Old Faithful and Its Geothermal Community of Wonders: Hiking Yellowstone's Top Must See.

Old Faithful, September 29, 2023

Date: July 17, 2020

Place: Yellowstone National Park, Wyoming

Coordinates: 44.460143, -110.830148

Length: 2.1 miles

Level: easy plus

Old Faithful is the poster geyser of Yellowstone National Park, and probably universally too. It is certainly the most famous and most visited geyser in the world. A big part of its popularity is its fairly regular eruption schedule, making it convenient to fit the eruption event into a busy day of sightseeing in Yellowstone National Park. Most visitors observe the eruption, then move on to other places, but a good number also go on the hike of the Old Faithful Basin to see the other natural treasures this place has on display. When I arrived in Yellowstone with my youth companions on our July of 2020 impromptu road trip it was clear that we'll visit Old Faithful. We came there in the afternoon, driving north from the Grand Teton National Park, arriving at a perfect time - a few minutes before the geyser erupted.

Old Faithful

A geyser's eruption is a very impressive sight, especially one as big as Old Faithful. The Old Faithful Basin however, is a large and very active geothermal area that has numerous geysers, springs and pools, and also a hillside trail to a view point where Old Faithful Basin can be observed from above. After seeing Old Faithful's eruption from ground level we went on a sight-seeing hike up the hillside and around the basin.

Our hike as captured by my GPS

At first we wanted to go up the hill and observe Old Faithfull's next eruption from the higher point of view. On our way we crossed Firehole River, which runs through Old Faithful Basin and collects all the hot water that springs from the earth there.  

Firehole River

The hillside trail is just outside the basin and the plant and wild life there isn't directly impacted by the geothermal phenomenon. On this part of the hike the immediate surrounding was like just like a forest hike with standard plants. Many of the plants were blooming at the time, too. 

Wild Rose, Rosa sp. 

There were birds there too, and the elder chika, which had her special birding camera by then, was eagerly clicking away at them. 

Violet Green Swallow

I left the birds to my chika and focused on the wildflowers, of which there were many. I include here only a small sample of what I saw on that short little stretch of trail along the boundary of Old Faithful's basin. 

Richardson's Geranium, Geranium richardsonii 

Focusing on wildflowers doesn't mean that I pass on opportunities to observe wildlife, especially when I see them engaged in interesting activities. This wasp in the photo below is carrying a caterpillar. She'll stuff it inside her nest and lay her egg on it. The caterpillar isn't dead (yet), only stunned, and it'll be the food of the growing wasp larva after it hatches.  

A wasp with her catch

The wasp flew slowly away, heavy and low with her load, and I continued up the trail, looking for more wildflowers and trying to keep up with the youth who were already far ahead on their way to the view point. 

For a short distance the trail was almost level. Then it was sloping up, mildly at first, following that with steeper switchbacks. 

Angelica

The hillside was mostly forested, but even above the Firehole River, there were small clearings that were exposed to the sun and had small patches of grass and herbaceous wildflowers. 

Aspen Daisy, Erigeron speciosus

On a wetter spot in what might have been a running brook a bt earlier in season, bloomed bog orchid. That sighting made me very happy indeed. 

White Bog Orchid, Platanthera dilatata

The youth were far ahead up the trail. I found it difficult to detach myself from all the growing plant beauty around me but I was liable for these kids s I hurried up after them. 

Penstemon sp. 

Where the slope was rocky it was also clearer of vegetation, and the volcanic nature of the rocks was revealed, colorful and ruggedly beautiful. 

Even in the drier parts of the trail, at the higher elevation, were wildflowers blooming. I didn't slow down too much at that time. By now I was concerned with not missing Old Faithful's next eruption. 

The trees seemed smaller, higher up the trail. They were all pines there, and they looked nice and healthy. Where the trees opened up enough I could see the forest extended far and wide below, around and beyond the Old Faithful Basin.

Trail

The youth had reached the view point and settled there to observe the basin below while I kept clambering uphill, stopping almost every other step for one wildflower or another.

Stonecrop

Eventually I too reached the viewing area. There is a large barricade of logs at the front, meant to stop people from sitting all the way at the edge of the rocks. Some venturing souls ignored the barricade and did go to sit at the very edge. Most people who were there however, simply sat on the logs. Some wildflowers bloomed right between those logs.

Penstemon sp. 

We sat and waited. It was a hot day and the viewing area was exposed, and people were shifting in their places. Some got impatient and left to go downhill, and others were coming up and sitting next to us. Not too close - it was the height of COVID time after all.

Old Faithful, July 17, 2020

Old Faithful is named thus because of its usually reliable eruption schedule. Sometimes it does skip, however, and it had skipped one while we were there up at the viewing area. We waited for a long time, and when nothing happened that was bigger than a few puffs of steam, we gave up and got up to continue the rest of the hike. When I revisited Old Faithful last fall with my sister we also went up to the higher view point, after first viewing Old Faithful from ground level, and we did get to see Old Faithful erupting again from above. I chose one of the photos from this recent trip to head this blogpost. My sister and I did not go on the full hike that day.

Snowberry

From the view point we descended north, returning to the basin from its farthest end. The trail down was nicely shaded by the pine trees, giving us some relief from the heat.   

Trail

There were more wildflowers along this part of the trail as well. Trying to keep up with the youth in my charge, I practiced the 'photo on the move' approach. 

Arnica sp.

This approach doesn't yield the best, most artistic photos ever, but it does keep a good documentation and memoire of life's richness in this very special place at the time of our visit. 

Clover

Then again, some sights definitely merit stopping and huddling over. I called my companions to come back a few steps and appreciate the gorgeous columbine that was blooming in our path. 

Yellow Columbine, Aquilegia elegantula

Where there are wildflowers there would be butterflies. The butterflies we saw were all very hyperactive, and I got very few photos, mostly blurry, of them. The elder chika had better luck than me. 

We reached down to the basin and exited the forest right by Solitary Geyser, which apparently, is a man-induced geyser. According to the explanation plaque it used to be a calm thermal pool, and it was an attempt of humans to channel the water to make a hot bath that messed up its internal balance, starting a geyser activity there. This activity isn't very big but it is fairly regular, even a century after the tampering. 

Solitary Geyser

When we reached it, Solitary Geyser looked indeed like a calm pool. The sign said that this geyser erupts every few minutes so we waited and saw the bubbles push through the surface, stirring it up, then receding back to calmness. The eruption was indeed very small, but fascinating to see. 

Solitary Geyser, erupting

Solitary Geyser is very isolated from the rest of the geothermal activity in the Old Faithful Basin. The trail leading back to the center of action had also some cool wildflowers blooming along side.  

Rein Orchid, Piperia sp.

I loved the variety that I saw within the boundaries of the basin itself. Because of the very unique conditions there I had expected to see a narrower range of species, but the local plant community seemed pretty diverse to me.

Allium sp. 

As we made our way into the basin the trail rose onto a boardwalk. The boardwalk of course, was put in place to protect the visitors and allow closer view of the geysers and thermal pools safely. 

The top crust surrounding the thermal pools is thin and can collapse under the weight of a human. Still there are the daredevils who step off the safe path and venture close to the heat. Almost every year there is that someone who falls through and perish. 

Thermal Pool

On my first visit to Yellowstone the elder chika was 4 years old and a runner, and I feared that she might give us a slip and go to one of those beautiful geothermal pools. Me and Pappa Quail kept a tight hand on her the entire visit, and I remember not enjoying as much because of my maternal stress. In 2020 all the youth in my charge were mature enough and knew the potential danger. This time I could enjoy myself and pay attention to the lovely nature all around. 

Gentian sp.

The other geysers in the basin are much closer to one another than Solitary Geyser.  Once we came closer to the cluster we were able to go quickly from one to the other. Some of them were quiet, only a sign revealing their geyserous nature. Others erupted as we observed, giving a nice display of their activity. When the trail came close to a geyser we could tell the eruption wouldn't be a large one. 

The immediate area surrounding the geysers and thermal pools isn't very hospitable for plants. The plants that grow nearest to the geothermal features are best suited for the extreme conditions within that belt of special niche. One of these plants is the arrow grass, that I see around natural hot springs in other places as well. 

Arrow Grass, Triglochin concinna

Some of the geysers in the basin had built up a large mound of sediments deposited by the eruptions. During the short hike we had there, I could nt see any correlation between the size f the mound and the size of the erruption. 

While we were waiting at the high viewing area for Old Faithful to go again I kept my eye on a far away geyser that seemed to erupt much more frequently. That was the Castle Geyser, an impressive one that wasn't on the loop trail we were hiking on. I observed it erupt again and again from the center lop trail. 

Castle Geyser

In fact, the Castle Geyser looked much more impressive than most of the geysers near Old Faithful, except of course, for Old Faithful itself. I would settle for the far view point of that geyser because I wanted to check out other geothermal basins after we'd finish the Old Faithful hike. 

Thermal Pool, and the Castle Geyser in the background

The quiet thermal pools were also a magnificent sight. These pools can be very deluding in their calm - they are extremely dangerous. On my first visit in Yellowstone with my family, 16 years ago, I noticed that many of the signs warning people to remain on trail and keep their distance from the thermal pools were paid for by a couple who lost their adolescent boy who jumped into one of these pools. There is no surviving such a dip - its pretty much an instant death. Moreover - in most cases where a person had fallen into such a pool, there was also no body left to recover - the organic matter falls apart very quickly. 

Depression Geyser

Many of the thermal pools and the small brooks and streams that flow out of the geysers are very colorful. These colors come from a plethora of thermophilic microorganisms, bacteria mostly, that evolved and thrive in the unique conditions in the geothermal pools. 

Each of the geothermal pools is a singular niche with specific temperature and mineral composition, and each has its on community of microorganisms giving it its individual color and/or whiff. 

Many of these microorganisms also take an active part in depositing the sediments that give the geothermal feature not only its color and smell, but also its texture. The thermal pools in Yellowstone National Park are truly Nature's top art work. 

One of the less predictable geysers in the Old Faithful Basin is the Beehive Geyser. There was a nice information plaque near it, explaining the mechanism of geyser eruption. Basically, a geyser is a fissure reaching deep into the earth in an area where magma is relatively close to the surface, as it is in volcanic places such as Yellowstone. Precipitation water that seeps down the fissure heats up and pressurizes. When the heat and pressure of the water lowest in the column overcomes the weight of the water at the top of the column, the geyser erupts, pushing the top water up into the air and steaming outside with it. 

Beehive Geyser

We moved slowly between the geothermal features of the basin. There were many other visitors on the path with us, and it was difficult to get photos sans people. Despite it being the height of the pandemic fright and the travel restrictions placed in many parts of USA, including California, Yellowstone was bustling. In fact, it made it very difficult for us to find campsites within the park for the duration of our stay there. Every day started with looking for cancellations, breaking up camp and moving to a new, recently cancelled site. That was the main problem with having an unplanned impromptu trip. Except for that first night at the Grand Teton National park, we were fortunate though, to find a vacant campsite each night while visiting the area. 

The youth were very impressed with the geothermal features of Yellowstone, as was I. I loved watching the thin bacterial filaments swaying in the gentle flow of the hot water. Microbiologists study an entire world of life within the Yellowstone geothermals. Some of the thermophilic bacteria studies resulted in ground-breaking research and diagnostic techniques such as the PCR (Polymerase Chain Reaction) which utilizes the heat-resistant DNA Polymerase enzyme taken from these bacteria. The PCR technique which was then so well used to detect the presence of the COVID-19 virus in exposed people was possible because of the bacteria that created these pretty Nature's tapestry in the thermal water. 

Thermophilic Microorganisms

As slow as we were walking, we still eventually got to round the hike and slowly circle back in the direction of the Old Faithful Geyser, and the lodge where we were parked. As we turned the corner I caught the Castle Geyser erupt again behind us, like a beautiful farewell. 

Castle Geyser

On the slow walk around the trail I paused again and again to enjoy the colorful tapestry laid out by Nature's tiniest creatures. It has been 12 years since my first and only visit in Yellowstone before this one, and I had no foreseeable plans to visit there again soon. As far as I knew at the time, there could be a wait of another 12 years, or more. 

I was fortunate to have my sister visit me last fall, and we were fortunate that the weather had altered our original plan to visit Oregon and Washington. It took me less than a minute to switch direction to Yellowstone, giving my sister the opportunity to see this wonderful place for the first time, and myself to enjoy it again, for the third time now.  

I hope to not wait many more years before my next visit to Yellowstone - after all Pappa Quail would love seeing it again, it has been 16 years for him now, and he had only seen it once.

Geothermal Sediments Art

We passed another small geyser on our way back to Old Faithful. After seeing the grand eruptions of the larger geyser, this one looked like a cute baby. 

Plants were actually growing quite close to the baby geyser, and not only the arrow grass, but also some monkeyflowers which, although tolerant enough to grow this close to the geyser, they were still pretty stunted. 

Monkeyflower, Erythranthe sp. 

The blue thermal pools looked very inviting. Not seeing steam coming out of them, I assumed that some of the people who were lured by the pristine beauty of these pools did not think they were dangerous, not more than your regular hot spring, anyway. These pools are way too hot, however. Diving into any of them means instant death. Sadly, people falling or jumping into the thermal pools is one of the most common causes of death in yellwstone National Park, at least according to the book, 'Death in Yellowstone', which I bought at the visitor center and the youth had an exciting time reading out loud in turns during our drives.  

Geothermal Pool

Standard brooks would have vegetation growing right inside the water flow. The little brooks coming out of the geysers had only thermophile microorganisms growing in them. For standard plants this water was off limits, at least until it reached the distance where it cooled off enough. 

Distant enough from the geological heat the plants could grow to their optimal size, as the monkeyflowers I saw. 

Monkeyflower, Erythranthe sp. 

Once again we were walking in the outskirts of the basin, and the natural scenery looked more like a familiar forest clearing with the wildflowers I anticipated seeing in such a place. 

 About to complete the loop within the Old Faithful Basin, I was eager to get going to our next stop. Not that this eagerness stopped me from pausing for wildflowers when I saw them. 

Thistle, Cirsium sp.

On our first visit to Old Faithful Basin in 2007 we saw a large bull elk walking nonchalantly between the geysers, not paying any heed to the warning signs. This visit we didn't see any elk inside the basin, but birds were plenty, and the elder chika got very excited about them. 

Pink-sided Dark-eyed Junco

She was excited even about the most common birds - they were different variants or morphs of the same species in California. 

Audubon Yellow-rumped Warbler 

At the very end of the hike we saw a cute little female chipmunk, bulging at her belly, collecting nesting materials. Late in July, it might have been her second pregnancy of the season. She wasn't concerned with all the human visitors and my chika got a nice photo of her. 

Yellow Pine Chipmunk

 Old Faithful is considered a must see when visiting Yellowstone, and it is indeed an amazing sight. The Old Faithful Basin however, is only one of numerous such geothermal basins within Yellowstone National Park, and each of these basins has its own unique features and atmosphere. After completing our Old Faithful hike, which by no means covered all there was to see there, we continued to the campsite I managed to reserve for that night, but on the morrow we'd keep exploring the geothermal wonders of Yellowstone, starting at the Norris Geyser Basin north of Old Faithful.