The Grand (Mis)Adventure: Day 4 – Old Faithful, Black Sand Basin, & West Thumb Geyser Basin

“The Grand (Mis)Adventure” is a blog series chronicling my fourteen-day-turned-seven-day adventure in July 2025 through the rugged, awe-inspiring northwestern corner of Wyoming. From hiking and backpacking along the Continental Divide to paddle boarding on alpine lakes and camping under the stars, I’ll be sharing the highs, challenges, and misadventures from my summer vacation that didn’t go quite as planned.

July 16, 2025

Time to face my fear… fear of traffic and crowds of people!

Why did I come to Yellowstone National Park in July? That is a very good question, but alas, this was intended to mostly be a backpacking trip, and the backcountry (or any place 500 feet from a parking lot or boardwalk) is devoid of people in Yellowstone. Hindsight, however, has me wishing I was out and about exploring at 6am this day, instead of leaving the Grant Village Campground around 10:30am…

First up on my agenda was picking up my backpacking permit from the Wilderness Office in the Grant Village Visitor Center. The ranger turned on the safety video (which I could not take seriously due to how awfully the actors were wearing their backpacks…), thankfully making me only sit through half of it before going over the details of my permit and turning me loose. It was honestly scarily easy how fast it was issued, about a quarter of the time I’ve spent at Rocky Mountain National Park, where they always make me explain in detail how my bear canister locks. Huh.

After stamping-and-dashing at the visitor due to a tour bus that had unloaded, I joined a thirty-minute traffic delay due to road construction activities (which I can deal with, as Yellowstone has an incredibly short window to perform such things). Off to Disney World Old Faithful I go!

Y’all. I just can’t. It was pure INSANITY in the Upper Geyser Basin (where the majority of the world’s active geysers are found). The massive parking lot around Old Faithful was Death Race 2000 combined with the Hunger Games, but luckily I secured a spot unscathed. I swam upstream of more people than I have seen in a very long time, stamped my passport, and then called my parents to complain about the crowds which I am fully aware I was part of (and to check in!). Confused on how to even go about my day, I headed to the post office.

The post office, unlike the rest of the area, was empty. Even had a ton of parking available (I had walked over). The clerk was an absolute gem, and also a Postcrosser so I enjoyed nerding out about stamps and postcards for a few minutes with her!

The conundrum of if I should leave continued, and then I saw I was within five minutes of the predicted time for Old Faithful. I figured “why not?” and headed to the boardwalk that had more people clustered around on it than most Wyoming towns have people in general. It was hot, and Old Faithful was being everything but faithful on this day. Turns out it erupted about 35 minutes later than predicted.

The mad dash to the parking lot ensued, and I made it out of Death Race 2000 and back onto the road (but not before becoming really close to witnessing my first vehicle versus pedestrian crash when the truck in the lane next to me blew through a crosswalk and missed a pedestrian by inches!). Since Firehole Lake Drive is one of my favorite places in the Upper Geyser Basin, I decided I would head there… meaning I would sit in heavy traffic through Midway Geyser Basin only to discover Firehole Lake Drive was closed (due to road damage.. you know, because the road is built over a volcano and everything. However, while writing this post, I learned it is open to bicycles and pedestrians!). Arghhhh. Due to traffic, I ended up all the way to Nez Perce Picnic Area, which I pulled into since I was getting hangry. Time for a sandwich…

Now I got to turn back around, get in a bison jam, get in a traffic jam at Fountain Paint Pots (forget about seeing that area on this trip… I settled for waving at Leather Pool as I drove by), and another traffic jam around Midway Geyser Basin (a no-go anytime after like 8am anytime of the year I’ve learned). My mind was blown that people were willing to deal with the parking and traffic nightmares. I guess if you’re from an area with traffic it is not much different than every day life… but for me, this small-town Wyoming girl… well, I was pulling my hair out.

I did manage to catch some very quick, distant photos of Biscuit Basin, which has been closed since a hydrothermal explosion of Black Diamond Pool in July 2024. Some of my favorite hydrothermal features are in Biscuit Basin, so it was a bummer not being able to visit, but considering explosions are still happening, I am okay with NPS keeping everyone away from the area.

For some reason, Black Sand Basin was decently empty, so I decided to treat myself to a scene that was not the dashboard of my Subaru Forester. Finally… some hot water and thermophiles! This geyser basin is part of the Upper Geyser Basin, and receives its name from obsidian, which is essentially black-colored volcanic glass.

A highlight for me was seeing Sunset Lake on a hot, sunny day. During all my previous visits steam had obscured this beautiful hot spring, so I was quite giddy as I snapped a lot of photos.

I wrapped up Black Sand Basin by nabbing photos of a few other pools and Spouter Geyser, which perpetually erupts near the parking lot.

Since the day was still fairly young, I decided to head to West Thumb Geyser Basin to wrap up my day. Though not as an active area as other geyser basins within Yellowstone, West Thumb is worth a visit because it sites on the shores of Yellowstone Lake.

I say everything is my favorite hydrothermal feature, but West Thumb has Abyss Pool, which is one of my top favorites. The boardwalk to Abyss Pool was closed in 2022 due to a human foot (!) being found in pool, so I had to miss it during my last visit. I wanted to see if its brilliant blue color had returned, as it was dark green in 2021 when I visited. Well worth the thirty minute traffic delay to go, just for Abyss!

Even if geyser activity with eruptions up to 30 m (100 ft) is known, usually Abyss is a quiet pool. It is also one of the deepest clear pools of Yellowstone. Most of the time it shows an exceptional rich green color, a result of the combination of the yellow, microbe-populated lining and the blue diffraction color of pure water. … In the green state temperatures are around 60 °C (140 °F), but during the rare active phases Abyss Pool heats up and shines light blue to deep blue because the yellow microbes die and get replaced by nearly colorless hyperthermophilic microorganisms. After the last eruptive phase took place between September 1991 and May 1992, a heating up had been observed again during the summer season of 2024, but until the winter closure no eruption occurred.

Dirk Niermann http://www.volcanic-springs.com/

I meandered the boardwalks, snapping photos of the thermal features in my everlasting quest to have comparison photos over the years. I also went way overboard on the nerdiness explaining what makes Bluebell and Seismograph Pools blue to some fellow tourists (their eyes started glazing over and they looked at my wearily after I probably showed way too much excitement about the topic of thermophiles). There are a TON of photos coming up, and it is mostly for me… like I said, I love being able to compare over the years the changes to Yellowstone’s hydrothermal photos! Definitely not sorry 😀

Luckily the construction had been completed by the time I left West Thumb for my campsite at Grand Village Campground (whew… as much as I love my car, I wanted a change of scenery!). Back at the campsite I made a fairly sad dinner of ramen and managed to catch up on one of Handstand’s vlogs from the PCT.

Yellowstone Lake, the largest high elevation lake in North America (we like our superlatives here in Wyoming, so if you don’t like it… well, I’m sorry not sorry?), is just a short walk from many of the campsites at Grant Village, so I took an evening stroll to check out the lake. It was a nice chance to check the views, and also escape the thick fog of campfire smoke that was choking out the campground. I spied kayakers in the distance!

Whelp, it was nice to see you, front country of Yellowstone, but tomorrow it is time to go choose the bear, and hang out in the backcountry!