Winter in Wonderland: Yellowstone

Every year, over four MILLION visitors travel to Yellowstone, the world's first National Park. It's no wonder - the park is a beautiful landscape of mountains, meadows, lakes, geothermal features, and abundant wildlife. But the downside is that all those people mean lots of traffic and pollution, parking problems and blocked views.

It was c-c-c-cold!!!

But in the winter, Yellowstone gets fewer visitors per MONTH than it does during a busy summer day. The figure-8 road that runs through the park is closed to the public, and only snow coaches and snowmobiles can make it to the heart of the park. The landscape is covered in a thick layer of powdery snow, so cold and dry that individual flakes stay separate. Trees are coated with snow and rimefrost, the frozen ice from the condensation spewed out by the nearby geysers and fumaroles. It's sublime.

Rimefrost near Steamboat Geyser

Ever the willing adventure partner, Anil flew out to come with me. We stocked up on gear (plenty of long underwear, thick socks, and handwarmers!) and headed out to Bozeman, Montana on the first day of Winter Break.

Flights always seem to get in late (after midnight) to Bozeman, so we found a nearby hotel and took the shuttle bus into the park the next day. Bozeman was cold, but at 2,000 ft higher elevation, the entrance to Yellowstone was much colder. Thank god for snow gear!!
The Yellowstone area has been used by humans for at least 11,000 years. The first white explorers, members of the Lewis and Clark Expedition, came in 1805 and observed at least one geothermal area - a place described as "fire and brimstone" that most people thought were a myth. It wasn't until 1871 when the Hayden expedition, including photographer William Henry Jackson and painter Thomas Moran, reported to Congress and convinced the government to set aside the land under federal protection. In 1872, President Ulysses S. Grant signed The Act of Dedication, creating Yellowstone National Park. The vast majority lies in the state of Wyoming, but three percent is in Montana and one percent is in Idaho.

The main reason why Yellowstone is such a remarkable geologic area is because of the supervolcano lying underneath. The Yellowstone Caldera is the largest volcanic system in North America, around 40 miles long and 20 miles wide.
Three major eruptions have occurred - the most recent being 640,000 years ago, which produced 240 cubic miles of pyroclastic material (over 1,000 times greater than Mount St. Helens). The others were 1.3 million years ago, and 2.1 million years ago (the most violent at 588 cubic miles of material). Ash from that first explosion went as far South as Mexico and as far east as Illinois. Each explosion probably led to the extinction of many species and caused significant changes in weather patterns.

With over 10,000 hydrothermal features, Yellowstone is the most active spot on earth. The current geothermal activity is because of the magma chamber lying close to the earth's surface under the Yellowstone Caldera. Molten lava heats up the underground aquifer, and depending on the underground plumbing system and makeup of rock, one of four geothermal features can be present.
 

Fumaroles at Roaring Mountain

Cistern Spring, Norris Geyser Basin

All hydrothermal features need water, heat, pressure, and a plumbing system. The difference between geysers, hot springs, mud pots, and fumaroles depends on the amount of available water, the makeup of the surrounding soil, and the plumbing system.

Mud Volcano

Vixen Geyser, Norris Geyser Basin

We did get to see all four features - mostly at Norris Geyser Basin, but we also visited West Thumb, Hayden Valley, Lamar Valley, and we stayed for four nights at the Upper Geyser Basin (and Old Faithful).


We started the trip at Mammoth Hot Springs, with three days exploring the northern part of the park. It was especially interesting to see the travertine terraces, whose hot water keep it from being covered in snow. Different bacterial thermophiles live in the springs, turning the waters different colors based on the temperature and type of bacteria. Hotter waters generally grow deep blues and greens, while cooler temperatures foster oranges and yellows. The terraces are formed when thermal waters dissolve calcium carbonate in the limestone bedrock as it travels to the surface. When it reaches the surface, carbon dioxide is released from the water, causing a precipitation of the calcium carbonate.

 With most of the park closed to public vehicles, dozens of snowmobile tour groups come in from West Yellowstone just for the day. Looks fun, but we saw two different accidents (and the people looked SO cold!)





One of the highlights of the trip was the early morning 'Wake Up to Wildlife' tour, leaving before the sun rose. We went into the Lamar Valley to see the many animals that migrate there in the winter in order to forage in the open meadows.

Bison (also called buffalo), are an icon of Yellowstone. Over 5,000 bison roam through the greater Yellowstone ecosystem, but that number grew from only around 23 individuals in the 1800s because of poaching. Historically, bison roamed the American West in huge numbers - between 25 and 60 million - until they were hunted to near extinction. In the mid to late 1800's, they were down to 23 individuals, until the US Government stepped in by introducing a captive herd. Now, over 5,000 bison roam through the greater Yellowstone ecosystem.

Can you spot the wolves?

The story of the Yellowstone wolves is just as interesting - they were purposely exterminated in the 1920's, back when the park believed that any carnivore was a 'bad' animal. When the elk population exploded, there was worry of plant die-off and land erosion. They then realized wolves were part of a healthy ecosystem, and in 1995, 41 wolves were reintroduced to the park. Today, around 100+ wolves help keep Yellowstone healthy. We were lucky enough to see two black wolves on our first full day in the park, bounding through the snow at Swan Lake Flats.

Often mistaken for wolves, coyotes are much more abundant in the park. With the white snow covering the landscape, it was easy to spot these canines hunting for mice under the snow.

Head-first diving into the snow!

A highlight was seeing moose, which aren't very common in the park (the fire of 1988 burned much of the moose habitat, and they are just slowly returning).

Did you know? Antlers - like on this elk - aren't permanent.
Animals like elk, moose, and deer grow new antlers every year.

Bighorn Sheep

One of the more interesting animals that we got to see was a river otter! Much easier to spot in the winter, playing in the snow.


We also saw many, many different birds - surprising, since it was SO DANG COLD! Did you know that a chickadee goes into forced hypothermia every night, shivering to keep warm? The trumpeter swan is North America's largest waterfowl, with a wingspan of 8 feet! Bald eagles, who normally feed on fish, eat a lot more waterfowl in the winter when their water sources ice over. And the unobtrusive American dipper is the only North American songbird that can swim underwater!

This bald eagle was feeding on fish.

Trumpeter swan

Staying at the Snow Lodge in the heart of the Upper Geyser Basin meant being able to see Old Faithful erupting at all hours of the day. The first time was during the day when hundreds of day snowmobilers were visiting, but the lodge only has 134 rooms so morning and afternoon/evenings are really quiet. When we went to Old Faithful at around 9PM, only 5 other people were out there and a red fox ran across the geyser base just as it started to erupt!

Staying at Snow Lodge also means getting the opportunity to wander around the Upper Geyser Basin, which gave us a close and intimate look at many of the features. We snowshoed around, which was a lovely way to enjoy the area.














On Christmas Day, we took an all-day excursion to snowshoe around the Grand Canyon of the Yellowstone. We were able to follow a path by the river that doesn't exist in the summer, and it gave us a great vantage of both the canyon and the falls.

Firehole River

Another excursion we tried was the Lone Star cross country ski trip, a 5-mile journey skirting the Firehole River through some of the most beautiful landscape in the park.

We made it to the Lone Star Geyser just in time to see the 45-foot tall geyser erupting. It's a cone geyser, as seen by the mound of built up geyserite, which causes a steady jet to shoot up in the air (as opposed to a fountain geyser).











Another interesting thing in winter is seeing all the animal tracks. After several days of no precipitation, it snowed on Christmas Eve, leaving a clean white blanket that clearly showed new animal tracks. It was fun trying to figure out what animals had left their tracks.

Larger prints are coyote; smaller are mice, squirrel, and/or voles.

Vole on the left, squirrel on the right (see the tail track?)

But the best part of being in Yellowstone in the winter was just admiring the landscape. Amazing!















































It isn't an easy trek to get out to Yellowstone in the winter, but if you ever get the chance, its well worth the effort!

Adventures in Alaska: Katmai National Park

2 August – Katmai

Traveling around Alaska is an interesting experience because of its inaccessibility, and getting to Katmai was definitely memorable. We had an early morning checkin time for our small (9 passenger) plane to King Salmon (Anil sat in the front with the pilot!), then we transferred to the float plane that would take us to Brooks Camp. The plane was bigger than I was expecting – we climbed onto one of the floats to get up into the plane, and we took off on Naknek Lake. Landing on water is actually a really smooth experience, much smoother than land, and it was a quick 20 minute ride over emerald green waters.

Unloading from the float plane

At Brooks Camp, the plane parked right onto the beach on the shores of Naknek, and we walked first to the Visitor Center for a briefing on the camp and on bear safety. Here the rule is different than what we’d heard before – we were to stay 50 yards from any bear. Walk off the trails if a bear was on the trail with us. There’s no food or flavored drinks allowed outside of walled structures. But really, we thought, how close could we possibly get to a bear?? (ahem. The correct answer is: petting distance...)

Instead of heading straight to the Brooks Fall platform 1.2 miles away (which holds 40 people with a 1 hour limit if people are waiting), we decided to have lunch and join the ranger cultural site tour in camp first, and go to the falls after the day trippers left (some people take the morning flight in at 10 and leave in the afternoon around 4 or 5). After eating, we decided to work on our junior ranger books while we waited for the ranger program. Gemma and I went down to the beach by the float planes. We sat on the driftwood in front of the Brooks Camp sign and concentrated on the (really difficult!!) word search. Suddenly Gemma panic-whispered, “KATHY!” and I looked up to see a sow with two cubs strolling in front of us, about 8-10 feet away.

They were totally silent – we couldn’t hear the crunching of rocks even as they passed. The mom was uninterested but kept looking back to make sure her cubs were following, and the cubs looked curiously over at us. Gem and I were frozen in surprise and a little panic – we’d been told to back away when encountering a bear, but we were sitting down and it would have been more disruptive to stand up. So we decided to just sit and savor the magical moment. The bears continued down the beach, completely unconcerned and uninterested. 

Without a doubt, I saw way more bears than mosquitoes while in Alaska!! (but that might have something to do with the changing weather patterns - it was an unseasonably warm, dry year. Good for us, bad for Alaska...)

My pumice experiment!

We kept working on our ranger books, doing the different activities that taught us about the park. The enormous volcanic eruption of Novarupta in 1912 sent a huge cloud of ash and pumice all over the peninsula, and chunks of it were scattered all over the beach - did you know pumice floats?
We then joined in on the ranger-led cultural tour, to learn about the people that once inhabited this area.


Before Brooks Lodge became popular (and so well protected), there weren't as many bears in the area. Before Novarupta erupted in 1912, there were four native groups that settled permanently in Katmai, and several others came seasonally.

The site of a former
semi-subterranean home

Near Brooks Lodge, a 650 year old semi-subterranean home was found and reconstructed. Around camp, dozens of pits can be found, each where one of these homes likely stood.

Mama bear, peering into the high brush for danger

As the day progressed we soon realized the bears were literally everywhere. The boardwalks have multiple gates to cross to keep the bears off – much like the butterfly and bird doors in aviaries – and it’s a bit nervewracking walking down the Falls trail, which we share with the bears, since we’d had first-hand knowledge in how quiet the bears can be. In addition, the vegetation was deceptively high – crossing the water by camp the landscape seemed fairly clear, but a bear coming out of the water and into the grasses almost instantly disappeared in the brush.

As we walked, we continued a conversation so that the bears could hear us – if we had nothing to say, we’d just call out, “Hey bear!” or other nonsense.

His swollen belly will help him survive the upcoming winter

And closer to the falls, there were plenty of signs of bears. There were several well-trampled paths criss-crossing under the boardwalk, and several indentations dug in the dirt – belly holes, so that the bears could comfortably rest and have a place to put their salmon-swollen bellies.

And the view from falls was incredible. 

Over a dozen bears were in sight – the biggest alpha bears were at the top of the falls, heads down and eyes fixed intently on the water waiting for the right moment to snatch jumping salmon from the air. Other big bears were sitting in the pools at the base of the falls, scanning for fish that had failed the jump. 

Three little cubs, waiting for
mom to bring them supper...

and their patience paid off!

Further down the river were sub-adults and younger bears, waiting their turn and looking for cast-offs – it seemed as though some of the bigger bears would catch fish, take one or two bites, and let the rest float away. 
Downriver, the bears were “submarining” – keeping their heads underwater as they looked for the right fish for dinner.

Among the mix were dozens of birds – mostly gulls, with ravens and magpies as well, waiting their turn. They were greedy, eating gigantic hunks of fish and sometimes taking pieces that seemed way too big for them to swallow or too heavy for them to fly away with. That didn’t deter them – one particularly greedy gull kept swallowing a too-big string of fish guts, throwing up most of it and trying to swallow it back again.

That's my shadow on those bears!

The platform is built right up to the river’s edge, and several of the young adult bears used that area to get close to the falls while avoiding the big males. One young bear caught a fish very close to us, bringing its meal directly under the platform under us to eat. We had a clear view of him tearing into the fish, with another next to him reaching in a paw (and getting swatted away) until finally it got hold of about half the salmon to eat.
It was mesmerizing to watch the bears, and we stayed over 2 hours to watch before going back to camp.

After dinner, we went back to take advantage of the late-night Alaskan sun. The area is closed from 10PM until 7AM to allow the bears who are more shy of humans some time to fish, so we went back for another hour right before the platform closed for the night.
It was very clear who were the experts and who were the inexperienced fishermen – after dinner we went back to the platform and saw that the big older male had left. A younger bear in a prime spot tried his luck, but kept batting the fish with his paws instead of catching with his mouth, and he missed way more fish than he caught. But the better fishers could stand on the ledge and snag a salmon after less than a minute of waiting.

Unquestionably, the brown bears of Katmai are one of the most iconic images of the National Parks. We marvel at them, and cheer when they make a spectacular snatch of a fish flying through the air. But let's think about the fish for just a sec...
There are five main types of salmon that spawn in Alaska: the Chinook, Pink, Sockeye, Chum, and Coho. In the clear, freshwater gravel of the rivers and lakes of Alaska, salmon are born as small 'alevin' with their yolk sacs still attached. As they grow and develop, they become 'fry' and start swimming around in search of food. Salmon fry stay in freshwater for up to a year or two, depending on the species. At this time, they grow into the 'smolt' stage and start to get ready for their ocean migration. They live in brackish water where the sea meets fresh water. When they get to a certain size, they become adults and swim into the open ocean to feed.

The spawning vs. marine stages
of Alaska's salmon species

King salmon can live in salt water up to 6 years, while others like the pink return after about 2 years. In any case, when they return to fresh water to spawn, they start physically changing. They develop darker colors like the maroon/red of sockeye and kings, a defined hump in pink and sockeyes, and a large hooked jaw in the males. But all salmon swim back up the rivers where they were born. Some, like chum salmon in the Yukon River, may migrate over 2,000 miles to get to their spawning grounds!

One fish, two fish, red fish, GO FISH!

During their singleminded pursuit to get to there, they don't eat or sleep - they become zombie fish and use all their resources to get past all obstacles - it's not just waterfalls and rapids and bears, but eagles swoop down, water levels fall, and hundreds of human anglers come to try their hand at fishing. Those that are lucky enough to make it pair up; the female deposits her eggs in a bed she digs in the gravel, and the male fertilizes them with his milt. They stay near the eggs to protect them, then die - their bodies becoming nutrients to help feed the environment of their growing young. A single female lays around 4,000 eggs; only one of these will successfully return as an adult to spawn.
Most of the fish we saw hadn't turned their characteristically bright red yet - they do that right before spawning, as their bodies start leaching nutrients and they begin to zombify. The majority  we saw were sockeyes, and they'd already traveled for miles to get to Brooks Falls. 200,000 to 400,000 salmon will successfully leap Brooks Falls each year - but it takes many tries to do it. One ranger estimated that around 6-7% of jumps are successful. In the peak of the season, around 300 sockeyes jump per minute. When we were there, it was probably closer to 75.
It's easy to look across at the panorama from the Brooks Falls platform and 'see' the bears, but it was an interesting exercise to look at it from the point of view of the fish. They struggle mightily to get up the meter-or-so vertical leap of the falls, only to be thwarted by the gaping maw of a thousand-pound brown bear's open jaws.
After a while, I was secretly cheering for the salmon, gratified when one would make it up the falls and swim away towards Lake Brooks, preparing to continue the cycle of life.


3 August – Katmai

Unbeknownst to most visitors, Katmai National Park was actually created because of the landscape and geologic features, not because of the bears. In 1912, a catastrophic eruption of Mt. Novarupta occurred on the eastern side of the park, the fifth largest volcanic eruption in recorded human history. It was devastating to many of the native villages and covered the area in a thick layer of ash and pumice.

Four years later, National Geographic Explorer Robert Griggs came to the area and found steaming fumaroles and a barren, moon-like landscape. The area, now known as the Area of Ten-Thousand Smokes, was the inspiration for Griggs to petition Congress and create Katmai National Monument in 1918. Later, in 1980, the area was expanded to protect the natural habitat and surrounding environment, and Katmai National Park and Preserve was established.

Because our flight out that afternoon wasn’t leaving until 5PM, we decided to take the all day tour into the Ten-Thousand Smokes area. In the morning, Gemma and I went out to the Brooks Falls platform for about an hour, watching the bears in the lower falls area. There weren’t any above the falls fishing, but the sow with three cubs was in the lower area exploring and eating.

From there we walked back to the far side of the camp boardwalk to meet the bus. Around us were 5 or 6 bears either sleeping or playing in the shallows, close to but totally oblivious to the human onlookers.

We took the approx. 1 hour ride into the valley, stopping first at an overlook to see the sweeping views to Naknek Lake and the rich vegetation of spruce and birch trees.

The closer we got to the valley, the smaller and younger the vegetation; at the ranger overlook, there was a view of the valley and the desolate landscape still devoid of green.
Minerals from the eruption color the soil and former steam vents or fumaroles. We didn’t see any smoke (most of the active fumaroles are in the upper valley), but we had an unusually clear and warm day that gave us a great view of the entire valley and chain of mountains surrounding it including Mt. Griggs, Mt. Katmai, and the Buttress Range.

After lunch, we hiked the 1.5 mile trail down to Ukak Falls. From the bottom of the canyon, we had a great view of the layered ash and leftover volcanic debris. It was a great way to see a less-traveled area of the park!

On the bus ride back, the bus startled a brown bear on the road. We slowed and he ran off ahead of us, but every time we turned a corner he was still there on the road. He had several chances to veer off the road but continued running off in front of us; it was a bit sad to see him expending so much energy that he would need to survive the winter. It wasn’t until we reached the Molly River that he finally ran into the brush.

We made it back to Brooks Camp a bit after 3:30, a bit too late for us to go out onto the Falls Platform, so we headed back to camp. There was still bear activity around the boardwalk, and one final bear walking down the beach just as we were boarding our little float plane. He came right by us as an older man was trying to get on the plane, and the pilot had to hurry him along since the bear was coming fairly quickly towards us and passed just a few feet away.

All in all, being in Katmai is such a privilege and it’s nice to see how well the National Park has maintained the separation of humans and animals. The boardwalks and platforms are positioned in a way to stay fairly unobtrusive, and visitors aren’t allowed to stop on the boardwalks so that bears don’t feel impacted in any way if they want to cross. We’re truly made to feel like we’re the visitors and the bears are the residents, and we’re taught to stay as impact-free as possible all while still being able to enjoy the views.

Alaska’s National Parks are truly spectacular, and the vastness and scope are really incomprehensible. It’s difficult and expensive to get here, but I’m eager and excited to put the other parks high on my priority list!