all on what to do if attacked by a grizzly.  After breakfast, we decided that we wanted to explore the Canyon area of Yellowstone.  First stop, the Grand Canyon of Yellowstone.  We packed up our Camelbaks and headed out to hike.

We started out at Uncle Tom's Trail, but many of the trails were closed due to snow and erosion.  We were able to view the upper falls, and then we took the South Rim trail down to the lower falls.

When we hit the lower falls, we were dismayed to discover it was a zoo there.  There were so many people all around.  We couldn't get a good picture, let alone a few minutes to ourselves.  We were feeling a bit claustrophobic, so we opted to ditch the crowds and head for a backcountry trail.

No sooner had we hit the backcountry, then we saw this sign.  Tatum was not amused.  She wanted to turn around immediately.  We coaxed her into a few more miles, and promised ice cream at the end of the trail.

The backcountry proved to be just what we needed.  We didn't see any wildlife, but we came across the beautiful Clear Lake.  Clear Lake is an acidic lake, and you can hear and see the gases bubble to the surface of the water, but it is so gorgeous.  It might be my favorite sight so far.

Once we made it back to the trailhead, we were hungry for more adventure...  and some lunch.  We had packed lunches earlier that morning, so we ate our lunches in the car and made our way to the Norris Geyser Basin.  The kids had never seen a geyser before, and they were not fans of the smell.

There were several miles of boardwalk trail and more geysers than we could count.  The smell was a little overwhelming, though.  Tatum even remarked that the smell of geysers was worse than hiking.  Haha.

Most of the geysers weren't active, but we did get to see a few erupt.  We are hoping for better luck at Old Faithful.  Once we'd thoroughly explored the Norris Geyser Basin, we headed back to the Canyon General Store for some ice cream, as promised.

We rounded out our evening with dinner around the campfire and board games until it got dark, which is pretty late around here.  It finally gets dark around 10pm.  When we went to bed, it began to rain, and it rained all night long.  We stayed warm and dry in that little trailer.  We have patted ourselves on the back a couple times for that purchase.  It's been a great adventure so far.