Where Do You Find The Middle?

JWise Photo of the Day, Travels

Sunrise over Scobey, Montana

Scobey, we hardly knew you. The Daniels County Museum and Pioneer Town we drove by last night and that the locals raved about won’t be visited by us this trip, but here it is linked in my post, so we might stumble upon it again should we make it up here in the future. We had to be up and out early as, from this point on the map, more than 2,000 miles home had to be finished in four days.

Northeast Montana

I hope we run out of abandoned homes eventually because they are time sinks but just look at this beauty.

Northeast Montana

Whatever fence had been attached to this gate is now long gone, but I do find it intriguing that it’s here in the middle of the property, leading nowhere.

Northeast Montana

I’ll guestimate that this house was abandoned between 1965 and 1972 based on the old television that was shot dead somewhere in the past. Cable TV obviously wasn’t a thing yet, as the two tuners were used for VHF and UHF bands. My guess is that it’s black & white as there are no color controls visible, nor can I spot a door hiding any knobs. Color TV became mainstream in the mid-’60s.

Northeast Montana

But then I started to reconsider after spotting a  Zenith washing machine with a manual ringer attached, which appears to be from the mid to late 1940s, while that stove over in the kitchen might be an early 1950s model. I’m guessing that the cabinet in the photo below is a record player.

Northeast Montana

Finally, there’s a painted-over sign on the front of the house that I was able to manipulate with a bit of Photoshop until I could decipher that this Farm Bureau sign was offering a $200 reward for information about anyone tampering or destroying this property. Well, that program with a $200 reward appears to have run from about 1930 to 1969, so I’ll stick with my guestimation of when this property was abandoned.

Redstone, Montana

Another 50 miles east, we reach another ghost town. This one is called Redstone and is still in Montana. I say still because we were 45 minutes away from North Dakota.

Redstone, Montana

Like St. Marie, this town is not totally deserted yet as there are some holding on to this remote corner, really out in the middle of nothing.

Westby, Montana

Westby, Montana, is our last stop in this state as we are about to enter…

Northwest North Dakota

…North Dakota.

Northwest North Dakota

And this is where we’ve been ever since. We ran out of gas, and this station has been closed for a long time. Thanks, Google, for telling us that this was our next opportunity to fill our tank. The cafe on the other side of the pump is more bird sanctuary than a place to get a bite. If you somehow get this far in this entry and you’ve not seen us in a while, please send someone to this random spot along U.S. Route 5, east of the old Air Force facility in Fortuna, North Dakota, to save us. By the way, we don’t even have cell service out here so I can’t know that anyone will ever see this before we die.

Northwest North Dakota

While we were out here waiting to be rescued, we visited the metal building next door and found that the padlock wasn’t locked, so of course, we opened the door to explore the rusting hulk. The brand-new snow plow thing in the back of the garage was of no interest, but this sign from the Dominion Automobile Association was cool. Maybe I should have noticed the maple leaf there on the sign, a viable clue to what I was photographing, but I had no idea that this was the Canadian version of AAA here in America.

Northwest North Dakota

At the intersection of 93rd St NW and 27th Ave NW is the town of Renville, North Dakota, but calling it a “town” is being generous. A convenience store sits on one corner, and a grain silo on the adjacent corner. There is no town. What is here is U.S. Route 83, which runs from the Canadian border all the way down to Brownsville, Texas, for a total length of 1,885 miles or 3,033 kilometers. We are skipping the leg that runs northeast from here to the Canadian border, as the extra 31 miles each way will add an hour to our drive time today. With it being 1:00 p.m. already and another 353 miles ahead of us today, we are well aware that we can easily turn 5 hours of driving into 8 hours of dawdling.

Highway 83 North Dakota

This photo of corn though cannot be considered wasting time as it feels obligatory to feature at least one image of corn porn, considering where we are here in the very middle of America.

Highway 83 North Dakota

Okay, this can certainly be considered a moment of dawdling, but I just had to know if the phone worked. No, I didn’t need to know that because the fact is I pulled over to heed the call of nature, and the cool mailbox was a bonus I only saw after I stopped. After reading that I could only make local calls, I was minorly disappointed as I wanted to ring Caroline back in Phoenix, but imagine the anguish I felt when I learned that the phone didn’t work at all.

Highway 83 North Dakota

Had this unfortunate raccoon played it safe and stopped in Bismarck with Jessica and me at the Bearscat Bakehouse to pick up some yummy bearshit donuts, it might have stayed alive to tell the story like I am today. Enough making light of this poor animal’s sacrifice to the monsters of the road that tore off its foot and spilled its guts; sure, it’s an ugly and tragic photo, but this is what our need to be on roads does.

As a matter of fact, based on a 1993 study, over 130 million animals become roadkill every year in America, but that pales in comparison to the 32.5 trillion insect deaths we are responsible for. Interestingly, it seems we might be more effective killers than we know, as some studies suggest that those death numbers are going down which only means that we are having a noticeable impact on the amount of insects in our environment.

To paraphrase Pastor Martin Niemöller:

First, they killed the birds and squirrels with their cars, and I did not speak out—because I was not a bird, nor a squirrel.

Then they ran over the sheep and deer, and I did not speak out—because I was not an ungulate.

Then they splattered the bees, flies, grasshoppers, and butterflies on their grills and windshields, and I did not speak out—because I was not an insect.

Then the aliens hit me with their spaceship—and there was no one left to speak out for me.

Highway 83 North Dakota

There will be no idyllic scenes of farmhands tossing hay bales on flatbed trucks out here today as these hay rolls can weigh as much as 1,700 pounds or about 770 kilos each. The golden age of hard work has been relegated to the machines, and that would be okay if it weren’t for the large segment of our population that is only about as smart as a 40-pound hay bale.

Highway 83 North Dakota

I remember how back in my day, I and about 1,000 hardworking young whippersnappers would hit the field with a 35-gallon basket strapped to our backs and we’d busy ourselves picking those sunflower seeds right out of the flower heads. At the end of the day, tired, with hands cramping from the delicate work, we’d sit around the pickup truck that was going to bring us back into town, and we’d try to guess how many seeds we’d picked. Sam Miller seemed to have a strange knack for being the closest, but how does a boy keep track of how many seeds he’d picked while we were singing those old ditties about bringing in the summer harvest of sunflower seeds? Maybe Sam wasn’t really singing but was closely paying attention to exactly how many seeds he’d picked instead.

Highway 83 North Dakota

I remember how, back in my day, I would have to pick an entire field of beans ten times bigger than this all by myself…

Welk Homestead State Historic Site in Strasburg, North Dakota

…and then at night, we’d all gather around the television to watch the Lawrence Welk Show. We’d dance along to a polka or two as Myron Floren belted out the tunes on his accordion while Barbara Boylan danced up a storm with Bobby Burgess. Life was good…

Highway 83 North Dakota

…until the dark clouds of punk rock came along, and Black Flag, the Cramps, and the Circle Jerks disrupted the harmony of living as one with nature out here on the Great Plains. Before we knew it, many in our bucolic town were pogo dancing and singing about being a Human Fly: life was never the same again. Yep, that was back in 1978, and when 1982, Lawrence Welk and his Champagne Music Makers ended the last show with that old familiar Adios, Au Revoir, Auf Wiedersehen, I shed a quiet tear.

Highway 83 South Dakota

For a minute, I moved south, but to tell you the truth, it was much of the same. Sure, South Dakotans were more in tune with ska and British punk, but how much Madness, Clash, Buzzcocks, and Sex Pistols can a person listen to? It seemed like half the state was singing something about Homicide and slam dancing; where the hell did that come from?

Highway 83 South Dakota

Maybe you thought I would have something better to write about that might share our experience out on the vast, dusty, flat plains of the middle of America? Are you kidding? The mind wanders when there is nothing on the horizon. The land is blank, and animals are sacrificing themselves due to the tremendous boredom that comes with being in a place that hardly supports life.

Highway 83 South Dakota

We drove for hundreds of miles before we spotted even a tree. Sure, we could have gone west to Sturgis, but how would we be welcomed driving a Hyundai, carrying a computer, expensive cameras, and eating granola at an event that attracted over 400,000 bikers in leathers, drinking whiskey from “tailpipes” (if you know what I mean) and spitting in the eye of COVID?

Highway 83 South Dakota

So, we drove and drove, further and further south, as far as south would go. Whoa, is this Dorothy’s house? Just kidding, that’s tomorrow night in Liberal, Kansas, where nerds gather to celebrate the Wizard of Oz.

Highway 83 South Dakota

Have I ever told you the story of when we used to pick semechki for the gopniks over in Ukraine? We’d have to wear our best Adidas out in the field for the marketing material, but damn, did we have it good with such a hot market for sunflower seeds grown right here in South Dakota. Life was perfect out in the field, listening to those mixtapes of Теорія Ґвалту and their folk/ska songs that had us dancing in the fields…

Highway 83 South Dakota

…until the dark clouds of techno music came along, and we were hosting giant raves among the soybeans and corn, listening to trance as the DJ played well into the next day. As magic mushrooms replaced our staple crops we knew then that the likes of Lawrence Welk would never again grace the airwaves that once had made America great. Had Donald Trump really wanted to “Make America Great Again,” he’d have had us all drop some good acid and binge-watch all 1,065 episodes of that seminal Lawrence Welk show that defined our country’s greatest generation. As the sun and my heart set here on the plains, I brought up Bubbles in the Wine and remembered better times while sharing a tear with my daughter, who learned today just who her father really is.

Way Up North

JWise Photo of the Day, Travels

Roundup, Montana, appears mostly dead as you enter town, though the bars and lone casino will likely serve the depressed-looking small population for some years to come, at least those who cannot afford to move on. I might suppose that as usual in impoverished areas, the women are the last members of a community trying to maintain the financial health of a place – this dumb assumption is based on that Jessica, and I only saw only men entering the bars and the casino here in the still early morning.

While the town’s former retail presence has faded and is but a dusty shadow of abandoned dreams, my research after returning home showed that this little town has become a kind of hub for Amazon. Third parties that sell things on Amazon are forwarding products to Roundup for repacking, allowing resellers to avoid state sales tax (Montana doesn’t have one), and this allows their packages to conform to Amazon’s shipping requirements.

There were more than a couple of shops with full inventories showing their age. Greeting cards bleached by the passing years and old sweaters with a layer of dark grime suggest that the shop owner’s departure was abrupt. Now I have to wonder if the people who operated these shops passed away, gave up, or moved. If they are still in town, do they ever visit these time capsules?

The local antique shop was closed long ago and strangely enough, remains untouched, same with the other shops. That the windows are intact and the doors not broken in might be a testament to people in small towns all knowing one another and the local hoodlums knowing they’ll be identified as the culprits, so they keep their noses clean and leave the relics of former prosperity alone.

We are leaving Roundup on U.S. Highway 87 and spot this “art project” with a For Sale sign. Of course, we had to stop. The phone number was cut out of the sign, and the house is a ruin, but like the buildings back in downtown, it hasn’t been ransacked. I called this an art project as I can’t imagine this was ever really for sale and that the sign was a prankster’s joke.

What an amazing day of contrasts this is turning to be as we left the bikers, Beartooths, and trees of Red Lodge on our way into the Great Plains here on Highway 87.

There were very few cattle out here and only a couple of oil wells being actively pumped that we could see from the road, but there’s lots of agriculture under cultivation.

Damn, we are foiled here on our adventure in the Great Flat Plains that we’ve been told are out here as we spot these hills.

I’m a sucker for abandoned structures as their decaying presence feels as though they contain hidden mysteries waiting to be discovered. The appeal is as strong for random farmhouses as it has been for exploring old castles across Europe or visiting the Eastern State Penitentiary in Philadelphia.

Some might ask why we’re out here traveling roads in the middle of nothing. Large expanses of wide-openness strain the eye to see further while filling the imagination with the potential that something might appear. And when that something emerges out of nowhere, we get to take delight that we have discovered maybe the only thing that might be seen today. And so we continue to crawl over the landscape, looking for treasures.

Highway 19 gave way, merging into Highway 191. Before long, we are back in the hills and encountering the Upper Missouri River Breaks National Monument. The Missouri River is one of the treasures we have passed over many a time and what qualifies it as such beyond simply being a river is the history of the Lewis & Clark expedition that traveled its waters.

Jeez, will we ever encounter the infinitely flat expanse of land where we are able to get lost in nothing at all? What are those mountains out on the horizon?

They are the Little Rocky Mountains, as seen from Montana Highway 191.

Warm brown grasslands offer ideas of being in the breadbasket of a country.

And where do all those seeds that feed us end up? In grain silos like these found in Malta, Montana. We were looking for hot food but only came up with a sausage and egg breakfast burrito at a gas station/farm equipment shop east of here that was pretty gross, to be honest. It turns out that burritos are not very sought after in this part of America. For the rest of the day, stopping at various gas stations trying to satisfy my craving for a good old meat, bean, and cheese frozen burrito was only met with disappointment. Too bad I wasn’t looking for beer and a can of tobacco.

Saco, Montana, has an old defunct gas station that plays host to a stupid amount of pigeons. That mound next to the pump is pigeon poop. In front of the door is another mound, while above our heads in the roof is evidence of a ton more poop. Squeezed between a couple of boards and a gap was a dedicated specimen existing in two worlds, that of the open air and an amount of avian feces I would never want to rain down on me…and so I stepped away from the building and my desire to peer into its windows.

More of those amber waves of grain.

And then, out of nowhere, a mirage appears in the form of a ton of ruins. In a previous life, the town of St. Marie was the Glasgow Air Force Base. Back in 1976, the facility was shuttered, and instead of condemning everything to clean it off the face of the earth, the government tried selling homes to the residents who wanted to stay. Most of the town never sold.

While there are a few handfuls of diehard residents living among the ruins, the school and all the businesses are long gone. The nearby airfield survives and is said to be used by Boeing, but the multitude of warning signs are all from a company called Montana Aviation Research. I’ve been stopped by law enforcement near a DuPont factory in Buffalo, New York, an airfield north of Tucson, Arizona, and a random road north of Las Vegas, Nevada, by menacing men who obviously meant business telling me to leave the area, I take signs for an area under surveillance seriously.

Entering these abandoned former military homes, I was constantly aware that at any moment, either a local sheriff or armed residents might interrupt our explorations and demand that we leave. So, as we dipped into places with open doors, I made sure we kept things brief so we would hopefully avoid being surprised by people who didn’t appreciate our snooping.

It turns out that back in 2012, the wacko members of a local sovereign-citizen movement called the Citizens Action Committee of Valley County attempted to take the town as their own, but fortunately for the people who were living there, they failed. Researching this history and learning of the Montana Freemen who, in the mid-1990s, tried something similar to maybe another Branch Davidians or Ruby Ridge-type incident, I have to wonder about the New Yorkers and Californians who are leaving behind one looney place for another.

To deter squatters, the electricity has been cut to large parts of St. Marie, but appliances are often still in place, and I’d wager that with the gas, electricity, and water turned on, some of these homes that have been empty for 45 years would be habitable with just a few days of work. After scouring the better part of the abandoned corners of this old Air Force Base, it was time to get back down the road as we’d earlier entertained the idea of going further than our original destination. By now, though, we’ve likely lost about 90 minutes to roaming around Roundup and St. Marie.

Okay, I think we’ve finally found the flat part of Montana.

While the sun isn’t so low in the sky to threaten the arrival of the evening quite yet, we do want to reach the Canadian border for a selfie, proving that we’d made it that far north. So we drive.

We drive until another distraction rears its head just north of Baylor, Montana. This old farm had no fences and nothing suggesting we shouldn’t “trespass.”

All the elements of intrigue are on display, old wood, old machinery, old cars out back (beyond a fence). No windows, but there were signs of stuff inside the house as we approached.

The old house is barely a shell, and I could see it collapsing in the next ten years, but that didn’t stop us from wanting to go inside for a more intimate view. Our smarter selves were effective in dissuading our dumber voices, trying to convince us to take the risk as stepping on nails or falling through floors could be problematic so far away from phone and medical services.

Jessica did her best to lean into the window in the center of this photo, trying to snag the old pot on the stove I wanted, but it fell off and became unreachable. As you look at this image, you can see that the left side of the kitchen is listing. This structure was way too sketchy to attempt going in, but we did try to open the door on the right, behind which you can glimpse Jessica. I’m glad we couldn’t pry it open, as it did occur to me that it might be the structural support that was the glue keeping everything standing. By the way, the stove appears to be a valuable antique!

I’m in love with this bed and would gladly claim the frame and bring it home if that was possible. Even the cotton batting that is no longer in its mattress cover is intriguing. Where did the cloth that contained it go? I’m surprised that birds haven’t claimed all of the fluff for their nests, but then again, where would birds build homes in a place with so few native trees?

Over at the barn, I was incredulous to find the center third filled with barley. The closeup I shot of it was taken to avoid all of the poop that was atop the grain. Not only rodent poop but rather large ones (all very dried out) that were scattered about. The grain silo next door suggests that it was last filled and is still full of barley from a 1960 harvest. It’s inexplicable as to why the barley never sprouted, molded over, or was decimated by rodents and birds over the 61 years it’s sat here.

After Caroline saw this photo, she wished that I’d reached out to share an image so I could have snagged her one of these ancient bridles. Maybe she would have restored it and sent it to our niece in Germany, who loves horses but I couldn’t have imagined that she’d have been interested. Maybe she and I can travel through this corner of America next summer to collect a bridle, bed frame, an old stove, and that pot I wanted. Heck, there’s even an upstairs to the old home that might contain things of interest.

Instead of just bolting across the road it was moseying over, the deer and her fawns casually headed to the fence and then turned back to look at us with our window open, snapping photos of this beautiful family.

All the way up U.S. Route 24, we reached the Canadian border, and other than some border agents, there was nothing else out there. With all the ruins and this detour, we will not get further than my planned stop. Hey, Scobey, Montana, here we come.

Arriving in Scobey, Montana, after 12 hours of driving, we stopped at our hotel but didn’t check in as we learned there might be a restaurant still open over at the local golf course. It was dark as we passed what appeared to be an amazing history museum on the edge of town, but obviously, it wasn’t open. We’d called ahead to the Club House to verify it was open while on our way, and sure enough, it was open. Keep in mind that Scobey has a population of about 1,100 people and is seriously out in the middle of nowhere, so this was a real find after 8:00 p.m. on a Thursday night.

At dinner, we met Don and Laura Hagan while their daughter Erin was our server. We got to know a couple of other locals, too, but it was the Hagan family that made our night. Don has been farming about 4,000 acres of durum wheat, peas, and canola out this way while Laura works in the healthcare industry. If Caroline and I should ever pass through here, we’ll have to look them up. Thanks, Scobeyians, for making us feel so welcome.

Deep In The Beartooth Mountains

JWise Photo of the Day, Travels

We stayed in Red Lodge, Montana, just for this reason, a hike in the area known as the Absaroka-Beartooth Wilderness. Not a half-mile south of our hotel is West Fork Road, which dead-ends in the Custer Gallatin National Forest. Yeah, lots of names.

A relatively short part of the road was paved and a seemingly larger part of it is gravel, but Rock Creek that runs next to the road is nearly ever-present.

Somewhere out there is the end of the road and the beginning of some trail options.

A small wooden bridge took us over this view of the West Fork of Rock Creek.

Not far from the trailhead, we were greeted by this beautiful little marmot. Considering the burned log, Mr. Marmot is perched upon, you might be wondering if maybe fire has been through here recently. Well, we’ve been seeing the scars on the landscape, though there’s lots of regrowth in the area. Back in the summer of 2008, the Cascade Fire burned through about 10,000 acres southwest of Red Lodge.

We had planned to hike the Basin Lake Trail but decided to at least see what was at the end of the road and then decide if we might want to hike a mile or two in that area before tackling our 5-mile hike at the lake. We didn’t have a lot of water with us nor a backpack to carry it in, hence the consideration of a manageable 5-miler.

The trails out here are about 12 miles and up, so with only 2 liters of water, we knew that we’d have to keep things brief. In addition to being dumb enough not to have bought more water in town, we took off down the trail without so much as a tiny snack.

No matter, though, as we’re not going far, and when we return up the road to Basin Lake, we’ll remember to take a couple of energy bars from the car with us.

Though all around us is evidence of the fire, the regrowth is drawing us in to see what’s just up ahead.

Are these berries a type of bear food, or are we the tastier morsels? Without bear spray, I’m feeling a tiny bit vulnerable. Also, while we were out here, we failed to recognize these as elderberries, so we didn’t stop to enjoy a few.

That didn’t stop us from gobbling up as many raspberries as we could. These would come in especially useful about 5 hours later.

We passed a guy loaded with camera gear that told us of a nearby waterfall. That was enough to pull us deeper into the mountains to at least see that sight with our own eyes. He thought we were relatively close at this point.

We were wondering whether we might have missed the falls the guy told us about, as this cascade didn’t look like the image he showed us on his phone. No matter, this is pretty enough, and maybe the falls are just up ahead.

No, we want waterfalls, not rockfalls.

Okay, a lake is nice and well appreciated, so we’ll take that as motivation to look just a little further up the trail. We also seem to be moving away from the burn area as we are seeing more trees that escaped destruction.

Things are becoming enchanting with this giant boulder that apparently arrived from high above as who doesn’t love swirly granite?

Although we’d been super conservative with our limited water, we were aware that we should turn around soon if we were going to make our 5-mile hike back to Basin Lake.

Just a little further, and that would be it, but first, we needed to luxuriate in the shade of the forest that was getting thicker with every step forward.

Well, I learned that this is a tachinid fly, which was first identified by Carl Linnaeus back in 1761, and that Carl is known as the “Father of modern taxonomy,” but other than that, all I can share is that this is a fly.

Indian Paintbrush is beautiful no matter where one may see it. While I could be wrong about where I first saw it, my memory of when I learned its name goes back to our 2012 trip on the Alsek River.

I’ve just spent the better part of the last 20 minutes trying to determine what type of butterfly this is. Google, with its image search function, is great, but I keep getting pointed to this being a dark green fritillary. The problem is that this butterfly is not found to be in North America. Then there’s the silver-bordered fritillary that is a species found over on this side of the earth so I guess I’ll go with that.

As we walk along the trail, the scenery is forever changing, with perspectives offering views that are never the same twice. At best, we can only glance over, take an impression, and keep going; such is the nature of limited amounts of time and resources. The original inhabitants and explorers of these lands would have been able to crawl over the environment to their heart’s content; I, on the other hand am not offered this luxury.

Ooh, the trail is fully green now, so we should be smart about this and turn around.

Have I ever shared with you that my middle name is Moss-Garden?

Come to think of it, maybe I should have named my daughter Cascade instead of Jessica.

I believe the 60% of me that is water senses when molecules of its kind are flowing nearby, signaling me to bring them closer to where their cousins are free to travel where they will as opposed to being my prisoners. Sorry water, but in order for me to walk the land, I have to carry my personal ocean with me.

But look at how seductive this appears. Your cells will dry out one day anyway, so why not set them free to spill back into the flow? Water nourishes all, and if you think about it for a second, why not ask yourself what exactly you are doing to benefit life as you sequester those 16 gallons of water so selfishly?

Mountain ranges often act as vapor dams where clouds bunch up to drop their moisture on one side of the range. Down their slopes, the water is carried by gravity past trees and plants to feed them while also filling depressions and pockets, which supports the various lives that are scattered across this environment that is too hostile for humans to live in. What isn’t captured for these purposes might join a stream below, carrying it to other locations where water works to sustain all living things on this planet.

These craggy mountains are not the most inviting when it comes to the idea of taking a hike up their slopes unless walking on scree is your idea of a good time. Maybe if I were closer to that side of the range we are walking in, I’d have a different opinion, but from my vantage point, that looks hairy.

Damn, these photos suck compared to my memories of how extravagantly beautiful this place is.

Have you guessed yet that we have not yet turned around? We have no food with us, and while there’s a ton of water flowing nearby, neither Jessica nor I am willing to risk a Giardia Party in our pants on the way back to the trailhead. You would be correct in your summation that we are being idiots out here trying to limit how much we are drinking compared to the length of our hike.

Going into the mountains short on the essentials is feeling like my predicament right now as I try to write a coherent blog post about our hike; I’ve included too many photos, and I’m short on words to describe all of this.

Tufts of thick green grasses reflected in the water made for a beautiful sight while I stood on the opposite side of the river in admiration. I took the photo as I knew I wanted the reminder to share with Caroline after our return that this trail is significant for us and that we should endeavor to come back. Of course, my enthusiasm should be enough to share with my wife the impact this area has made on me, but on the other hand, I’d like for her to see a tiny fraction of what I was able to see.

My daughter Jessica is shooting an excess of photos too, but for her husband, my son-in-law, Caleb, who couldn’t be here with us.

If I think about it, I might have to admit to a small fetish with drying bleached fallen tree trunks and limbs. There’s something about the grain, twists, and jagged edges that my eyes find particularly appealing.

Fetish number 2, lichen. I should just continue with admitting that moss has a place in my heart, dried leaves too, and while I’ve taken time to inspect a scat or two trying to identify the fur or berries in it, I can’t really say I’d stop for every pile of poo I pass. Lichen, moss, driftwood, fallen leaves, plants reflecting in the water, yeah, all those things I’ll never get enough of.

Speaking of reflections.

Meadows are yummies for the eyes in my world.

I’d go out and frolic, but we don’t have bear spray, and by this time we’d seen probably three other groups out hiking and a family or two, and they all had bear spray on their hip …jeezus, we were unprepared. Well, not totally unprepared as we are armed with cameras and various lenses with plenty of storage capacity that, if we had to, we could probably photograph a bear to death.

Walking through this rockfall, I’m the kind of guy who listens closely for the boulder heading down from the cliffs above at ballistic speeds, as I imagine that I might be right here at the wrong time, ready to dodge such a deadly projectile.

This is not a forest pancake; it was a crawling fungus triggering PTSD memories from that late 1950s sci-fi horror film titled “The Mutoid Space Creature With Two Radioactive Mushroom Pancake Heads.”

It’s been over 4 hours since we started down this trail, and our Fitbits are saying we are already nearly 6 miles into the mountains.

We are looking for something that suggests that this is the definitive turn-around point; I’m certain that something along the way will let us know that this is it.

But we just keep on going.

Okay, this is it. The path forks, and we certainly won’t be making the hike up a strenuous trail to get to Lake Mary, though it’s only a mile. We are both getting hungry, and we are thirsty which was to be expected after this many miles with an equal number yet ahead of us. The other side of the fork goes to Quinnebaugh Meadows, though a part of me wonders if we have already reached that point. On that other fork, enough water is flowing over the trail that we know that this is where we turn around.

How’d we miss this on our way up the trail?

Ooh, and how did we miss this?

Did we see these flowers earlier, or were we looking the wrong way?

The hike back is mostly downhill, so we are making great time on our retreat, but some nice cold water sounds perfect right about now.

Along the trail, after being in the thick of the forest, we will be back among the raspberries that sustain my growing hunger pangs. My eyes, on the other hand, are well-fed.

Thirsty and hungry I still can’t help myself taking photos.

I first spotted a small snake crossing our path, but neither Jessica nor I were quick enough to grab a photo. Not 15 minutes later, she spotted this specimen curled up and warming on a stone. It didn’t move a scale the entire time we snapped off a dozen photos.

I took more than a few photos of butterflies, but this one was my very favorite.

Seven hours and twelve and a half miles later, we were done with our hike into the wilderness in a state of total unpreparedness. It was great to sit down in the car only to discover there was an extra bottle of water on the floor behind Jessica. Food was also at hand as we’ve been traveling with an ice-chest stocked with what we’d need to avoid restaurants as often as we’d want to. The hard part here was only having a small snack, so we’d be prepared for what comes next.

Dinner was again at the Piccola Cucina Ox Pasture Italian restaurant, except this evening, we indulged in our first dessert of the trip with a tableside “deconstructed” tiramisu. The espressos turned out to be a big mistake, as sleep was difficult to find after getting back to our motel. All around, it was just a perfect day, and was terrific to be out of the car for so long exercising the legs. Just an all-around sense of “wow!”

Transition Zone

JWise Photo of the Day, Travels

Yellowstone National Park in Wyoming

On our way out of Yellowstone, we are driving once more through Lamar Valley as the Northeast Entrance Road is technically U.S. Highway 212. Before we get to that point in the day though, we were stopped on the road by a herd of bison meandering from one side to the other. We definitely weren’t in a hurry (nor were the bison), but one California driver showed his disdain for some stupid animals and stopped cars as he pressed his Big Ass Truck through the waiting cars and past the bison while gesticulating wildly at us sheep who were observing these creatures’ right of way. Sadly, those of us who don’t (or no longer) live in California don’t really expect any different behavior from these elitist tools. And what did we get for our patience? This photo is of a beautiful young bison who personally came up to our car and thanked us for not running over any members of her tribe.

Yellowstone National Park in Wyoming

Then that very same baby bison offered to have its parents pose for us, Dad looking stoic and Mom gazing lovingly at her mate. Our fairy tale visit to Yellowstone is now complete, except for not seeing bears, wolves, herds of elk, bald eagles, lions, the largest eruption ever of Old Faithful, a helicopter view of Grand Prismatic, witnessing the super volcano hurling its guts over the Eastern United States, and Jesus appearing in the heavens above. Other than those omissions, our time here has been great.

Yellowstone National Park in Wyoming

Somehow, we ended up under the caldera rim as smoke started billowing from the rumbling floor of Yellowstone. Is this the big one? Are we about to be launched into the stratosphere to get that birds-eye view of the total destruction the tabloid press and Discovery Channel have been promising us for years? False alarm, we’re just passing through a mountain range on the way towards Cooke City, Montana.

Beartooth Mountain Range in Montana

We are in the Beartooth Mountains for my first-ever visit to this rarely accessible range. The southern end of this road is often closed due to snow which has stymied Caroline and me driving this famously scenic byway in the western United States on previous occasions. The rest of the images that accompany this blog post are seriously compromised as the smoke from California and Oregon wildfires were making for poor visibility conditions. The following photos have a judicious amount of dehazing applied to them.

Beartooth Mountain Range in Montana

The short stretch of Beartooth Highway, a.k.a. U.S. 212 that I’ve traveled on in the past I thought might be indicative of the entire highway, and I therefore assumed that the beautiful photos I’d seen from deep in the mountains required hikes far away from the road, but today I would learn that this idea was wrong. This was the first stop along U.S. 212 that was so enchanting that I had to pull over. Mind you, I wanted to pull over a dozen times before this, but convincing myself that I wouldn’t get a reasonable shot left me with so much doubt that I hadn’t given in. Reflecting upon even this image, I feel cheated as we were near the top of a pass in a large meadow, and there was so much more that captured the eye than this photo represents that I’d like to exclude it, but then I’d have to also end this blog entry right here.

Beartooth Mountain Range in Montana

In-person, the pink and gray granite against the green meadow was so vibrant that it encouraged me to attempt grabbing images that avoid the hazy horizon, but without direct sunlight, my camera just didn’t do the job that my eyes were able to glean.

Beartooth Mountain Range in Montana

I should share that I took very few notes about this day while Jessica and I were out on our road trip, and so here I am eleven days later, looking at the images and considering what I want to say and finding it difficult to grab words that will be vibrant enough to convey how profound things appeared. This tight crop betrays the nature of what’s up here, though maybe that’s a good thing as it should press me even harder to bring Caroline on a return visit with the hopes of catching this range on a clear day.

Beartooth Mountain Range in Montana

I shot this as a panorama, but the blue haze towards the right of the lake obscured too much, so here’s the left corner. With this final bit of lament regarding air conditions, I’ll try to move on.

Beartooth Mountain Range in Montana

Every corner up here in the Beartooth Mountains begs the visitor to leave the car behind and go for a hike, but without knowledge of trail length, bear spray, or even somewhere to pull over, it’s not so easy as just venturing into the landscape. If a return visit is ever going to be possible, it should be with the idea that we will remain in the area for three to five days with a number of trails already selected.

Beartooth Mountain Range in Montana

Like our visits to the glaciated area along the Alsek River in Canada and Alaska, I’m in awe at the profusion of wildflowers which have the briefest of windows to explode on the scene before the snows begin to fall again and the days grow short.

Beartooth Mountain Range in Montana

Why isn’t this area a national park? I’m guessing that the main reason would be that the designation would then require a better effort to offer visitor services in a place that might only be intermittently visitable for 60 to 90 days a year. Jumping ahead in our drive through here, I got the impression in Red Lodge, Montana, where we were staying for a couple of nights, that there are parts of the Beartooth range that are accessible for a good part of the year. So, the problem of access might be restricted to the highest elevations and coming in from the southerly entrance.

Beartooth Mountain Range in Montana

If you suffer from a fear of heights, avoid this road. Being simultaneously drawn to look out at the horizon and demanding that I maintain tunnel vision can produce moments of panic as it feels like my eyes are drawn too deeply into what lies beyond the safety of the road.

Beartooth Mountain Range in Montana

Live cams need to be placed throughout the area, or better yet; I need to photograph a couple of dozen or more locations once a month for a year so everyone can see how these places change throughout the year.

Beartooth Mountain Range in Montana

One has to wonder why this road is even here. On one side is Cooke City, Montana, and entry to Yellowstone, but there are plenty of other ways into the park. On the other side is Red Lodge, Montana, with a small population of 2,200 that really doesn’t gain a thing having this road wend its way through such treacherous terrain. That must mean that this road is only here for the pleasure of those few travelers who learn about its existence and need to revel in such extraordinary sights.

Beartooth Mountain Range in Montana

Along the road, we encountered a construction site where a primitive single-lane dirt road must be navigated behind a pilot vehicle that takes us past a bridge being built. $27 million in improvements elevate the roadway over the landscape so animals will have a better path through the environment. As construction can only proceed during the short summer season, there’s no completion date in sight, but when it is finished, it promises to add to the nail-biting experience of being out on the edge of the earth.

We are obviously above the tree line here at 10,947 feet (3,336 meters) above the sea far below. Sorry, but I must lament that with the Sturgis Motorcycle Rally starting soon, the roar of the bikes hauling ass up here is a bit annoying. Of course, to them, the incredible vistas make for an exciting ride, but those who get out of the car and want to spend a moment in admiration of the solitude in such a remote area find it difficult with the constant racing by of so many bikers. Not only do we hear the noise of their stupidly loud exhausts, but we must also contend with radios blaring classic rock and country anthems.

To belabor the point, this public performance of these songs from motorcycles is my equivalent of hearing the Horst Wessel Song on a hike through the Zugspitze in Germany. Mountains are for quiet contemplation, not listening to AC/DC sing Thunderstruck or Lee Greenwood asking God to bless the U.S.A. Yeah, I’m that curmudgeon.

Beartooth Mountain Range in Montana

The expanse is nothing short of awe-inspiring; the scale exceeds any ability of the photograph to portray what is seen beyond the haze. For the rest of our drive out of the mountains, the weather was turning dark due to storms in the forecast, and I just wanted to exit the strenuous side of the drive, so this was the end of photos.

Arriving in Red Lodge, Montana, it was raining as we checked into the hotel, but we were quickly gone to find a restaurant. Just a few minutes later, the rain stopped again, and instead of grabbing a bite to eat, we dipped into the local coffee shop that was closing at 6:00 to catch up on some note-taking and ensure we’d be awake past 8:00 p.m.

Dinner was at Piccola Cucina Ox Pasture Italian restaurant. What this place is doing in a town of 2,200 is beyond me, as their other locations are in New York City and Ibiza. Real and I do mean real Italian cuisine is to be found here. When I ordered the Cacio e Pepe I would have never dreamed that they actually make their pasta here locally and that my dish would be served from a cheese wheel at my table instead of a plate of something they call Cacio e Pepe.

Wild Nature

JWise Photo of the Day, Travels

Grand Prismatic Spring at Yellowstone National Park in Wyoming

It’s right in front of you, the biggest of its kind on these shores, but you can’t see it as it hides below a veil of steam. We are at Midway Geyser Basin in Yellowstone National Park, and right there is the Grand Prismatic Spring. Some walk by disappointed that the thing they know from photos or TV is not can’t be seen by them today while I relish the idea that I’m once again in the proximity of greatness.

Midway Geyser Basin in Yellowstone National Park, Wyoming

What would be needed to wake people to the fact that they are always near greatness? Because this rainbow-hued spring cannot be viewed in all of its vibrancy, people are grumbling while perceiving something was lost during their vacation. Nothing is common here; everything is out of the ordinary and unique, yet they fixate on seeing one or two things to define the value of where they’ve been. For some, seeing Old Faithful and bison will be enough to say they’ve seen Yellowstone, but that’s as shortsighted as going to Paris and briefly seeing the Mona Lisa and glancing at the Eifel Tower in order to tell everyone back home that they’ve been to the City of Light while ignoring the billions of other things that make Paris the city it is. While no one can see the entirety of a place in hours, we can be grateful for what we do have the opportunity to experience.

Midway Geyser Basin in Yellowstone National Park, Wyoming

Looking at the earth below our feet, we can gaze into the heavens using the reflection of the sky above while the waters that flow from the Grand Prismatic Spring continue to build the travertine structures and create beds for the bacteria that live in these organic puzzle pieces. The tiniest bit of skill is required to extract words from the language to give meaning to where we are, but when we betray that potential by reducing our vocabulary to grumbling, we forget to pay homage to our humanity and good fortune. We do not only smile at the baby, we convey a multitude of cultural and emotional context that is sharing with the next generation what we find important. When we pass through nature and find disappointment that we didn’t see the bear or some other particular thing, we are breaking the contract of sharing our best traits with the next generation by teaching them to vocalize their disapproval for all those around them who might be enjoying the moment.

Midway Geyser Basin in Yellowstone National Park, Wyoming

Behind me, while I was taking in the Grand Prismatic Spring, was the Excelsior Geyser, also shrouded in steam but with the gray sky and bits of sunlight peeking through. I looked at the reflections in that direction and couldn’t believe my luck at how many times I’ve stood in the park watching billowing clouds rise from hot springs that give us hints of things unseen below us.

Midway Geyser Basin in Yellowstone National Park, Wyoming

Words and emotions are the communicative hints of who we are within that are largely unseen by others. When we express ourselves with enthusiasm we are recognizing our good luck at how many times we’ve been in a situation worth sharing. Our essence of being human is locked in this exchange just as the waters of the geyser create the picture of the object you are looking for.

Midway Geyser Basin in Yellowstone National Park, Wyoming

Far from the waters that flow from the hot spring, beauty is also to be found. In a similar sense, the words and emotions people share flow far away from them, offering impressions to artists and new generations who borrow from those precious moments to shape culture. To desire only the big picture is to throw away the largest mass of unrealized potential, and this is the condition of those who only desire to exemplify the most superficial nature of the self, the exterior. We inhabit a multitude of various planes of existence that create our cultural complexity, and yet, by displaying only our external selves, we fail to share the inner self, maybe because we are afraid of the person inside we don’t really know. In my view, it’s a tragedy that we fail at putting the deeper self on display while we invest so much energy and money visiting the gym, buying trendy clothes, the right accouterments, tattoos, our cars, and homes that demonstrate the external self. We should aim for the same symbiotic relationship of elements we witness in the complex beauty we find in nature. When someone is more aligned with that symbiotic balanced personhood, we are better prepared to find magnificence in the little things.

Standing on our own atop a monument of what lies below the surface takes daring, as in our culture, we have no real room for individuality. Like here in Yellowstone, we don’t care about the hydrological function below the surface; we only desire to see the herd of animals, the forest, or the geyser as it’s geysering.

Excited to get to Grand Prismatic before the crowds, we waited for breakfast until we reached the perfect place for it. That ended up being after we turned east, away from Mammoth Hot Springs, on our way to the Lamar Valley at Blacktail Pond Overlook. I should finally note that we are traveling with much of our own food to cut down on expenses, hence why our first meal of the day was roadside.

I have to give my daughter credit as, like this ground squirrel, she takes an intense interest in observing stuff and trying to find her own angle as she snaps away, taking photos that will join her book of memories. The entire drive from Phoenix to this corner of Wyoming, she’s been talking about seeing animals along the way; this is the reminder for her that she not only saw ground squirrels but even had one rush up to her and try to poop on her shoe.

Bison in Lamar Valley at Yellowstone National Park, Wyoming

It’s rutting season for the bison, and the males are emitting some impressive guttural sounds. If their size doesn’t frighten you, these deep grunts certainly will.

Bison in Lamar Valley at Yellowstone National Park, Wyoming

As they compete for dominance among one another, they pair off and let the fur fly as we onlookers marvel at the primal force and musculature on display here in the park. Jessica and I were able to hang out at a safe distance and watch the fury the bison were directing at rival males to land prime mating opportunities if they could prove they were at the apex of this hierarchy.

Bison in Lamar Valley at Yellowstone National Park, Wyoming

These incredibly beautiful animals are but a few of the 360,000 that exist in the North American herd today. Prior to the arrival of our European ancestors, it is estimated that 30-60 million of them existed. At the low point, only about 1,000 of them were alive as they verged on extinction. If farmers on the borders of Yellowstone had their way, this herd would be destroyed as they risk bringing disease to the nearby cattle populations. A disease that ironically was brought in by non-indigenous cattle in the first place. By the way, those 360,000 bison are nothing when you think that right here in the United States, we slaughter 46 million cows, 121 million pigs, and 9 billion chickens per year, and it’s the existence of 360,000 bison that irks the cattle industry.

Okay, I’ll get off the mountain and come back down to being a tourist. Leaving Lamar Valley, we couldn’t take the road that passes Mt. Washburn (this is not that mountain) as that road is closed for construction. So we backtracked through Mammoth, past Norris Geyser Basin, where we turned left towards the lake again in hopes of seeing more elk.

Okay, so this isn’t wildlife, but if you think about it for a moment, this is wildlife.

West Thumb at Yellowstone National Park in Wyoming

Over the course of our drive to West Thumb Geyser Basin, we spotted a few elk, but with periodic rain and dark skies, I wasn’t able to capture a half-decent image, but that’s okay, by the time we reached this corner of the lake we had a respite in the foul weather.

West Thumb at Yellowstone National Park in Wyoming

Here at the Fishing Cone, it was common practice 120 years ago to stand on the cone and fish for trout. Once caught, the fish was dunked into the hot waters of the geyser and cooked before incredulous visitors. Back then, it was possible to see this geyser erupt to heights of 40 feet over the lake.

West Thumb at Yellowstone National Park in Wyoming

Back in 2003, the boardwalk led right up against this hot spring. I can only imagine it was moved closer to the lake to help stop people throwing stuff into the pool. While we are lucky to have been able to walk the original trail, I understand that we humans are not trustworthy to follow the rules and act respectfully. If you’d like to see that old boardwalk and what this pool looks like on a sunny day, click here and scroll down 24 photos.

West Thumb at Yellowstone National Park in Wyoming

Here we are at the edge of controlled and wild nature. In one corner, we have the National Park’s attempt at controlling people who oftentimes are being introduced to a vast, uncontrollable side of America, and in the other corner the untameable and unpredictable face of a caldera. Nature cannot bow to our will, though we do have the ability to harm it. In the end, it has a greater ability to inflict destruction upon us in profoundly unsettling ways. We are the ones who, with knowledge and the ability to control our actions, are supposed to respect nature and support how we can symbiotically live within it as it sustains us and all other life.

West Thumb at Yellowstone National Park in Wyoming

This dry, hot spring that might have also been a geyser is a dusty bowl here on our visit. Is it only dry due to the time of year, was it clogged with debris people threw into it, or is something ominous at work where the hydrology of the park is cooking up even bigger changes? We are not afforded the luxury of knowing the intention of such large complex systems below the surface of the earth, so why do we think we can control even larger and more complex systems such as oceans and the atmosphere of our planet? I think indigenous people are correct in saying that modern man does not pay enough respect to the land we live on or the skies we live under.

West Thumb at Yellowstone National Park in Wyoming

Forboding sky, meet convulsive earth, with these little naive people standing between you who believe they reign tall in the hierarchy of this spectacular evolving creation. I dream of the day they stand with respect before nature and harness their knowledge to instill values in their kind that are able to invest in places such as this in the same way they do their cars, homes, and cities. Fortunately for humans, there are no destructive hordes of creatures harvesting or burning their cities, and there are no other animals or organisms on earth that intentionally poison their drinking water or work so vigilantly as they themselves do to soil their environment. In that respect, humans might be one of nature’s biggest mistakes.

Grand Prismatic Spring at Yellowstone National Park in Wyoming

Well, here we are back at Midway Geyser Basin for a late-day visit to Grand Prismatic Spring to see how conditions changed between morning and now.

Midway Geyser Basin in Yellowstone National Park, Wyoming

Everything checks out for being in its place. Beauty still rules the view. Best of all though, thanks to the overcast skies, the parking lot, earlier quite overloaded with dozens of cars waiting to get in, was half empty, meaning we were here mostly alone. Just us here with some hot springs, distant trees, threatening storm clouds, the warm and glorious bacteria cheering our return, and some unfathomable amount of air and earth. Yep, just us.

Midway Geyser Basin in Yellowstone National Park, Wyoming

Hey John, is this really one of your best examples of photographic magic? Well, that’s purely subjective, isn’t it? What I can assure you of is that it’s a snapshot of a place and a moment that I experienced with my daughter here on August 2nd, 2021.

Grand Prismatic Spring at Yellowstone National Park in Wyoming

Yep, that’s lava flowing out of the water, or maybe it’s a trillion parties of bacteria in their lit cities, as seen from this satellite view. Oops, I was wrong; this is the work of Banksy, who threw down some damn realistic-looking graffiti turning this plain old hot spring into a multi-billion dollar artwork.

So Much To Do

JWise Photo of the Day, Travels

Writing setup in Old Faithful Inn Yellowstone National Park, Wyoming

With overcast skies early this morning, I sat down in a very quiet Old Faithful Inn to catch up on some writing but quickly realized my opportunity to see the lodge just this way was a rarity. Sadly, I didn’t wander the place as with the sun potentially making an arrival; I needed to jump-start the fingers to do some bidding of the mind to capture my thoughts for yesterday’s blog entry. Jessica is off outside for a short walk, seeing the awesome things I’ll fail to capture as my priorities have changed so dramatically since any of my previous visits to Yellowstone.

Old Faithful Inn Yellowstone National Park, Wyoming

With so much to do but limited time to do it all, we try to make priorities. Most guests appear to be sleeping in right now while behind the scenes; others are likely already prepping for the needs of those still behind closed doors. I need to put this to rest right now: I finished what I could write about yesterday, and it is time to get myself outside to see what the day and my imagination have in store.

Upper Geyser Basin in Yellowstone National Park, Wyoming

It’s cold and gray when I get outside, and I’m reluctant to explore. Something is missing in my joie de vivre, and that something is Caroline. It’s bittersweet finding myself at Yellowstone and not being able to connect to her passionate embrace of life. This leads to the question, how can I so easily find my enthusiasm to be in a place such as Europe when she’s not there? The answer is I’m trying to write to my wife during those times, but I’m distracted by such busy days out here with my daughter, and our personalities are not quite as in tune as Caroline’s and mine.

My inclination was to drag my bag of melancholy back into Old Faithful Inn and continue writing. I’ll start with a love letter to my wife before detouring with a good venting of whatever spleen was clogging up my happiness, but after Jessica and I walked awhile, things lightened up within me, and with the sun emerging, so did better spirits, but, oh how I wish Caroline was here with us.

There are as many memories here as there are trees and hot springs, and every step is a walk into experiences shared with my wife. I can’t begin to figure out how to make memories here for my daughter and me, as it seems that everything is seeping with the essence of Caroline.

After our long walk over the Upper Geyser Basin, we dipped into the cafe next door to the lodge for a quick bite and some water and then a return to the inn as I’d forgotten something in our room. With a full stomach and some sense, I needed to write something. I sat down at the same table as earlier and ended up feeling more tired than inspired. Maybe we should get up and go out for some more exploring of things?

Then, somewhere along the trail, I start to gather glimmers about what the issue might be, but first, some background. Of course, there’d be some other details as rarely, if ever, do I just drop into a concise explanation of anything. In national parks, where I should be leaving the rest of the world and my troubles behind me, I find myself locked in turmoil as, depending on the size of crowds I encounter, I have to immerse myself not just in nature but the morass that is a microcosm of our planet. During this time of pandemic, my immersion takes on interesting qualities. While I was in Germany I was dealing primarily with Germans, but here in Yellowstone, I’m mostly here with Americans.

As is typical for this time of year, should people be traveling (which they are), there are lots of visitors in the park. So, like in a high-end shopping center, I’m here with those people who can afford to spend $500 to $1500 a day on vacation. By and large, the experience regarding the human element in this park is not pleasant. The rangers and staff are great, as are a good handful of the visitors, but a majority are the worst. Not in some criminal or sociopathic kind of way but in attitude.

Amongst all socioeconomic classes of Americans are those who lack any hint of authenticity. I’m certain that to their other superficial friends and family, they are the greatest people ever, no doubt at all, but from my throne of judgment, I cannot find a hint of their empathy for others. Without empathy, you are not allowed into the club of the authentic.

I walked by a man who, by appearance, might have played a different role, but here on the Upper Geyser Basin, he was pushing either his own mother or his mother-in-law in a wheelchair. It’s hard to portray your arrogant loftiness when hunched over a person with disabilities. Back in June in Germany, walking at a snail’s pace with my mother-in-law as she scooted along with her walker, there’s no looking cool to others except those who might empathize with your task at hand.

A mother with four young children cannot wear airs of aloofness when the tribe is running circles around her. She tries to maintain decorum, but you can easily see her limits. A large family vacation, where maybe a reunion is happening, will show you a lot of their dynamic as most everyone is reduced to being their most authentic selves, and those who do not fit in with letting their hair down walk away from the group and are easily identified.

Visitors to any natural area should be there in the moment to see what is there and not worry about being seen or how they appear to others, but the truth is that we humans, by and large, take our swimsuit bodies and nightclub faces everywhere we go. How many would be disappointed to know that there are those of us out here who find more beauty in the steam rising off a hot spring than their ridiculous attempt at looking “put together?”

We spent hours out here on the Upper Geyser Basin, and not once did I see anyone else, aside from my daughter, get down to eye level with the small stuff. Heck, they barely slowed down even for the 20-minute wait to see Old Faithful erupt – in the company of 100s of other visitors.

What’s not seen here are selfies of my daughter and/or me posing in front of any of this because we are too busy not seeing ourselves and instead are witnessing the tiny details that will hopefully seep into our memories, hopefully creating a dad-and-daughter experience in our 11 days into America.

All of these photos I’m posting from here at Yellowstone are conveying information, and while you may not be able to read precisely what is offered, you could do some research and discover what they are. I could share 45 photos of Jessica and you’d still not know a thing about her other than she’s in a national park on vacation with her father. That would be enough as far as you, the casual reader of my blog, are concerned, but for me, I need to know that my shared time with other people carries value that will enhance who I want to be.

Bacterial mats are authentic as they cannot portray anything more than what they are, which is not true with humans. We play roles and use appearance to create our initial line of defense. We avoid eye contact to stop others from establishing a line in, and, should we talk with the other, we can use curt answers to push them away. Most times, we do not have to engage these people; they are offering up who they are within their own families, to their spouses, or to the service person attempting to assuage their anger that life isn’t perfect for them right now.

You will not look deeper into those people who don’t want you to see their humanity as our society has conditioned them that this is weakness. Beauty, perfection, and aloofness are how we allow those below us to fully appreciate the grandeur of our existence. Sadly, this is how a large part of our society responds and finds its own values.

Should you have strangely enough made it to this point in what should have been a silent soliloquy not meant for visitors searching for Yellowstone and reaching my blog, please excuse me, but COVID has turned our world upside down, and while I don’t know about everyone else, I’m evaluating, analyzing, and scrutinizing everything about how the world within and around me is resetting.

But enough of all that, as the world of traveling is not all about the depth of thoughts, it is also allowed to be about the depth of vision and the unknown depths of a geyser. Just take a second to admire the orange bacteria right next to the white calcified ring of minerals on the left of the hot spring, where its opening shows you the aquamarine hue that is difficult to see in the most shallow region of the pool.

Then, on the other side of that pool is a dew-covered plant that is diffusing the individual branches with the light of the sun blurring the picture into shades of red, yellow, and white.

An island sprouts from the tepid, chalky waters and would be easily missed if all I was doing was glancing over the complex landscape, looking for the biggest features that could grab my attention. Qualifying all things great and beautiful into categories that in an instant can be sorted into important or irrelevant is not a place my brain works as I feel that everything has the potential to shine through if you are open to discovering the things that are just before your nose.

It seems that nature has created its own Japanese Zen Garden right here in a hot spring otherwise, how do you explain the nearly perfect layout of river stones around the travertine temple?

This is the appropriately named Ear Spring that I believe I’ve photographed on every other previous visit to Yellowstone. With my 9th occasion to be here, I wonder how the other images might differ from this. After 20 years of not using best practices to catalog my photos, I have to admit I have no easy method for finding those other images from the many 10’s of thousands I store on my computer. Labeling is important, but who knew I’d still be snapping photos of so many places I’ve visited again and again over the years?

From morning to midday we are still walking across the basin.

Taking time to watch a skittish chipmunk emerge from hiding before darting out to nibble on some sweet flowers. Seems to us that this cute little guy is as delightful as seeing bison.

I can’t help but think that this new travertine growth wasn’t damaged by an animal stepping onto the geyser surface but by a human mashing this fragile stuff. While we know it can repair itself, if you imagine just 1% of the 4 million visitors, or 40,000 of them, were walking on this, there would be very little for the 3.96 million of the rest of us to see.

Purple, gray, orange, brown, and white are organized into peculiar forms. In the top left of the image, I see a face to the right of a small skull, and if I were stoned, I would probably see ten other visual features I’d swear were there.

Formerly known as Oyster Pool, this serene-looking hot spring had its name changed back around 1929 after a Belgian man somehow found himself in the 182 degrees Fahrenheit (82c) waters that claimed his life. This hot spring is now known as the Belgian Pool.

We’ll pay a million dollars for a work of modern art using this motif while a parent walking by will not flinch as their teen son spits into a hot spring, such class!

If you knew where this was you’d know what comes next.

Morning Glory Pool it is.

Firehole Lake Drive was our next stop on this adventure. The park is packed, jam-packed. The parking lots are overflowing, but maybe because you can’t see much of this drive from the main road, there weren’t many people turning to investigate the area, so we chose to go here instead of fighting with the lines to other basins. This is Firehole Spring.

The Great Fountain Geyser was not living up to its name while we were here, and we weren’t prepared to wait for 6 to 10 hours for it to possibly erupt, so here’s a shot of it in its elegant dormant state rung by orange pools.

Why is this fallen tree in this pool? Maybe it was here first, and water started bubbling out of a nearby hole, washing away the thin soil the tree was holding onto, and now, instead of the tree standing tall over the landscape, it is slowly disintegrating as it’s absorbed while death removes its existence.

White-footed trees are a feature here in the park as the highly mineralized waters are absorbed by the plant life. I would have liked to share the image of these trees on an early cold morning when steam is rising from the grasses, bringing yet more mystery to the landscape of Yellowstone.

The waters are flowing out of Black Warrior Lake, which is fed by Firehole Lake, this drive’s namesake. The combined waters of the two lakes feed into Hot Lake, which is then carried via Tangled Creek over to the Firehole River, and if I’m not figuring this wrong, they finally flow into the Missouri River.

Wait a second while I contemplate the merits of being moss, growing on an old tree, never paying rent or taxes, bargaining for fresh water, and needing to visit a grocery store for food. While my lifespan might only be 2 to 10 years, I’d have the exquisite fortune of living naked in a place no one can otherwise afford to live in.

If I were moss I’d be looking at the mating grounds of my parents because water is where the male and female reproductive cells meet to create. How moss ends up on trees and rocks, though, is a mystery worth maintaining. I think I’ll go with the idea that they are in contact with aliens who teleport them to places that would be comfy for moss to grow and enjoy the view, reporting back to their alien overlords what they are seeing on this planet.

Up Firehole Canyon past the waterfalls and cascades.

Upper Geyser Basin in Yellowstone National Park, Wyoming

And then back to the Upper Geyser Basin for sunset…

Upper Geyser Basin in Yellowstone National Park, Wyoming

…bubbling water…

Upper Geyser Basin in Yellowstone National Park, Wyoming

…some small eruptions…

Upper Geyser Basin in Yellowstone National Park, Wyoming

…reflections of the late day sun…

Upper Geyser Basin in Yellowstone National Park, Wyoming

…topped off with glistening water spilling over bacteria mats.

Upper Geyser Basin in Yellowstone National Park, Wyoming

Of course, this doesn’t all end with the setting sun, as I have plenty of photographs to work on and a need to try capturing some notes that can be turned into a full blog entry. I’d like to point out since I mentioned notes: compared to Germany, where I was writing each blog as I went along, my daughter and I on this adventure are just too busy exploring or driving to find enough time to stay current with each day. On to the next day.