Final Day at Yellowstone! (August 3rd)

Ah man! It's the last day. I know you are probably thinking "Thank Goodness! Kendra took way too many pictures!" Well, I promise that the next event I will only take 200! :) Anyway, we loaded up our cars with all of your goods (basically most of our human possessions...who knew that it took so much stuff to go on vacation with the 2 little girls!) and went in the park for another half day. Our first stop was the Midway Geyser Basin, home of the Grand Prismatic Spring, which is truly breathtaking! First you walk across Firehole River and walk onto the basin. The springs just flow into the river and it looks like lava from all of the different kinds of bacteria that grow in the spring. Then you walk past a huge bright aqua spring that is really deep (and quite stinky!). It is bigger than an Olympic size pool (I think) and I cannot remember the name of it. Here is a fact while I am looking up the name of the Spring... Yellowstone holds close to 60% of the world's geysers! OK, so the think that I thought was a spring really is a geyser called Excelsior Geyser and apparently the big crater that I was talking about (the really deep part) is 200' (wide) x 300' (deep) and lets 4000 gallons of water into the river per minute!


This beauty is the Grand Prismatic Spring. It is absolutely amazing to behold! It is 370' (wide) x 121' (deep). The steam that comes off of it really looks like a rainbow (I think that it is the reflection of all of the bacteria growing in the springs).

Miss Independent: Tori, decided to dawn her fairy wings at this beautiful site. Here are a few of my favorites! There is one that looks like she is taking a nap on the boardwalk, but she is just looking through the slats for bugs. She loves bugs...I know, weird! Jason was scared that she was going to take a walk off on the thermal grounds surrounding the springs (which mind you she tried climbing off the trail...but not before we asked her to stay on) so we had to be close to her during this little jaunt. But isn't she so cute?!
Grandma ("Mama") and Grandpa ("Papa") sure love their little grandkids! Can you tell? And boy do the girls just love them right back! Although Grandma didn't get to visit most of the sites with us she was always willing to take care of the munchkins while we were off gallivanting! Gwen, you are amazing and you made our trip that much better! Thank you!



With Brookie playing with Grandma in the car (I didn't want her to get sun burned) we marched Miss Tori up to see the Fountain Paint Pots located in the Upper Geyser Basin. We were a little geysered out, so we just took the short trail around the paint pots.
Once again, the pictures of the paint pots aren't nearly as cool as watching them bubble pink and white ooze from the ground. Tori thought these paint pots were pretty cool and she especially liked the fact that she could climb the fence to get a better look! As you can see from the picture above, we tried to bring the stroller with us, but she would not have it and pushed the stroller instead of riding in it. On the way out we had to hug a tree for good measure!


Our last picnic! (Sadness!) We got an amazing spot on the Firehole River (up the hill from the river so that Tori wouldn't jump in!) and set up. While we were getting ready Tori went off with Grandpa to explore the surroundings (that is her favorite: to explore anything and everything with Papa). She found a lot of bugs and flowers and learned the art of throwing rocks into the river. I am sure that she wanted to jump in, and if she had her swimsuit on I am sure she would have!

There is not a picnic without a photo shoot of Brookie! We let her play on the tablecloth again and she was way excited to be out of her car seat again. After lunch we let her play in the grass by the river and she was elated with all of the space. What a cutie! I am so glad that she didn't perfect her crawling until we got home the next day or she would have been all over!


Ahhh! Cute family pics thanks to Dennis! We sure got some tender pictures of the girls! With Mama and Papa too! So cute! My favorite has to be the one with Tori and Brooke in front of the river. We finally have a picture of our whole family that isn't 9 months old! (Hence the new side bar!)
Some black and whites for your enjoyment. Well, it was sad to end our Yellowstone trip and we sure do miss Mama and Papa! We love spending time with all of our extended family and it is hard to see them leave and then get back to real life! Thanks Mama and Papa for everything!
If you missed: Day 1, Day 2, Day 3!