Author Blog | Yellowstone Treasures

Picnics in the Park

June 4, 2020

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American white pelican spotted over the Yellowstone River on May 17, 2020

All entrance roads opened on June 1. So you may be thinking of a visit, but it’s best to do your homework. For the time being, perhaps the whole summer season, there is no sit-down dining anywhere within the park. Instead, you should stock up on supplies at one of the gateway towns (such as West Yellowstone or Gardiner, Montana, or Cody or Jackson, Wyoming). Check in advance; some stores, such as Gardiner Market, will even do curbside pickup. Or buy grab-and-go meals in Yellowstone National Park. Some facilities are already open at Mammoth and Old Faithful Villages. The general stores at Mammoth and Fishing Bridge open tomorrow, June 5. On June 19, the eatery at Canyon Village will open. See this helpful “Operating Hours and Seasons” page on the official NPS website for all the details to help you in planning. And we’d love to hear from you in the comments how these new meal solutions are working for you.

Where will you take the picnic you bring or purchase? Yellowstone Treasures contains descriptions of all the picnic areas in the park. Some of our favorites are those along the Madison River, at Bridge Bay Marina, and at Gibbon Falls. Just be sure to keep your distance from the other visitors. See more about picnics in “Anyone for a Picnic?” by author Janet Chapple.

By the way, spring is a great time to see baby animals and for bird watching. Some of the birds recently seen include the American white pelican, the bald eagle, the osprey, the kildeer, the yellow warbler, and the dusky grouse. Our nugget called “Yellowstone for Birders” tells you where to see these and more. In the picnic areas you are most likely to see ravens, Clark’s nutcrackers, and gray jays, also known as camp robbers!

Photo credit: NPS / Jacob W Frank, May 17, 2020

Phased reopening

May 19, 2020

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Cow elk with calf

Roads in the lower loop of Yellowstone National Park opened to the public at noon yesterday. Certain restrooms and gas stations also opened up. That means people can drive through the East and South Entrances (from Cody and Jackson, Wyoming), but the popular North and West Entrances are closed.

Keep in mind that the restrictions may seriously hamper any trip you are planning. Please peruse the chart on the NPS “Current Conditions” page carefully. Lodge rooms and sit-down dining will not open in all of 2020; cabins and grab-and-go eating or picnics will be the way to go. It’s possible to try to reserve cabins at Old Faithful starting on June 8, or at Lake or Canyon starting on June 17 or 19, respectively. Camping is possible at Madison from June 15th, as well as in other campgrounds.

This being Yellowstone, the warning out today is look out for those aggressive cow elk!

ALSO, today Gov. Bullock of Montana announced that the state will move to phase two of reopening on June 1. The good news is that “the 14-day travel quarantine for out-of-state travelers and residents arriving from another state or country to Montana for non-work-related purposes will be lifted” on that date. And restaurants can reopen at 75% capacity with social distancing. But the bad news for travelers is that for phase two they still have the same guidelines to minimize nonessential travel. In particular they warn that vulnerable populations and the elderly should continue to stay home.

This year, careful planning and accepting that you can’t just get in your car and go are more important than ever.

Photo credit: NPS/Jacob W. Frank

Keep calm and read on with IPG’s book sale

April 8, 2020

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Update May 15, 2020: Today is the official print publication date of the Yellowstone Treasures, updated sixth edition! Because IPG has extended this sale I announced in April through the end of May, you can get the 30% discount off a brand-new book! Enjoy.

We sympathize with what you’re going through, whether you’re sheltering in place or working at an essential job in these risky times. So we’re happy to report that our distributor, Independent Publishers Group, has a 30% off sale on all orders via their website through April 2020. Use the code KEEPCALMANDREADON to get the discount on any of our books on IPG’s store as well as their wide selection, from children’s activities to cookbooks to escapist fiction. IPG supplies you with print or e-books, whichever you prefer.

Our books [link to IPG’s store] work as escapist armchair travel, but with a practical bent, since you can apply what you learn to a future trip. Become the tour guide for your family or other group! As Janet Jones, the cover photographer for the new edition of Yellowstone Treasures wrote me recently:

“Yellowstone Treasures is a great way to virtually visit the place Yellowstone fans love.”

Sixth edition e-book birthday!

April 2, 2020

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Today the latest digital version of our popular guidebook was released! During July-December 2019 our team worked on updating the geyser basin, trail, and road descriptions, creating a new introduction and geological time line, revising the geology chapter, and researching new photos. The book’s cover is graced with a photo of Old Faithful Geyser by photographer and naturalist Janet Jones of Snow Moon Ink. Explore America’s first national park from your armchair with Yellowstone Treasures! See the guidebook page for more.

See our new E-book page to buy! You can get the new book in Kindle, ePub, or PDF formats for a variety of e-readers. If you’d rather borrow the book, you can ask your library to acquire this new version. (The ePub ISBN is 9781733103213.)

The print book will ship on May 15, but you can preorder it now, such as via Bookshop, a new online bookstore with a mission to financially support independent bookstores and give back to the book community. Buy local, indie first! Or see other places to buy the print version.

Yellowstone is closed until further notice

March 25, 2020

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News Release: Effective immediately, @YellowstoneNPS and @GrandTetonNPS are closed to all park visitors until further notice. There will be no visitor access permitted to either park. #Covid19 #CoronaVirus
Details at: https://t.co/4YLJxQqvFw pic.twitter.com/yUnXTra8vP
— YellowstoneNPS (@YellowstoneNPS) March 24, 2020

Were you, as we were, planning a trip to the park this summer? The COVID-19 outbreak means we all need to practice social (physical) distancing, which now means a need to cancel those travel plans. Last week, concessionaire Xanterra announced they are suspending their operations (lodging, campgrounds, dining, and tours) through May 21 (see https://www.yellowstonenationalparklodges.com/coronavirus/). Yesterday, the National Park Service made the unusual but prudent decision in tandem with gateway county health departments that they have to follow suit. NPS closed both Yellowstone National Park and Grand Teton National Park to visitors until further notice. To quote from the news release: “There will be no visitor access permitted to either park. State highways and/or roads that transcend park/state boundaries and facilities that support life safety and commerce will remain open.” So one thing that is not clear at the moment is what happens to travel on the Northern Range road between Gardiner and Silver Gate. Another question no one can answer yet is, When will the parks be able to reopen?

Please stay tuned to this website, because we will soon have news about the guidebook and a short-term sale. On Friday we announced the publication date for the sixth edition of Yellowstone Treasures on our Media Kit. For now, the best advice is stay home, stay healthy!

Consider spring cycling

March 3, 2020

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Spring biking with bear spray at Silver Gate (The Hoodoos), March 29, 2017

Updated March 25, 2020: This post should be renamed “Consider spring cycling another year instead.” Xanterra has closed all park facilities through May 21st at least, and as of yesterday, the National Park Service closed both Yellowstone and Grand Teton National Parks until further notice. More in the next post. For nostalgia value and future planning, we will still leave this post up!

Doesn’t this picture inspire you to get outside (well prepared for encountering cold and bears) in Yellowstone National Park this spring? Before the first roads open up again for public travel comes the spring shoulder season for cycling. Here is what our guidebook Yellowstone Treasures has to say about the road you see in the photo, which is about 4 miles south of Mammoth Hot Springs on the Mammoth to Norris Road:

3.7/17.3 The Hoodoos (or Silver Gate) one-way road. Go slowly to find and take the very short, unmarked loop road to the west—a remnant of the 1899 stagecoach road. Park here to look closely at some unusual rocks.
The massive, topsy-turvy blocks of silvery, gray-white travertine, strewn about so haphazardly, are the result of a large landslide from the slopes of Terrace Mountain to the west. No one knows when the boulders slid here. These boulders are not the same as the hoodoos you can see near the park’s East Entrance (see “What’s a Hoodoo?” on page 154). The other official name for this place, Silver Gate, is actually more appropriate.

The Mammoth Hot Springs to Norris road, the northwest segment of the Grand Loop Road (see map), closed to oversnow travel this year on Sunday, March 1st. The planned reopening date for cars for this road and out to the West Entrance is April 17th. So that means that for about two weeks before that, bicycles, including e-bikes, are allowed on certain roads! (They are never allowed on park trails.)

The following road segments may be opened to bicycling each spring:

Mammoth Hot Springs to the West Entrance
East Entrance to the east side of Sylvan Pass (six miles from the entrance)
South Entrance to West Thumb

Keep in mind, though, as NPS says: “Roads will not be free of cars during these times: bicyclists will encounter employees, contractors, plows, and other administrative vehicles on the roads.” You’ll need a helmet and high-visibility clothing. You’ll also want to do your research in advance; Camping for bicyclists is limited to the developed campgrounds located throughout the park. See the park’s Spring & Fall Bicycling and Bike in the Park pages for more.

Credits: Photo by NPS/Jacob W. Frank, in the public domain (see Yellowstone National Park’s Flickr page for more wonderful photos!). Road log section quoted from p. 269 of the 6th edition of Yellowstone Treasures, due out this May.

Park visitation levels off

January 30, 2020

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Yellowstone Treasures editor, author, and granddaughter visit Hot Lake on Firehole Lake Drive, Yellowstone, June 22, 2013.

According to the Big Sky news website, www.explorebigsky.com, visitation to the park has leveled off since its peak in 2016. Here are the figures the Montana website presents.

Yellowstone Visits by Year

2019 – 4,020,287
2018 – 4,114,999
2017 – 4,116,525
2016 – 4,257,177
2015 – 4,097,710
2014 – 3,513,486

Explore Big Sky does not hazard a guess as to why visiting Yellowstone National Park has stopped increasing. Certainly summer will still bring crowds. Do you have an answer or even a reasonable speculation about this pattern of visitors? Are you planning a trip in 2020? Please write and let us know!

An unusual geyser basin closure

October 7, 2019

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Click for a larger image.

A heads-up for anyone traveling to Yellowstone this week: Norris Geyser Basin in Yellowstone closed on Monday October 7, 2019, to all visitors. The area closure includes the entire basin, entrance road, parking lot, and Norris Geyser Basin Museum. (The Norris Campground and the Museum of the National Park Ranger already closed for the season in September.) The closure is for paving at the junction. The announced closure is for just two days, but weather and other factors could easily extend it.

This picture shows how Steamboat Geyser’s runoff looks during a minor eruption. According to Geysertimes.org, it’s been six days since the last major eruption of Steamboat Geyser, so it’s well within the expected window for its next one. So that is annoying to geyser gazers, but of course this is one of the last possible weeks to do any construction before the winter snows come.

The photo of Steamboat Geyser’s prodigious runoff channel, Norris Geyser Basin, was taken by Beth Chapple on June 28, 2019.

An active Norris Geyser Basin geyser

August 25, 2019

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Norris Geyser Basin’s most famous geyser is Steamboat, which can amazingly spout to three times the height of Old Faithful Geyser, making it the world’s largest. On June 28, during a research trip for the forthcoming sixth edition of Yellowstone Treasures, I lingered in the basin for three hours, catching some of Steamboat’s minor eruptions and watching the runoff channel. Steamboat has been very active all summer, as you can see on the Geyser Times website, so maybe you will get a chance to see it erupt during your visit! But on that particular day it did not erupt until nearly midnight, when I was long back to my home near Seattle.

While waiting, I strolled over to Veteran Geyser, “which probably derived its name from the very old sinter deposits all around,” as author Janet Chapple says in the fifth edition of the guidebook on page 238.

Veteran Geyser, morning of June 28, 2019

Veteran Geyser back vent But behind the main pool of Veteran Geyser is a vent that has become more active in recent years. So we will be adding the phrase “recently getting a beautiful light coating of geyserite” to the description. Below you can see a more detailed view.
—Editor Beth

Fresh geyserite deposited by Veteran Geyser, June 2019

Yellowstone’s Fire Lookouts

July 19, 2019

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Today I spontaneously decided to check into the status of the fire lookout towers inside Yellowstone National Park, since the guidebook points out the ones on top of Mount Sheridan and Mount Washburn. Well, I was saddened to learn that the Mount Holmes fire lookout burned to the ground on Tuesday, July 16, 2019. The tower was built in 1931 and had historic value. A fire observer working in the Mount Washburn lookout tower spotted the lightning-caused fire. This first Yellowstone fire of 2019 means that the Mount Holmes Trail is closed until public safety can be assured. The Billings Gazette had one good story about the event, and National Parks Traveler had another.

If you’d like to learn more about the job of being a fire lookout in the park, I recommend this short Inside Yellowstone video on the National Park Service website.

—Editor and Publisher Beth Chapple