Moose and geysers

 The best word to describe today is “amazing “. The day was a story in two parts. This morning before breakfast we watched a moose bull and cow advertise their availability to one another, including the bull shaking branches with his antlers to show how big and strong they are and drooling to maximize his moosey scent.

 Then after breakfast, we stopped at a scenic overlook of a small river valley. While there we saw a bull moose eating, splashing, and getting acquainted with a cow and her calf.  Five moose, and great behaviors, before 10am!

We then drove north into Yellowstone park, passing evidence of many forest fires, some as recent as 2018. We stopped at Oxbow Lake, where we saw otters playing in the water near the shore and a bald eagle landed in a tree near us. We lunched at West Thumb, a caldera within the Yellowstone caldera, and walked around its hot springs before driving on to Old Faithful. We watched Old Faithful erupt twice (the two eruptions were quite different in onset speed, height and duration).  We also saw several other geysers erupt. After dinner we went for a sunset walk and watched more hot springs and geyser eruptions. The prevalence of these thermal features amazed us; everywhere you turn something is emitting steam! And tonight we also got to see a bull bison calmly munching away in the meadow between the geyser fields. An iconic view indeed, bison and geysers on the Yellowstone plains.