With the sun low in the foothills at the horizon, I parked the car at Bear Lodge Butte (commonly known as Devils Tower) and started toward the scree field at its base. The face I approached was hit square by the setting sun—one wall of the great gray laccolith lit golden. Pronghorn grazed between Ponderosa […]
Monthly archives for October, 2017
Death by Grizzly
The Lower Falls of Yellowstone were framed by jagged rock walls, stained yellow from sulfur, red, purple, pink from iron and aluminum oxides. Lodgepole pine lined the path we hiked from the viewpoint. Snow crunched under my boots and Evan’s sandals. “This is uncomfortable,” said Evan. “We can turn back any time.” “No, it’s my fault […]
Death by Peeing
The waves of Yellowstone Lake were whipped up by alpine winds, children of the mountain bowl that hems in the park from all sides. Here, sailboats sank often. Sailors underestimated the gales, and phones lacked the service to call for rescue. “Imagine going through all the trouble of getting a boat up here just to sink […]
Death by Lava
Yellowstone National Park sits in the caldera of an active supervolcano, which last erupted 640,000 years ago. Minor blasts occur once in a while, but the next most recent kill-everyone-in-Wyoming-sized eruptions were 1.2 and 2.1 million years ago. If you can calculate averages and harbor any fear of dying, you might not want to visit […]