A Trip to the Park Pt3

The following is from a trip I took to Yellowstone National Park with my father and brothers. I was 14 at the time so don’t get too prudent with the sentence structure.

Day 1: Exploring

To recap the night , we arrived at are campsite, put some grub on, set up our tent and some chairs, built a fire, ate dinner, and relaxed by the fire. Which was slowly dying, with the occasional pop and crackle. Then we went to bed, hoping a bear wouldn't decide to take a stroll through our campsite. I awake, alive of course, heard the crackling of a fire, so I slipped on my boots and headed out, so I could warm up and eat a hot breakfast. My dad, brother and I just sat around the flame, just trying to wake up. “I am glad” my father stated “because the sun’s warmth couldn’t get past all the trees. My hands weren’t cold, it was my feet. I had to put 3 layers of socks on because it felt like they were about to fall off, that’s how cold they felt if you can imagine. Are breakfast included cheerios, O.J., veggie bacon, and toast, a small and simple meal but it filled my stomach, and we waited for the fire to die down and we would head out to explore the park.

As we exited out campground someone had hit an elk, there were park rangers, the lady who was in the R.V. was crying and the man who was driving talked with one of the rangers. Anyways, our first stop was the famous geyser, Old Faithful. After we saw and took videos and photos of it erupting, we walked around looking at the heated pools and other geysers located around Old Faithful. For about an hour we stopped and got ice cream from one of the many grilles/bars/gift shops in the area. The air their smelt like sulfur (rotten eggs) and the soil around the geysers and pools was as white as snow. From all the chemicals boiling up from them. You could tell the hotter pools from the cooler ones, the hottest ones were a dark blue or white with hints of blue. The cooler ones were a dark red, redder than a glowing fire, filled with hot coals.

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The trees, the were unlucky enough to have been there before the geysers. They were dead, petrified with no branches at all, just giant wooden poles sticking out from the ground. Some people actually just jump in the pools, thinking that they are natural hot tubs you can swim in, but when they found out it was too late. People have been burned, severely injured if not dead when they touch over 200 degree water. The water doesn’t stay there, some of it flows into the Fire Hole river and in some parts of the river you can swim in because the heated pools heat up the river. Which is where my dad, brother, and I are headed. As we arrive to the rive the trees move back and it opens up onto a small amount of grassland. The ground is white, but there are no geysers or heated pools. the trees come back and then all you can see is the road, trees, and the Fire Hole river.

If you turn 360 degrees around you’ll notice large hills and small mountains surrounded you, this ancient crated was from 600,000 years ago when a super volcano erupted and my dad says it was due for another one. I thought it could happen right at that very moment or tomorrow or in 100 years, too band we don’t know how to predict those kind of things, could save a lot of people.

We arrived at the river, got out of our big truck and headed down, the water was cold but not freezing. Now, the part that's the worst is from the top of your thighs to your belly button, if you catch my drift fellas. I put on my goggles and dove under, the water was crystal clear, the sulfur doesn’t let much grow. Although, it didn’t affect any of the people. We spent about 2 hours swimming and exploring the small section of rive that was swimmable. I found a ring and made a small log tower with some wood I found at the bottom. I doubt it will remain their for very much longer. After that, we dried off, got all are things together and headed back to our tent. On our way back we saw a buffalo right up on the road. It was just chilling and relaxing, soaking up some sun. We stayed and took a few photos, then continued on our way. There was some elk but too many people had stopped already and park rangers were telling people to move along.

I sat in our truck and looked at the scenery until we arrived at our camp. When we did, I opened this (my journal) up to explain/write down everything that had happened throughout our day.

I wanted to put this somewhere digitally because ink will eventually fade to nothingness. I want this story of my father and brothers to last longer than some dollar store pen ink will allow. Thank you for reading and have a nice day.

A young writer trying to find his way as a human and a writer.

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