Family Reunion Day 2: West Yellowstone

We spent the second day of the family reunion in West Yellowstone. We visited the Grizzly and Wolf Discovery Center and saw Newsies at the Playmill Theatre which was really good.

Kids playing before we left. The trampoline and the playhouse got good use!

The Granite Wolf Pack had some enrichment activities. Here one of the wolves (Adara) was eating some food off a rock.

Summit caught a fish in the stream!

Looking for more goodies.

Nakina in the grizzly bear enclosure.

Learning about bears and what they eat.

The 5-12 year olds in the group participated in Keeper Kids. They went into the grizzly enclosure where they hid food for the bears. They each got to pick out a button of one of the animals. Megan chose Kootenai, one of the River Valley wolves, and Matthew chose Zack, one of the bald eagles.

Entering the grizzly enclosure. All the kids threw some apple slices into the pond for the bears.

Matthew hiding his bear treats. It consisted of dog food, carrots, lettuce and apple slices.

Megan hiding her bear treats. The kids hid the food really well so the ravens wouldn't get the food before the bears did.

Keeper kids waving once they finished hiding their food for the bears.

Spirit and 101 entered the enclosure and immediately started looking for the hidden food!

Spirit went to the area where Megan hid her food (on the left) and 101 went to the area where Matthew hid his food.

Spirit

101

Waiting for the bird show to begin.

This is Nahani, a rough legged hawk. Impressive wingspan!

This is Acadia, a northern saw-whet owl. She is tiny!

Roosevelt, Grant and Coram in the grizzly enclosure.

The bears often test out new designs of "bear proof" containers. If the bear works at it for an hour and can't get into the container, it is officially considered bear proof. However, many don't pass the test. It was really interesting to watch--the bear jumped on the trash can, bit it, rolled it, pushed it and pried at it. It really wanted the food insider that can!

Success! (For the bear, anyway.)

Two bears playing in the water together.

The bald eagles, Josh, Zack and Jordan.

Megan with a bald eagle carving.

Matthew, Megan ad Me

Sam. He is a big Alaskan bear and is twice the size of many of the other bears at the Center.

Sam after his bath.

Matthew and dad with Sam in the background. Matthew really wanted to see Sam because he was so big and because then we'd have seen all the bears at the Center.

Kootenai of the River Valley Wolf Pack awaits his enrichment time. This is the wolf Megan got on her button.

Yellowstone: Mammoth Hot Springs

The next morning, we headed out from Gardiner to Mammoth Hot Springs. I had really been looking forward to seeing Mammoth as it looked amazing. It did not disappoint. On our way to Mammoth, we stopped at the 45th Parallel and played in the river. We had planned on going to Boiling River, where hot spring water flows into the Gardiner River but it was closed due to high water flow. Instead, the kids enjoyed playing in a shallow, slow-moving part of the river instead. We then hiked and drove around Mammoth Hot Springs.

Ben, Matthew, Me, Cheryl-Lynn

Me and U

Cheryl-Lynn and Me.

Ben and Matthew play by the river.

So much fun!

Lizzie, Megan and Cheryl-Lynn walk to the river.

Megan and Lizzie.

Sarah enjoyed building stone cairns.

Mammoth as seen on the approach. It looks pretty desolate!

Ben, Matthew and Andrew at Palette Spring.

Palette Spring

Here you can see the deposits of calcium carbonate forming the terrace.

Sarah and Me

U at a flow area by Palette Spring.

Little "terraces" created by the spring.

Liberty Cap, which is 37 feet tall. It would have been cool to see when it was active!

A plover enjoying the water.

Sarah by Minerva Terrace.

Matthew, Lizzie, Andrew, Ben and Sarah

Mound and Jupiter Terraces, which are currently not very active, hence the lack of color.

U, Luke, Ben, Lizzie, Cheryl-Lynn, Megan, Me, Matthew, Andrew and Kiley.
(Kiley was taking pictures and then got in when someone took a group picture for us. That's why it looks like my sister and I switched husbands....)

Me with Cleopatra Terrace.

The next pictures are a sampling of some of the cool formations we saw. Some are quite little. Many reminded me of coral.

Spring, possibly at the top of Palette.

Megan and Lizzie with New Blue Spring.

Top of the Main Terrace.

Kiley stayed with all the kids while the three other adults walked to Canary Spring. It wasn't far but no one else wanted to come.

See the steam? That's where we are going.

Cheryl-Lynn and Me with Canary Spring. She's so tall! (She might have had a little help from the stairs.)

Me and U.

Canary Spring. It was really pretty!

Close up of Canary Spring.

Snake on the terrace. We thought there were better places for it to live!

The next few pictures are of some of the formations we saw on the Upper Terrace Drive.

We stopped by the Albright Visitor Center where Megan decided to try on some horns and antlers. Here she has on bison horns.

Megan with an elk antler.