The
Lower Falls of the Yellowstone, in winter. Notice the ice cone that
partly covers the falls. Notice that there is less water going over
the falls than in the summer.
The
Grand Canyon of the Yellowstone. The canyon area was, and still is
to some extent, a thermal area. The action of the hot water caused
the rocks to "rot", which made them soft and crumbly, and allowed the Yellowstone
River to cut the deep canyon. The thermal activity stained the rocks
brilliant orange and red colors too. These colors are more evident
when it is a sunny day, and in summer when they are not covered in snow.
Check out this summer picture taken
from the bottom of the canyon.
This
is the Lake Hotel. It is very old, the oldest existing hotel in the
park. It is also big, supposedly the second largest wood frame building
in the U.S., and elegant by Yellowstone standards. Here it is put
away for the winter. The only lodging facilities in the park open
in the winter are at Old Faithful Snow Lodge and at Mammoth. OK,
sometimes some concessionaire has yurts at Canyon, at least they used to,
and you can camp in the back country, but many wouldn't consider that lodging.
Some lucky person does get to live here as the winter caretaker though.
As far as I know there have been no "Shining" type incidents at the Lake
Hotel in winter yet. 
Lion
Geyser, Upper Geyser Basin. Lion is a fairly active, fairly big (30
- 70 feet) cyclic geyser on the
Geyser Hill part of the Upper Basin. It got it's name because it
sort of "roars" with quick bursts of steam before an eruption.
To me the roars sound more like a quick warning growl. If you were to spend
an hour or two on Geyser Hill you would have a good chance of seeing
Lion erupt if you are there during of one of it's cyclic series of eruptions.
A
coyote is scavenging cooked buffalo meat at Scalloped Spring, Upper Geyser
Basin. It is not only the two legged variety of animals that sometimes
fall into hot springs. The four legged kinds will also step where
they shouldn't and get cooked because of it. If you look around,
you can see bones in several of the quiet, clear hot springs in Yellowstone.
This
is Scalloped Spring in eruption. This is not something you see every
day. Scalloped Spring used to be a non erupting hot spring with ornate
scallops around the edge of an overflowing pool, much like nearby South
Scalloped Spring. It was illegally induced to erupt (before my time,
and no, I won't say how to make a spring erupt) and this caused the water
level to fall several feet below the surface where it boils, and rises
and falls, but does not normally erupt. Something about having a
bison fall into the spring made it erupt for a day or two this particular
winter. It was erupting about every minute or two when I was there,
throwing smelly brown buffalo soup anywhere from a foot to say maybe eight
or ten feet high and angled toward the boardwalk. You can see where
the snow on the boardwalk has been melted by the splashing water.
I learned that Scalloped Spring was erupting while sitting in the Employee Dining Room eating dinner. Doug, another employee, came in all wet and smelling really bad. He had been sprayed by the spring. Just imagine what cooking a live bison, hair, guts and all must smell like. Yum. Doug was not the most popular person in the dining room that evening.
Eerie
looking trees by a hot spring, Upper Geyser Basin. Trees will sometimes
get covered with ice from condensed steam or geyser spray in the winter.
Then they get to be called ghost trees.
Riverside
Geyser, Upper Geyser Basin. Riverside is a large, very predictable
geyser. Predictions are usually posted in the Old Faithful Visitors
Center. Riverside is actually more regular than Old Faithful.
The interval between eruptions is longer than for Old Faithful (5.5 to
8.5 hours), but the eruption lasts much longer, about 20 minutes.
This gives plenty of time for getting lots of shots from different angles,
and for just sitting back and watching the show. It is also very
pretty the way the water column arches out over the Firehole River.
Lion
Geyser from down the hill.
Plume
Geyser, Upper Geyser Basin. Plume is usually fairly active, with
eruptions about every half hour to hour in recent years I have been there,
but it's activity is prone to change. Actually, all features can
change, it's just Plume does so maybe more than some of it's neighbors.
It was created by a steam explosion in 1922. In 1972 another steam
explosion opened another vent, and it now erupts only 20 to 25 feet high,
instead of 40 ft. The interval between eruptions can even change
with the time of day - sometimes runoff from other springs flows into Plume.
During the night and the morning this runoff is colder and has more of
a quenching action than in the afternoon when the runoff is warmer, and
this colder water causes the intervals to lengthen. If Plume is very
active when you visit (you can ask the rangers at the Visitors Center,
that is what they are paid for) it is worth the wait. You are close
to the geyser, and can watch the water rapidly fill the vent. Then
there is a very quick burst, and the vent drains. The water usually
wells back up for a second, a third, and sometimes a fourth burst.
At least that is what Plume was doing when I was there last. Lately
(2003) I hear it is not always so regular.