Since our natural time to wake up in 6:30 am CST, Glenn and I were up at 5:30 am MST. Unfortunately, they only give you 2 packets of caffeinated coffee, and nothing opens until around 8:00 am. Other than that, we were excited for the day’s upcoming adventure. First on the plan was to stop at the Biscuit Basin, view the thermal features, and hike to Mystic Falls. Zach was a bit more comfortable around the thermal features, and we did not have to worry about him venturing off the boardwalk.
Once we reached the trailhead, we armed ourselves with bear spray and bug spray. The insect repellent is an absolute must on this trail. It was chilly when we headed out, so Zach and I had to take our jackets off and re-apply. However, this is a very beautiful hike along the river. It wasn’t hot, and there wasn’t a huge elevation gain. Zach is not much of a hiker yet, but he did very well, and hiked on his own the entire way. Mystic Falls was a gorgeous water fall. There are a few areas where you can actually see steam coming out of the rocks due to thermal activity. We just hiked to the waterfall and returned the way we came instead of doing the loop. We saw some squirrels, chipmunks and magpies on this trail. Luckily, no bears!
Our next activity is to hike to the overlook to get a good view of the Grand Prismatic Spring. It wasn’t a long hike, but getting up that hill with all the downed trees and the soft dirt would have been a challenge if it was just me, but I was also assisting my 4 year old son. Zach fell quite a bit, and even I fell once. Glenn went up much further than we did. Zach found a spot where he could sit and play in the dirt, and he was happy with that. I found a spot to sit on a downed log while we waited for Glenn to snap his pictures. I enjoyed taking the view in from above. The sun was out, and it was really amazing to see all the beautiful colors of the Grand Prismatic Spring. We survived the trip down the hill and got to the pavement. While walking back to the parking lot, we saw an osprey flying overhead while carrying a fish in its talons. There were also some cool dragon flies flying around the river. Now that we were sweaty, covered in dirt, and still smelled of bug spray, we decided to head back to the cabin to get cleaned up and have some lunch.
The agenda for the afternoon is to see more geysers, walk to the Morning Glory Pool and back. We saw that Old Faithful was about to erupt, so we hung out to see Old Faithful again. Zach really enjoyed seeing this geyser. Our next stop is to see Daisy Geyser, and we had 30 minutes to get there. We stopped a little too long at some of the areas such as Castle Geyser, which was bubbling pretty good, and Grotto Geyser, which was bubbling even more. We reached Daisy Geyser right as it was shooting off. It was neat to see another geyser besides Old Faithful. There was also the treat of seeing a bison off in the trees. Although the clouds overhead indicated there may be some rain in the near future, we decided to push onto the Morning Glory Pool since we’ve come so far. The Morning Glory Pool was beautiful, but it would have been nice to see in full sunlight. We started making our way back, and once we got back to the Grotto Geyser, it was starting to lightly sprinkle. I was so glad that I put the rain ponchos in my backpack, and Zach and I put ours on at this time. After ours were on, Glenn decided he should put his on too. It was a good thing because it POURED on us! We were pretty much the only ones out there with rain jackets. We would have been soaked and frozen had we not had them.
Once we made it back to the Village area, we warmed up with some dinner and coffee. We went back to the cabin to rest for a bit. Although exhausted, we all wanted to see the Riverside Geyser, which was estimated to erupt at 7pm. At 6pm, we headed back out, and thankfully the rain had stopped. After viewing this unique and long lasting geyser, we all decided that Riverside was our favorite, and we were glad we made the trek out there.