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Decided that there wasn't much point to getting out to Grand as it was getting light, so surprised to find out that it had a well over seven hour interval. That messed up plans for the morning, so didn't really get out til it was close to noon. Mostly got started because there was some minor event at Fan & Mortar, and wanted to see what was going on, but arrived after everything died down.

As it was, Castle started erupting as I was tying down my bike. It had all the earmarks of being a minor eruption, as it was constantly stopping and suddenly restarting. One pause, around the 4-1/2 minute mark lasted for almost a minute. But by 15 minutes it was obvious that the transition to steam had started.

Over at Grand, it was a short, two Turban interval wait with no sign of any delays. The eruption itself as two bursts, which is always welcome.

From there, wandered back down to Fan & Mortar to kill some time. Nothing much happened. On the way back, noticed that Spa was boiling in the northern vent, and near overflow, waited for a bit, and it finally did get to overflow. But within ten minutes, the boiling had quit, and it was back below overflow. Grotto was quiet during all this.

Went out for the afternoon Beehive (they are all afternoon Beehives). From there it was obvious that the fire to the south had flared up, and was getting bigger as we watched. No smell of smoke yet, but expect that to change tonight. Last night we caught whiffs of smoke while waiting for Castle.

The evening Grand was entertaining in multiple ways. I saw Turban in eruption as I was walking up, and when I arrived, West Triplet was in overflow, ending about a minute later. The next interval turned into a Turban Delay,

At around the 28 minute mark, Grand, which had been having waves, booped. Then over the next minute, it had several more, before starting to drop. Turban finally erupted about 6 minutes later, and Grand was low. I made a few notes about the activity, taking about a minute, and when I looked up, Grand was not only full again but having another boil. That lead into an explosive start for Grand.

With the sun low, there were some nice rainbows. And it was a pleasant surprise when Grand quit at the 8m24s mark. Except it really didn't try to refill, and then drained, making this one of the shorter eruptions I've seen.

We waited a bit for a possible afterburst, but Grand gave no sign of that happening. So it was about seven minutes before I got down to WestTriplet. It was in a heavy overflow, with thumping and large waves being generated over the vent. Also, a brochure which had been sitting in the vent area for several days finally started to fall apart, with lots of shreds being circulated by the convecting. None of them were escaping down the runoff.

Over the next six minutes, the thumping and upwelling got stronger, and we started getting small splashes. These quickly built into splashes that I consider to be eruptive activity. Then about three minutes later the splashing got really strong, and continuous, and it was obvious that West Triplet was in a full eruption, the first since 26 Aug. During all this, the remainder of the brochure finally drifted into the vent, and it became part of the shreds being circulated.

It was only three minutes later that Rift started. This seemed to start out slower that the typical Rift eruption, and I wouldn't have been surprised if it had been one of those rare eruptions that never overflow. But it too got stronger as the eruption progressed, and the runoff looked normal.

I've seen Grand have this sort of "low pool eruption" before, but this is the first time I can remember actually seeing West Triplet come out of a dormancy period. Interesting that the eruption started in a way (very gradually) that is much different from normal, and how Rift came alive so much faster than normal.

Went out before midnight for another Grand eruption. The smoke filled the basin, not quite as bad as some of the geyser fogs, but still not pretty. While waiting for Grand, at one point Rift started steaming heavily, and making rumbling noises at depth. This lasted for about four minutes, at a time when Sput D was active. An interesting followup to the earlier eruption.

This Grand eruption had a first burst that lasted 7-1/2 minutes, and the whole eruption was only 9m06s. The second time in a row that we were cheated out of a burst.

Also, the bison have made their reappearance, choosing to use the roads to move around, causing lots of problems.

With the weather still nice, went out for another moonlit Grand eruption. This time we got a Turban Delay, but Grand managed to erupt anyhow, and gave us a second burst.

It was still pretty cool out when started waiting for the next One Burst Grand eruption. Castle started as we walked up toward Crested. Waited for an eruption that never looked like it was going to be a minor eruption.

After Grand and Castle, decided that wasting time at Fan & Mortar was the thing to do. In two hours (a full Daisy interval) nothing much happened, which is not surprising since the previous eruption was only a few days ago.

Beehive had it's regularly scheduled afternoon eruption, and after that I saw a Bulger major eruption that had a brief moment of water visible in the Hole. The last 90 seconds or so of that eruption had Bulger stopping briefly, even starting to drain, only to start back up. The Grand eruption was after a two Turban Interval delay, and did give us a nice second burst.

It seemed like a good idea, to go out at sunset and catch one of, and maybe both, of Fountain and Great Fountain. Arrived to the Lower Basin and just as we turned into Firehole Lake Drive, heard a call announcing the start of overflow. Pulled up and sure enough, there it was. That gave us a timeframe for visiting Fountain. Over there, nothing happend during the time we had, so we returned to Great Fountain to catch it, and maybe, if lucky, return for the end of Fountain.

Arrived to find a vent that was barely in overflow. Turns out right after we left, there had been some sort of major drop, and the overflow had only just restarted. So waited, and watched for Fountain. Which also took its time. Well after sunset before it erupted, and still no Great Fountain heavy boiling. Fountain finished and we were still waiting. It was almost completely dark before we finally got "the big boil", and then had to wait almost eight minutes for bursting to start. Fortunately, the crowd there was well behaved, and no one had the genius idea of illuminating it, so we got to see the bursting silhouetted by the last light.

On the drive back, past Hot Lake, the car in front of us suddenly stopped. Odd, but then we saw why-- there was a badger crossing the road and headed toward Narcissus.

By then it was almost time to go to Grand. It seems that it had a Turban delay as we arrived, and we finally got the One Burst Eruption four Turban intervals later. On the second Turban eruption, we even got a long, heavy overflow, but not enough to be a Delay in its own right.

Finally decided since Grand was so late that we'd not try for the next one before dawn, but wait for Castle. After over half an hour, it finally started. Then quit for a short minor eruption just about the time we got into position to enjoy the moonlight on the water column.

Update: Added photo.

With a bright full moon and no need to go to Norris, it was time to see Grand in the dark instead of just hearing in. Came out and waited just two Turban intervals for a nice One Burst Grand eruption,

While waiting for the next eruption, I noticed muddy footprints on the wet boardwalk. Between the rows of benches on the north side were a faint line of paw prints, about 8 to 10 cm across. There was a second set on the main walkway area. They both appeared at the north end, crossed over the runoff channel, and disappeared at the sign location.

It was supposed to be a windy day, and already there was a strong, cool breeze moving the steam around during the One Burst Grand eruption. In the afternoon we did have to endure a four interval Turban delay for what was pretty much a repeat.

The final Grand of the day was again in the dark. There was a small crowd gathered, including people who had just seen Castle have one of its pause-type major eruptions. Many of those drifted away during the several Turban eruptions we had to wait for. But the conditions were fairly warm, for September night, despite the steady wind. Grand finally rewarded us with the fourth One Burst Eruption of the day.

Of interest is that West Triplet still hasn't erupted in over a week, and each eruption of Grand was followed by a strong overflow from it. And, as noted before, the fluctuations in Belgian seem to have stopped. There is even some runoff coming down from Crystal at times.

Day started cold, but not as cold as the forecast. At Norris it was overcast well into the morning, so it never really warmed up until around noon.

Of course there's no fun in finding out that you wasted another day in a place you don't particularly like only to have the geyser you waited for erupt as you were near Madison Jct. just as it got dark and cold again.

A cold, wet day where the original plan was to head to Norris. Except based on the reports and instruments, there wasn't any reason to go and kill a day there. So instead it was spent mostly staying warmer and drier.

Did head out for a couple of Grand eruptions, The first One Burst Grand had an interval just under six hours, and there were only light sprinkles during the wait of a couple of Turban eruption intervals.

The evening Grand was dry, but conditions seemed worse. It looked and felt like October, with a cold wind and gray, low overcast clouds and everything steamy. But Grand cooperated, and gave us a nice second burst after a short 8-1/2 minute first burst. And once again, West Triplet came up to overflow, but did not erupt. Also I've noticed that Belgian Pool still has not fluctuated much in the last few days.

Made an attempt to see Great Fountain, as it was near the end of the NPS window. But when we arrived, it was not even in overflow, and it was going to get dark in about an hour. With the heavy overcast, no chance of any sort of sunset light show, so we left.

Checked out Oblong, just in case, but it was full and overflowing. The Giant Platform was mostly dry, with a few puddles probably left over from the rains the other day, or some big Giant surges. Over at Daisy there was a normal eruption.

Grand had another one of its fifth hour Turban Interval delays, but this time instead of making us wait for an hour, it had a second delay and then erupted. It was another two burst eruption, and Grand's vent held up for about fifteen seconds before draining and and immediate quitting by Vent & Turban.

Wasted some time at Artemisia, then went on down the trail to see if anything was visible. While most of the interesting features are completely hidden, I did see a Cauliflower eruption that had about a meter boil at the beginning, then a few more boils before dropping back down.

The weather deteriorated for the late afternoon Grand wait. There was a consistent 15-20mph wind the whole time, and despite the sunny, clear sky, it felt cold. No delays, and the interval was less than six hours. There was a large boop from Grand a couple of seconds before the eruption started with a bubble bursting. There was a rainbow coming and going the whole time as the wind shifted the spray that was headed toward Rift. We also got a second burst, a long one so not chance for a third. The surprising thing was that despite the eruption lasting over 11-1/2 minutes, Vent & Turban didn't quit.

Once again, West Triplet showed no attempt at erupting, just heavy overflow after each Grand eruption. Now over four days since and eruption, and even longer for Rift. During this time it also seems like Belgian has been full most of the time, and not shown the fluctuations and drops seen earlier.

In the Lodge Cabin area, the NPS has the fire crews doing some tree thinning within ten yards or so of the cabins. Lots of smaller trees are being removed, and branches from some of the larger trees, too. No evidence they are going to clean up all the deadwood littering the area, though.

More Grand eruptions today. Came out at the 11 hour mark no knowing when the previous eruption had occurred. Was at Belgian when Turban started, and moments later saw what appeared to be a Grand Boop well over a meter high This was followed by another, maybe two meters high. Finally Grand started a One Burst Eruption.

Turns out the NPS had the electronic time (around 04:15), but never got around to publishing that information. Typical.

Later spent a hour at Fan & Mortar where I saw nothing but Garbage Mode, with the vents starting and stopping several times during that period.

The after ended the string of short intervals at Grand with a four Turban Interval delay. Once again this eruption was followed by overflow from West Triplet without an eruption. It's now been over three days since its last recorded eruption.

The night was warm, with a clear sky and a bright moon. Probably arrived just in time for a Turban Interval delay. This Turban duration was long, and the next interval didn't have overflow. The delay turned out to be beneficial, because before the next Turban eruption, Oblong erupted.

In the dark, it seemed like the Oblong eruption was short in both height and in duration, but could definitely see bursting and hear it. Several others went down for a closer look, and got there before the end. During the subsequent wait for Grand, it seemed at times like the steam picked up down there, but no followup eruption.

The One Burst Grand eruption was pretty standard for one lasting about eleven minutes. But during the eruption, I noticed Churn splashing, backlit by the moon with heavy steam. Was over by the time I got past the trees at Rift and Bulger, so I returned to Grand.

This time, West Triplet did not even overflow following the Grand eruption. It's now been well over three days since the last eruption of West Triplet was observed.

Went out in a foggy Upper Basin with the expectation of waitiing a few hours for Grand. Turned out it was less than one, although that was a two Turban Interval delay. The eruption itself was my third consecutive two burst eruption, which is something I haven't experienced in quite a while. The second burst had a distinct false pause about a minute in, but instead restarted and lasted for another minute. During the eruption West Triplet overflowed, but I don't know if it actually erupted.

In the afternoon we finally got back to having One Burst Grand eruptions. I think this was probably a four Turban Interval delay, but can't be sure. The first Turban eruption I saw lasted over six minutes, which is a good sign of a delay, and the next interval had no overflow.

It was an all Grand day, it turned out. Went out after dark for the moonlight One Burst Grand eruption. This one was short, less than ten minutes and Vent & Turban seemed to quit at the end for well over a minute, then came back without a pause in Vent.

After came in last night, the thunder and lightening started. There was more in the early morning hours, which meant there wasn't much incentive to get out despite Giantess still being active. This rain did have the nice effect of getting rid of most of the smoke in the air, although there was still a hint when I first got out and about.

Thanks to an electronic time, knew that we were actually well into the interval as we headed out for the One Burst Grand eruption. I noticed that Sawmill was perhaps even higher than noted earlier this visit. The catch basins may have been just rainwater, but hard to tell. At Grand only waited for one Turban interval. After the eruption, West Triplet was overflowing heavily for a while, showing no attempt at erupting.

On Geyser Hill, waited through a rain show to finally get some daylight activity from Giantess. At over a day, it was still bursting nicely. Infant was still boiling heavily up to a meter, and it smelled almost exactly like Emerald Pool at Norris.

Walked around to check out Plume. The only difference was that the water level was actually visible in the two front/lower vents, and the deep sputtering was visible and sounded a lot wetter.

For the afternoon Grand, there wasn't any attempt at a Turban Delay. We also had a relatively short first burst and a quick second. After this eruption, West Triplet didn't try to overflow.

The early nighttime eruption also had two bursts. Caught us by surprise, as the interval was under 5-1/2 hours. But it had two bursts, and again, West Triplet overflowed after the Grand eruption with no attempt at erupting on its own

After last night's fiasco, headed back to Norris when we found no report of any eruption. This time not only was it dark, but foggy as we pulled into the parking lot. The fog got worse out in the basin, such that as the sun rose, it was difficult to see from the platform what was going on with the vents. We did know that there was some sort of push around 07:07 that got us excited, as if it was starting to erupt.
But nothing.

And that was the way it went for the rest of the day. There would be what appeared to be the start of the push from the North Vent, only for the South Vent to take over.

Around 11:00 we got a radio call informing the gathering that Giantess had started erupting a couple of hours earlier. There was general disappointment with this, but no one left to head back south the the Upper Basin.

At around 17:15, I went down to Cistern to take a look at what it was doing. It wasn't overflowing much, even though the boiling over the vent was fairly heavy. The day had been so disappointing that I was considering leaving to got and see some of the activity of Giantess. As I rounded the last hairpin turn and got within sight of the platform, New Crater started another push that actually got the inhabitations shouting. I started video recording, and made my way back to my chair as this push died. I left the camera running, fortunately, as a second push started a few seconds later, and this one led to the actual eruption at 17:36.

I rushed back to get a height measurement. I got 65% of 130 meters, or 84.5meters (277ft). This matched the impression of those who saw the start from a distance, that it wasn't one of the taller eruptions.

The wind direction was perfect. Most of the parking lot was spared being drenched, and we never were in danger of getting wet. If the wind had been a bit more to the north, we probably would have had a dirtier eruption, and perhaps even a choke. As it was, North only showed a hint of brown for a while.

Stayed for about 90 minutes, until the clouds and wind shift encouraged us to leave. Got back to the Upper Basin with it not quite dark, and headed over to Geyser Hill. The parking lot was mostly dry when we left, although the exit end loop was damp along the edges.

Did the loop around the hill before heading over to the benches near Vault. At Plume, it looked like there was quite an area that had gotten wet, but Plume itself sounded unchanged from what I'd seen earlier. Over between Depression and Heart I thought I caught a whiff of low tide. I expected more, considering there had been quite a bit of time for grass to grow in the various runoff channels.

Caught a couple of Giantess active periods, and an eruption of Vault. Most interesting was the activity of Infant. It was well above the rim, and the muddy looking water was boiling and erupting up to a meter high almost continuously. It also had a sweet smell a lot like Emerald, not the putrid smell I normally associate with it.

On the drive to Norris in the dark, had a bison encounter. It was standing in the southbound lane in Fountain Flats just across from the Thud Group. It didn't move until was right next to it, despite flashing lights and honking horn. Other than that, the drive was uneventful.

When we arrived there was someone on the Upper Platform, prone and in a sleeping bag. I rudely woke him up and he quietly disappeared.

Uneventful also describes the day at Norris. There was a datalogger report of something big happening around 03:00 and New Crater/Steamboat was in some sort of recovery mode the rest of the day. Most of the activity consisted of strong North Vent activity which shut down when South Vent joined in. Only late in the day did it start showing real signs of life, with the biggest attempt right as everyone was headed out ahead of darkness and a windy storm and a stream of incoming drunken louts. Even then, despite the mass of water from South, the North Vent would die instead of getting stronger.

Which brings us to the big event of the day. During the drive back to Old Faithful, it is always fun being cut off from any information about what is happening at Norris for almost an hour. So the first thing anyone does, with a certain amount of dread, is check to see what happened at Norris during that time. I've been fortunate in that until tonight, I've not had to see a posting saying I've missed an eruption.

Except tonight's posting had a time that made no sense. It only about an hour old. I double checked my logbook, and supposedly the eruption started just as I'd left the platform. It always takes at least fifteen minutes to uncover the truck and head out, so there was no way this report was accurate. I flagged it immediately.

Needless to say, quite a few people saw this report and got upset by it. The report was not appreciated and caused a bit of anger at the sloppiness that got it posted in the first place. People who report this information need to remember that those of us actually here in Yellowstone rely on GeyserTimes for accurate information, and it is the duty of those making reports to insure they are accurate before making them. There is nothing to be gained by attempting to be "First!" if that information is flat out wrong, as it was here. It's not a game.

In the morning I expect to check GeyserTimes and see if I need to head back to Norris, or if I can sleep in. I want to be sure I can trust that info, and not have to independently confirm it at a time when I am barely awake.

As mentioned earlier, it was stormy on the drive back, with occasional showers. Unfortunately, it appears that there really wasn't enough rain to have an effect on the fire, and the wind was probably not helpful.

Arrived at Norris at dawn, not really expecting much until the afternoon. Turned out to be late afternoon, with over a period of 20 minutes there being three significant attempts at erupting starting around 16:27. There was a second, even better period starting just about the time to leave, with three more attempts in a period of six minutes starting at 20:13. Then nothing as it got dark.

It was hard to tell the smoke from the clouds during the day, although by evening there was some patchy blueness to it. Back at Old Faithful, the smoke could be seen as fogginess and was definitely a smell in the air.

The fires didn't dominate the day. The general smokiness wasn't changed much, but this morning there was a definite smell of burn wood in the air that disappeared as the day progressed. It wasn't until about noon that the plume of smoke from down south became obvious. By evening it would have been clearing if not for the local fire.

The morning Grand was a Turban Interval delay, and it was on the third Turban eruption that we finally got the One Burst Grand eruption. That burst lasted just over 9-1/2 minutes, then Grand held water over the vent for nearly a minute before draining. With that, Vent & Turban also quit.

The afternoon saw another Turban delay, this one for five intervals. Grand finally erupted as West Triplet quit. Fortunately, we got a second burst this time. With a first burst lasting less than eight minutes, we definitely expected one. That burst was fairly short, and Grand showed no attempt to have a third, even though the duration was still under ten minutes. Again, Vent & Turban quickly quit once the eruption was over.

One interesting non-thermal item of the day were the otters just below the Sawmill bridge. They were seen first just after the morning Grand eruption. They got out of the river, only to disappear into one of those dead holes just upstream on the west side. The grass looks beat down between that hole and the river, like they've done that before. They weren't seen the rest of the day,

Went out early for Grand based on a double interval. Didn't find out until later that the first interval was particularly long, and we'd arrived not much after first overflow. No delays, but the One Burst Eruption had an interval of about 6-1/2 hours.

The mid-day Grand was similar. A Delay Turban was followed by three Turban intervals before we finally got the One Burst Eruption. This one also lasted just under ten minutes.

After Grand, decided to go to Artemisia to kill some time. Walked up, dropped my pack and started to get out the water bottle when I felt the first thumps. Unfortunately, the wind was pretty strong, and shifting, so there wasn't any place to stand where one didn't get the full force of the steamy fog. And it was hot.

Returning from there, glanced at Fan & Mortar, and they looked dead. By the time we got to Castle, there was a radio call about splashing in the Main Vent. Went back, and there was some huge splashes, as wide as the vent and well above the highest part of the rim. Unlike yesterday, Bottom Vent didn't dominate, but even so, the Fan vents started out nice but by the time Angle Vent started, it was obvious that there wasn't much of a chance for an eruption.

After the Fan & Mortar event, noticed that there was a large smoke plume to the south among the general haze. Turns out there's a small fire near Lone Star. The NPS closed the trail and evacuated the campsites by helicopter. We had intended to go out that way tomorrow, looks like that is off.

Went out for a Grand in the dark, and had the place to myself. Interval was just under six hours, and no signs of any sort of delay. Best of all, Grand quit at just over eight minutes, and followed up with a nice illuminated second burst. Total duration was only 9-1/2 minutes, so could've had a third if it had tried.

Another smoky day, but not quite as bad as yesterday morning. By evening most of the smoke seemed to be thickest to the south, down in the Tetons and Jackson.

Went out on a double interval for the One Burst Grand eruption, and got a full Turban Delay interval. So that was probably the shorter of the two intervals.

Checked out Daisy, which had another short duration of around 3m15s. Over at the Sawmill Group, saw Crystal in overflow, along with Belgian actually up to and over the rim. I still can't see any correlation between the water levels there and the activity elsewhere.

The mid-day One Burst Grand had to have a five Turban delay, again showing the bimodality in the intervals. The call that Beehive's Indicator was erupting came after about three intervals. So many left for the sure thing. Fortunately for them, Grand held off so that we had a total of five intervals in the Delay.

Later in the afternoon, Fan & Mortar had a nice attempt at erupting. There were some Main Vent surges that filled the vent area. Lower Mortar had a high water level too. But Mortar's Bottom Vent was dominating, and it lasted a long time. I don't like seeing that, and it always seems that Fan's response to strong Bottom Vent is weaker than desired. That was the case here, where the excitement evaporated at the activity died out as Angle Vent started.

So went over to Grand for the evening activity. There it seemed like I missed a Delay, based on the long Turban duration and the lack of overflow before the next Turban eruption. West Triplet started at the same time as Turban, and that led to a true Delay. West Triplet's duration was short, so it was a surprise that almost immediately Rift started. And then the One Burst Grand eruption started. I had been prepared for a long wait, with an eruption in the dark, so this was a nice relief to see it just after sunset.