I think I now have a better understanding of how the Elusive Vachuda felt back in August 1982.
Got back even earlier than the previous days. Not much had changed overnight. We were getting a nice strong surge every hour or so, otherwise it was just lots of strong South Vent, with some North Vent that wasn't being affected by South as much.
The weather was fine up until around noon, when it started to deteriorate. There was a rain shower around 13:00, and then about an hour later it started coming down hard and continuous. The surges kept coming at about the same rate, so we stuck things out as long as we could, but by 16:00 we gave up. There was a social gathering over in the government area, and by then it seemed a reasonable alternative to four more hours of rain. We were pretty well bundled up and warm and dry, but knew that as soon as we started to leave and pack up, everything was going to get soaked. And it did.
So an hour and a half later, at 17:32, an obvious roar coming from the east was noticed. There was never a radio call about any increased activity, or even the start of the eruption, despite people with radios seeing the start. Rushed on over to the area to see what we could, but it was steam by the time I parked in the lot. Another short water phase.
The wind direction was the same as last time, with the platforms, especially the lower one, getting soaked. The walk down to the bridge was in a downpour, but at the bridge itself it was just the slowing decreasing rain. Cistern was flooded and brown from all the debris washing in.
Unfortunately, no one at that gathering in the government area saw "an eruption of Steamboat". Yes, we all saw a powerful steamphase right after the transisition. But what we saw was also to the equivalent to seeing 99% partial solar eclipse. It's close, but it's not seeing totality itself. What happens is impressive and unusual, but it is nothing compared to what we could have seen. In that regard, I felt cheated by what I saw. I waited three days, in far less than ideal conditions, to pretty much see what I'd seen way back in the 1990s.
After we got back to the Old Faithful area, discovered that Fountain had been observed during the day, and we were approaching the eight hour mark. So we took a quick trip back out, and caught an eruption soon enough after the start that we got to see an eruption of Morning's Thief. The lenght was fairly long, but not long enought to make us want to go out for the next eruption.