Coming in during the day wasn’t too bad. Only had to wait about 15 minutes at the West Yellowstone entrance, and the drive was mostly at the speed limit, or close to it. The only problem was about a mile and a half backup starting at the Seven-Mile Bridge, cause by people stopping for a single elk. But by the time I got there a ranger was making sure people weren’t blocking traffic completely.
But what did make the drive in slower than it could have been, especially with the speed limit on I-15 in Idaho being raised to 80mph, were the two construction zones. First I had to wait about 10 minutes at the reconstruction of the Ashton Grade. That I expected. The road was so torn up when I went through there for the 4th of July trip that I figure I’ll still be dealing with it over Labor Day. But they are also repaving the last twelve miles in Idaho up to the Montana border. They will be finished in a few days, but I had to wait about 20 minutes. And of course after these stops the traffic flows at the speed of the slowest (and least considerate) RV in the line.
It was a cool, clear, cloudless day, and incredibly windy. The kind of wind we got back in 1988 on a regular basis, or associated with an incoming thunderstorm. The wait for Grand was interesting, as the Turban intervals were moderately long, and each eruption duration was shorter than the previous. With the start of West Triplet, I figured that it had to go on one of the next two opportunities, or it was going to be a 9 hour wait. As it was, it had a sub-ten minute one burst eruption on the second chance.
I watched West Triplet after Grand, because it seemed like a good time for Rift to start. The activity was weak, with many of the bubbles collapsing as they became visible, and the water just welling up with only occasional splashes. Finally, the upwelling stopped without Rift making an appearance.
For the evening, I walked up on a wet West Triplet runoff channel. A good indication that I’d probably have to wait for the next West Triplet opportunity for Grand to erupt. And as it turned out, Grand did wait long enough for the sun to set and it to start getting dark. At the end, Vent and Turban didn’t just quit, but we were treated to a period of Vent blasting away and Turban even more vigorous than usual. It would be nice if that activity actually meant something interesting might happen, but I’ve never see any indication that it means Grand might try for another burst.
And there are now traffic cones where one of the Grand benches used to be. Seem the support columns on that bench rusted through and it just collapsed one day. Expect to see more of that, and then the question is how long will it take the NPS to replace them? (A little preventive maintenance in the form of paint on those metal parts of the current would help, but I’ll be surprised if that happens.)