Day 14: Move Along, Move Along, Like You Know We Do

Sunburn has been the bane of my this trip. It seems like no matter now much I put on and how often I reapply I still end up burnt. I'm starting to think that the increased amounts of solar radation due to the thinner atmosphere, coupled with my sunscreen likely being expired is to blame. I am defintely not looking forward to how my skin is going to look when I come home and actually get to where a variety of different shirts. I will have weird farmer's tan lines, and my arms and neck will be somewhere to the tune of 5 shades darker than my legs. Some people would be excited about getting more tan, but not me. I've always loved my pale skin and since I have lots of moles as it is, it is also safer for me to not be tan, and instead to embrace my ghostliness. But sadly, it appears a spray tan may be in order once I get home, just so I don't look ridiculous in normal summer clothes. :(

Jackson Lake

But anywho, on to our activites from today. Today we left our wonderful campground in the Tetons to head into Yellowstone. We made a few stops along the way to our new campground. Our first stop was at Jackson Lake, to bid the Tetons goodbye (and get a good look at the Teton fault). The beach was an array of different sedimentary, igneous, and metamorphic pebbles, hinting at the complex history if the area which we had studied and examined so much over the past several days. After a 'always required' group shot (we take one at most of the places we go) we headed north.

Yellowstone Lake just beginning to thaw

Upon entering Yellowstone I think we all became a little worried by the amount of snow present on the ground. There was easily 3 feet of the white fluffy stuff still chilling out, holding down saplings and the lakes were still mostly frozen, making everything look like a winter wonderland. This would have been very exciting, if we weren't intensely aware of the fact that we may have to be camping in the lovely snow for the next several days. We then stopped at Lewis Falls to look the end of a rhyolitic flow, as well as the lithofisae, or stone bubbles, present in the rhyolite. A little ways down the road, we had lunch on the Continential Divide, which of course included a brief snowball fight.

Old Faithful

After lunch we went to Old Faithful, who was indeed faithful, and then we spent the rest of the afternoon walking around and looking at the various pools and geysers in the Upper Geyser Basin before we headed to Madison campsite.

Throughout most of the park, including our campsite, there is no cell signal of any sort, so my posts will likely be updated days later than they should have been. The majority of the park also lies within the caldera of the infamous Yellowstone supervolcano, so if the volcano erupts while we are here, you can be content in knowing that I will likely be dead before I even realize what is happening*. And really what better way to go out on a geology trip than in a volcanic eruption.

*no need to worry though because the park service does not believe that any kind of massive explosion is eminent :)

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