Mr. & Mrs. Vandebilt + kids

It seemed a shame to come this close to Old Faithful and the Morning Glory basin and not actually get to see it. Especially since it was a bit of a trek to get here. I will say though – this is one of the few areas that we’ve seen so far that I would definitely come back to. We had a few days to wait until the west part of the park was opened, plus we had a birthday to celebrate so we settled into a spectacular Airbnb with a view of the Tetons and our own hot tub.

We were essentially in the middle of nowhere, but it was so nice to just have nothing to do for a few days. I got some work done, the kids got caught up on school, we enjoyed the hot tub, the kids connected with their friends and we just enjoyed being. We had an upscale version of the Launching Cottage – an A-Frame with a loft – but minus the red shag carpets and wildly uncomfortable furniture.

Madeline celebrated her 9th birthday in the mountains of Idaho with a couple of gifts, waffles and bacon for dinner and brownies for dessert. She heard from all of her people and spent the day feeling special. It was probably the most successful birthday we have had so far!

Eventually it was time to head in for the opening of West Yellowstone. First stop was Old Faithful. Jacob and I have seen geysers before when we were in Iceland but this would be a first for the kids. I’m not sure if it’s our fault for hyping it up so much, or if they’ve just become completely desensitized but it didn’t necessarily live up to the hype. I also think the way it was presented took a way from it. It’s hard to believe that it’s actually a natural occurrence since they’ve built it up so much around it. It feels a lot more like a Disney show than an act of nature. You have to walk through the visitors centre where they have the eruption times posted. You sit down with a crowd of people surrounding the geyser and wait for it to shoot up. People started dispersing even before the eruption was over – kind of like beating the crowd before the buzzer in the third period.

Now I’m not saying it wasn’t cool. I think anytime boiling water shoots out of the ground is something to see. It just felt a lot like the Bellagio fountains and a lot less like a marvel of geology.

After the geyser we headed back through the park to stop at some of the coloured pools. The Morning Glory basin is the one that is most pictured. We were unfortunately there on a really calm day so we couldn’t really see the pool from all the steam. You can see that there are a bunch of colours, but you’re on a boardwalk that’s not raised, so you can’t really get to see it like the pictures show. You also have to share the walk with people who think its fun to throw things in the pools to see what happens. Sharing nature with people has its drawbacks.

Before we left the park we found another wolf hunting around the edges of a river. We got to watch it stalk around for probably 15-20 minutes before it wandered too far for us to really see it. It was absolutely spectacular to watch and a good reminder that I absolutely never want to meet one of these things in the wild.