(9/2) The Gires do the geysers.
Yellowstone has over 10,000 geysers, hot springs and fumaroles (steam vents), but we only saw a few of the better-known ones.
We enjoyed a nice display at Old Faithful . . .
along with a few hundred other people!
Then we visited the main geyser basins along the Firehole River, where we had more intimate looks at some of the park's other hydrothermal wonders.
The springs were especially interesting, because they build up sculptured borders from evaporation of silica-laden water . . .
and they have very colorful runoff channels colonized by algae and microbes that like living in scalding-hot water.
