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Been a dull series of days, with little to report, other than Beehive had yet another Beehive eruption with not just no indicator, but no warning. Someone whose voice I don't recognize was at Lion for the start, and because she was facing away, was caught by surprise.
And yes, below is another Grotto Fountain that didn't result in the start of Grotto.
Why are all the dead, rime frost killed trees on the hillside behind Grand still standing? There are one or two on the ground out there, but most of them are standing, just like they were when I first visited in 1980. You'd think that by now, with the shallow lodgepole pine root systems typical of the thermal areas, the wind would have knocked them down. It's knocked them down all over the rest of the Sawmill and Grand groups. It's taken care of many of the burned trees from 1988. (I even got to witness that a few times.)
On the other hand, many of them, especially those at the top of the hill directly behind Grand, are surrounded at their base by a wide area of small, young brushy trees. (Or maybe a single tree that's just not producing a single tall trunk.) Maybe the roots of these trees are helping to act as anchors, keeping these ancient dead trees standing.
Agsin, post-Giant there's not a lot to report. Yesterday I did forget to include the photo of the signs' resting place.
I did see a new bit of touron weirdness on my way to Grand: an orange car (I don't even bother keeping up with the models and makes any more) that was practially in the old plaza area between the old VC's theaters. It seems someone thought the walkway leading from the road across from the old Photo Shop was a road. It was headed by the time I got near enough to get a better view. No camera on me at the time, either.
Grand itself was another short interval. The best feature of that was that it put the next eruption squarely in the dark to dawn time frame, and that was more than enough excuse to use the night to catch up on sleep instead. (And the rain showers I heard at 02:00 helped, too.)
The day started out as expected: Grotto still erupting along with a several hour wait at Grand. But just before the Grand eruption, I noticed that the steam cloud at Grotto had suddenly ceased. Scott Bryan confirmed that Grotto was off, giving us a fourteen hour duration, and a Giant window opening sometime in early afternoon.
The rest of the morning was spent in trying to catch up on a little of the sleep I hadn't gotten the last few nights. Then it was out into the basin to see what would happen next. I figured the Bijou Cage was near capacity, so no reason not to wait at Grand, even though it was well before time for an eruption. One indication of just how full the cage probably was was when I saw an eruptions of Aurum and that weren't announced on the radio about an hour earlier. On the way out, ran into Lynn Stephens at Castle.
Since I was in time killing mode, we were talking there for quite a bit when Lynn suddenly goes, "Beehive!" Sure enough, there it was, climbing to full height, and once again without an indicator. You could almost tell by the radio reaction that there were a lot of people who once again were thinking of how they'd heard of another Beehive eruption while at Giant.
Beehive was nearing the end when Scott announced the rise in water in Mastiff. Now this was a bit of a disappointment, as we were only a little over six hours since Grotto quit, and the last time there was a quick hot period/recovery, it lead to a weak hot period and nothing much. But not this time. Lynn and I both got on the bikes and headed down that way. Within two minutes, at 14:01, the hot period had started with several vents starting. By the time I was in sight of the platform it was apparent that Mastiff was in charge, with nice boiling visible even at a distance.
After two consecutive nighttime eruptions, and two more under less than ideal conditions (although 31 May was more than acceptable), it was wonderful to be perfectly positioned to see a start on a warm afternoon. I quickly took the sequence of photos here, then used my clinometer to get a reading on the height. I was disappointed to get only 60%, which comes to 180ft. But as the photo sequence shows, this just didn't seem like a huge, high start.
(My camera is an ancient, ten-year old Kodak DC-50 first generation digital camera. It takes up to 7 seconds to process and store an image, so that sequence is at least 30 seconds long.)
I noticed that the northern corner of the cage got soaked nicely, and took pictures of the resting places for the marker signs. After that, it was enjoy the spectacle time.
Shortly after the start it was announced that Castle was erupting, as if anybody cared. I assume by an NPS naturalist on rove, as unless they were lucky enough to be stuck in an NPS staff meeting, every gazer seemed to be at their chosen spot in sight of Giant.
Grand kept up the tradition of being difficult in erupting after Giant. The two nighttime eruptions of Giant I saw featured Grand erupting within ten minutes or so (at least from the steam clouds I saw.) For this one, like the early morning eruption in May, Grand erupted while I was tying down my bike at Castle, denying me the enjoyment of waiting for Grand while watching the waning Giant activity.
Now the pressure is really on. I figure I've got one more chance at a Giant eruption, next week before I leave, and can't leave with a five out of six record.
The morning hot periods were a bit disappointing. I was expeciting a bit of a wait, and the first one occurred within minutes of my getting settled in. Doing the math, I realized there was no reason to go back in, as Grand would be due in a few hours more, and besides, the next hot period might be the real one.
As it turned out, I went to Grand, and caught a Penta eruption, too. The geyser fog was as good or even better than I remembered it. I really enjoy it when it's so thick and patchy that you get situtations like you can't see Sawmill group from Grand, but Beauty and Chromatic to the north are easily visible by their immense steam columns.
Back at Giant, things got progressively weaker, so that as noon approached, it appeared as if the platform was in a post-marathon phase. Both Scott Bryan and I noticed and commented on this at about the same time, how it reminded us of what things looked like last week. But this time, just as everyone was about to abandon the Bijou Cage, water rose in Mastiff and we got a fairly good (but not great) hot period.
So the rest of the day was a series of disappointments, at it just seemed that Giant did not want to erupt, and was using the hot periods to make that clear. Then we got a Grotto start which turned into yet another marathon, about the fourth for this interval. Ultimately, a less than satisfying day.
At sunset, we did get the first bug-hatching of the season. The Firehole River by the Castle-Sawmill bridge was thick with all sorts of insects, and the trout seemed to be actively feeding too. Over at Grand, the mosquitoes were not quite thick enough to be annoying, but it is definitely time to find that bug juice.
It's amazing to think that I can be awakened by Kitt Barger saying "Water rising in Mastiff" and be fully dressed and equipped and biking past the Inn when the hot period ends about 6 minutes later. (More on this hot period under "Stupid Geyser Groupie Tricks")
Turns out we had another short marathon, with Grotto starting before 05:00 and ending around 20:30. So now have a busy, " hurry up and wait for Giant" day ahead.
The middle of the night Grand was uneventful, but the morning one went and erupted when I've said it shouldn't: with both West Triplet and Rift both in eruption. Oh, well.
The other middle of the night eruption, just before midnight, delayed just long enough to not only miss out on a four Grand day, but erupted about ten minutes after the crescent moon set.
One of the examples of who atrocious yesterday was that I forgot to mention was that when Daisy erupted, the steam cloud was horizontal all the way to Oblong.
During this morning's Giant hot period radio wake-up call, one of the usual annoyances, Mr. Radio-Voice-Of-The-Upper-Geyser-Basin, had to interrupt to first inform everyone that he was arriving at Daisy (I assume he meant at Black Sand by car as he has been staying at West Yellowstone), then asking if Castle was erupting. Some people just can't seem to shut up and listen.
In the Lodge cabin area, the ravens have figured out that on the housekeeping carts, there are goodies in the form of bags of trash. When housekeeping takes their lunch breaks, they leave the carts, and the ravens move in, ripping them open for the goodies inside. On windy days, this also means that trash gets scattered everywhere. I would assume that eventually housekeeping will figure out that they need to put the trash in the "bear-proof" dumpsters, especially if they have to keep cleaning up enough times. But in this particular "intellectual arms-race", I would bet that currently the ravens have the upper hand.
There was nothing unusual or out of the ordinary about the middle of the night Grand eruption, other than it had two bursts, which I think was a first for my nighttimes, and it seemed like the wind picked up about the time of the eruption. By the time of the next eruption, it was an ugly, windy day that threatened to turn atrocious.. While we had to endure an endless wind mixed with sleet and rain, Grand did pick a time when things were a bit nicer to give us the usual one burst.
The afternoon wasn't so fortunate, as atrocious moved in and stayed. The wait for the afternoon Grand was miserable, not because of percipitation, but the winds that kept shifting directions. Things finally calmed down by sunset, when reasons for being out and about were few.
Grotto started sometime during the night, and by that time it appeared to be headed to a marathon. But around 11:30, it shut off. So instead of the full Giant-free day, it shaped up to be trying to have another event about 24 hours after the big attempt last night. Except the event seemed to come early. At 16:07, after only 4-1/2 hours,we got an 8m25s hot period which seemed to not really want to initiate an eruption.
Grotto continued through the night. I was pretty sure it was still active for the middle of the night Grand, and the way the Amfac louts illuminated it seemed to confirm that. It was seen to send around 06:15, meaning that it had been erupting for at least 25 hours.
In the dark of the night, one can't observe Grand's pools or much of anything that's going on. Instead, one must rely on hearing. One thing that I've noticed is how many of the Turban eruptions on which Grand starts sound decidedly different. More vigorous, noisier and not as slow starting as other Turban eruptions. This applies even to those eruptions where there's a considerable lag time between Turban's start and Grand's. I would supposed this isn't as noticeable during the day because of all the background noise, but if you listen for it, you'll hear it.
The morning Grand gave us the last three burst eruption Grand will ever have (the last was back in May.) Instead of quitting, Vent and Turban continued, but there was no attempt by Grand to have afterplay until much to late for a fourth burst.
This hot period seemed a daylight version of the one I saw earlier this week in the middle of the night, 24 hours before the actual eruption. It lasted even longer, 16m50s, and the late surging from Giant seemed even stronger. (My photos didn't capture any of the big surges.) But like then, things just sort of died down. Now the hope is that it'll take Giant about eighteen to twenty-four hours to try again, and get out of this nighttime eruption mode.
Thanks to the person who made a donation. Much appreciated, including the fact that I know now that that button really works! But when I saw the confirmation email, I almost tossed it because I thought it was another one of those scams to try and get my passwords.
