Geyser Notes

Had to choose, so went to Norris. New Crater/Steamboat's interval was slightly long, but it sounded like it could erupt soon. Giant was way too long, and acting like it could still be a while.

We arrived a little after sunrise, to find not one, but two Asian Invasion tour buses in the parking lot. But it seemed that they had gotten their selfies overlooking Porcelain Basin and were heading out.

The walk out to the platform wasn't too bad, despite the heavy frost. At Old Faithful, when we left at dawn, the temperature was about 25°F. Only when we got to the platform itself did it become icy, and that was because of the mist coming from New Crater/Steamboat having frozen during the night. Settled in for a bit of a wait. The chair was on thin layer of ice, but the board cracks kept it from slipping around. It was about an hour later that the ice really started to form, as it warmed up enough so that instead of ice crystals, it was water droplets coming down.

For that first hour, nothing much happened. There was a surge around 09:36 that caused me to get my phone/camera out and recording, but that was it. It was pretty quiet, and I realized that this might be a good opportunity to do some video recording from places besides the platform. It should be easy to move around.

At around 10:05, an loud, obnoxious student tour group showed up. They seemed more interested in the icy platform that the geyser. About five minutes later, there was a large surge, one that stopped just as I was about to start the camera. I was actually a bit relieved that the eruption didn't start then.

Just before they arrived, I was cold enough that I decided to put on the rain pants as an extra layer of warmth. The wind had started up, and it was occasionally in my direction. Also got out the extra blanket and wrapped it around myself. But after they left, I decided that a quick walk around might help warm up. So I went up to the upper platform and then headed back. Just about as I reached the junction, another surge started. It was sudden, and it was big. I managed to get my camera started seconds before the water column started climbing.

First instinct was to head back to the lower platform to continue recording. I didn't get far, as the platform was being drenched. The wind and spray from the eruption was forceful enough that I did get to see my chair, sitting on the ice sheet, start sliding across the empty platform, all the way to the far railing.

I did stop recording and quickly moved our packs up out of the wet area. Then I rushed, as much as the slippery boardwalks would allow, back to take a height measurement. I got 60% at 130 meters, which comes to 78 meters or 256ft. This eruption did look a bit smaller than the previous one I measured. Still, that's still the second highest measurement I've ever made.

And as planned, I did do a grand tour. I continuously recorded the eruption from there to the upper platform, to the lower, down to the runoff channel (where it was raining heavily) then back to the lower platform, where a crowd had finally gathered. All that video will have to wait for our return before it gets posted.

I retrieved my umbrella and went back to record the runoff at the bottom. Turns out there were some really nice, bright rainbows in all that rain, especially once you got past Echinus, or on the far side.

Unlike previous eruptions, the water columns never turned brown. Because of the wind direction, the hillside above the North Vent was dry. It was also a short water phase. At some point in my recording, I realized that I was no longer seeing water, just hearing the powerful steam roaring out. This also confirms my previous observations that the brown columns are due to the surface runoff back into the vents (especially the North Vent.) The choking we saw previous was probably due to excess water stopping up the system at the surface, nothing deep.

When it came time to pack up the folding chairs, I discovered something else about the start. Both chairs had blankets (now thoroughly soaked) in them. Both blankets had various rocky debris on them, ranging in size for flecks and flakes, to a couple of chunks about the size of x. There were a number of the larger chunks scatter along the boardwalk edges and under the benches, too.

After about an hour of the steam phase, we decided it was time to head back and see what Giant had done. Still, the best part of the wind direction is that the parking lot never got hit. For all the eruptions we've seen this summer, we've never had to pack up in the rain. But we still had quite a bit of wet gear in the back, our chairs and blankets and umbrellas and outer coats.

And the lot had empty parking spots, despite it being the middle of the day. Quite a change from just a few weeks ago.

We returned to the Upper Basin at about 13:00. Last night we'd left our bikes in the Lower Store racks figuring we might want them today. Had just finished rearranging the packs to head down to Giant, with the expectation that we could dry a few things out down there, when got the call that there was a hot period starting. Is an nice, easy ride from that point, especially when you don't have to thread through the people wandering around Old Faithful. I got to the area while the Giant Indicator Pool was still full because Mastiff had not yet dropped.

This hot period seemed similar to the one we had seen the night before. Again, Feather didn't quit, and Giant had some surging, but never looked like it really wanted to erupt. Left the area with the expectation that there wouldn't be much happening out there until after dark.

So the rest of the day was pretty quiet. Finally got around to seeing a One Burst Grand. This one featured a wind direction that was constantly shifting, but getting wet some portion of the benches. Definitely something that doesn't happen there much.

Also paid a quick visit to Geyser Hill, just to see what it looks like. Disappointing the way the NPS has overreacted to the breakout under the boardwalk. Disappointed, but not expected. They always overreact. In this case, they could just close things from Pump to Doublet, and enforce it by pulling up the boardwalk over the outbreak.

Noticed that there are minor changes to the Sawmill Group. The runoff from Crystal and Old Tardy is diverting itself at the boardwalk to flood the grass on both sides of the walkway. I even starting to use the Penta runoff channel. Spasmodic was down well below overflow, while at the same time Sawmill seemed as high as I've seen it all summer. There's also steam visible in the little crack feather to the northeast of Spasmodic, something I cannot remember ever seeing before.

When we got to Norris, I wanted to visiting the indoor plumbing, but the door was locked. I had to visit again later, and it was unlocked. (And the parking lot almost empty. Definitely a high percentage of vehicles for people out to see one geyser in particular.) I noticed on the first visit that the cleaning crew truck was parked nearby, so I assume they locked them until the buses left, so they could stay clean for bit longer.