Hello everyone!
I fall more and more in love with this place everyday and I am so unbelievably happy here. What an eventful, fun few weeks I have had…. I don’t even know where to begin!
Let’s start with the nerdy, fun stuff. Since I have arrived, I have gotten super into “geyser gazing.” We have about 6-7 “predictable geysers” in the Old Faithful Area, and my new goal is to watch them all erupt at least once this season, and hope I get lucky with seeing some of the unpredictable geysers! (For context, there are about 900 geysers in the world, and Yellowstone is home to 500 of them!!)
Grand and Riverside are my favorite geysers in the basin behind the visitors center, and I have also seen Old Faithful erupt plenty of times, as well as Daisy (linked below) and Castle, Lion, Beehive which I saw from my car or in the Visitor Center, so I hope to catch these up close sometime soon!
Work has been great! I am loving my job and getting more comfortable in my knowledge and my role as an Interpretive-Ranger! I finally have a uniform and feel like an official part of the team! (minus my flat hat which didn’t fit, 🙁 so I am exchanging it and an updated photo coming soon!)
I have also done some “bison babysitting” which is exactly how it sounds! Monitoring a bison that is near a populated area and redirecting people to stay out of the bison’s way.
As an Interpretive-Ranger, my role is to to “provide each visitor an opportunity to personally connect with a place”, and due to my bilingualism, I have had the chance to interact with several deaf visitors, some of my parents’ friends, and others by chance! I even was lucky enough to get special permission from my boss to “disappear” for 2 hours and give these deaf folks who are friends of my parents’ a small tour of the upper geyser basin! I happily got my “deaf fix” after these interactions!
On other notes of visitor interactions… one work shift, a group of 30 people visiting from Poland came into the visitor center and sang us a traditional Polish song to celebrate the 150th anniversary of the park! A little snippet of that is attached below :))
Outside of work, I have been having an amazing time going on hikes with a bunch of coworkers: Fairy Falls w/ Michael, Mystic Falls w/ Zenja (my wonderful roommate who I get along swimmingly with), Sentinel Meadows w/ Cayley and during a brief walk at Fountain Flats I saw some grizzly bears (attached at bottom)!
Last weekend, July 3-4th I did a small solo trip down to the Tetons! I checked out Hidden Falls, Inspiration Point and went out to Canyon Cascades. I did a solo overnight in the Bridger-Teton National Forest then spent the 4th in Jackson Hole before coming home to a bonfire! (I also learned today that Prince Harry & his wife Meghan Markle were in Jackson Hole for the 4th of July parade the same day I was there, but unfortunately I did not catch a glimpse of them! Darn!)
This week, I had a really unique experience. The Old Faithful area started a pilot program and established a Tribal Heritage Center. Each week, different Indigenous tribe members are invited to showcase their history and culture to visitors. One of our seasoned staff members, Bev, coordinated with Kelly and Susie Looking Horse from the Ogalala Lakota tribe to a private ranger campfire where they shared cultural dances and stories with us. What a humbling experience it was to hear from both of them as they shared from their hearts the honest truth of how the white settlers and modern Americans have treated and still treat Indigenous folks. They closed the night by teaching us cultural dances, the one I have attached below was a ritual that is performed before the men go out and hunt bison. It is considered to be a dance to honor God and thank the land for the gift of such a huge animal.
Although Kelly and Susie Looking Horse had been faced with many trials in their lifetime, they were some of the most positive and easygoing people I had ever met. When we closed in prayer they spoke in a mixture of English and their native language, and I had never felt the presence of God so strongly like I felt in that moment. I truly know I was meant to be here this summer and I am constantly in awe of the amazing opportunities that have presented themselves to me during my time here.
Today (Monday July 11th) I went up to the Northern loop with several coworkers and hiked Mt Washburn! This is a big deal because the Northern loop just re-opened on July 2nd after extensive flooding cleanup, it is open for travel besides exiting via the northern gates which are still flood damaged. AND the Mt Washburn trail has been closed since the end of 2018, so for many of us, this was our first time being able to reach the summit! What a stunning hike it was with phenomenal views of the Yellowstone area!
After hiking Mt Washburn, we drove the rest of the Northern Loop so I was able to see some of the classic northern spots for the first time including Mammoth Hot Springs and Tower Falls!
We also saw a TON of wildlife today, including a cross fox (which has small population numbers in the park so this was a neat find), some bighorn sheep herds and a black bear!!
To close out an amazing day, we treated ourselves to some local huckleberry ice cream, it seems to be the big thing out here. From huckleberry vodka, wine, jam, syrup to ice cream, I wonder if I should try them all before I leave.
Well, that’s the end of my updates for now. If you got this far, thanks for reading. I’m thankful to be here this summer in such a beautiful place making fabulous memories and sharing them via email with so many different people that have touched my life over the years.
All my love!
Rachel
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