I’ve finally been able to go through all my photographs from last summer in Yellowstone and have finished my now “annual” video . . . Just in time to start preparing soon for our return.
A Major Milestone
Tomorrow I’ll be 70 years old. Hard to believe . . . but true.
It seems I was only recently in my 20s, 30s. What words of wisdom does 70-year-old Melinda have for that younger woman just beginning her life?
Don’t take everything so seriously. Not everything is such a tragedy. What will all the anger achieve? Trust the Peace of God. It will come. It’s always better when you take it slower and easier. Your fearlessness is wonderful . . . even when it takes what seems to be forever to let go of the apprehension (there she goes, running forth—finally—in fearless abandon)! High Dive
When I was young, old was 30, 40 . . . 50 for sure. But by the time you were 70, you “mise well” be dead! Awww, the “wisdom” of youth.
I feel young. Certainly younger, even, than when I was young. In those younger days I would let so many concerns, fears and anger keep me stuck. You name it—work, money, life—whatever it was, I’d worry, fret, fume and be anxious about it. Depression often grabbed me like The Alien and I’d hide out for days.
It was gradual, but one day I awoke realizing the stress—that sense of just barely keeping depression at bay—was gone.
My life has transformed since those early “trauma/drama” days. I’ve worked with the “Course in Miracles” (www.acim.org) for over a dozen years, first hearing about the book in the 70s. But I really didn’t get it until I read “The Disappearance of the Universe” (www.garyrenard.com) when it first came out. I rode the bus to work in downtown Phoenix in those days and, when I’d finish it, I’d immediately begin again. I must have read that book at least a half-dozen times. It was perfect. For me. It was exactly what I needed at the time. Through that book I returned to “The Course,” and have never “finished.” I’ll continue beginning my day with that book, no doubt, the rest of my life.
I’m grateful for the extraordinary life I’ve had thus far. I’m more joyful and have such peace in my life. Does age bring wisdom? For me it certainly has. Gone are the days when I worried about . . . well, you name it. I trust that I’m exactly where I need to be, until Spirit shows me what’s next. It always works out. Joy is a good thing. The peace of trusting God is a good thing.
It’s all good. Besides, as the title of this blog indicates (and my wonderful mom used to say), “It’ll never be noticed on a galloping horse.” Thank you mom! You were right. I’m thankful for my mom and my dad for bringing me into this beautiful world. About Galloping Horse
Happy 70th Birthday Melinda!
Good to be back in Yellowstone!
Start back to work tomorrow! I’ll be doing tours again this summer and look forward to that, but it’s been wonderful to enjoy the Park before the summer crowds. The past five days we’ve just revisited our favorite spots. Yellowstone really is such a magical place. It doesn’t matter what critters you have a chance to see, it is always spectacular and certainly never boring.
Our first day of course was spent in the Northern Range up to Cooke City. Got to see the new wolf pups. A few pictures, but it’s quite a distance. I have a new camera this year and have gotten some great shots, but couldn’t really make out the pups in most.
The ospreys had returned to their nest again and enjoyed watching as they were both on the nest.
We’ve enjoyed lots of other birds as well . . .
One late afternoon we enjoyed watching the bison moms teaching the new reds (babies) how to swim the Lamar River. 
It was amazing to watch as they started racing down the river in the current until they were able to get a foot hold. Once out of the water they’d kick up their heels and race toward the moms as if to be shouting, “I did it! Look at me!”
The pronghorn are always enjoyable to watch.
And then, of course, so special to get to observe the bears.
And grizzly bears
I’m looking forward to a wonderful summer exploring more of this amazing place I call home for half of every year . . . Yellowstone National Park.
Heartstrings
As I pull out suitcases in preparation for return to Yellowstone, my thoughts turn to last summer’s experiences. Discovering the serenity of walking in the forest.
Experiencing the power of the river as the water comes rushing around the corner to the Upper Falls of the Grand Canyon of the Yellowstone dropping down right in front of me.
Remembering a child’s wide-eyed wonder seeing Old Faithful’s spectacular stream of ancient water.
Yellowstone has a way of pulling my heartstrings.
I relive my joy of seeing the awesome power of Beehive Geyser’s enormous firehose-like eruption, the beautiful rainbow appearing as it rains down on everyone.
I remember the astonishing sight of the Lower Falls tumbling down 308 feet.
I recall the massive bison herd crossing the road in front of me, the osprey’s call as it flies overhead with a trout winding its way back to the huge nest on the tall Lodgepole Pine.
I remember the emotion welling up inside me watching the majestic wolf pack from across the valley, realizing those incredible animals were virtually wiped out from this truly wondrous environment.
There are so many images, whether captured in a camera lens or in my mind, that stay with me. Once again I’m drawn back to those awe-inspiring thermal features. But I’m also feeling drawn to the silent forest and the wonder of just who—or what—is making that sound. I’m looking forward to once again seeing those trees, hearing the breeze through the pine needles releasing their scent on a warm day. I’m eager to once again hear the Firehole River tumbling over rocks and cliffs,
and to watch the ice breaking up on Yellowstone Lake while hardly being able to see across that massive expanse of water.
Yes, Yellowstone pulls on my heart strings. My thoughts and remembrances of a place that is so very special to me now. We leave in a week to return to that extraordinary, magical place called Yellowstone National Park.
Thankful to now be part of a place I call home for almost half of each year.
Our Summer of 2016 in Yellowstone National Park
Snow!
It is 7:00 on a cold, gray and rainy morning in September at Yellowstone National Park. As a tour guide here in Yellowstone, I am driving myself to Grant Village at Yellowstone Lake to pick up my tour bus. Today I am to “step on” one of the outside tour buses coming into the Park. I’m spending the day with them, having fun interpreting the Park’s flora and fauna, history, geography, geology and ecology. What an opportunity! To share my joy, enthusiasm and knowledge, while helping them appreciate the many amazing qualities of Yellowstone National Park.
I start up over Craig Pass (rising up to over 8,000 feet) and see a sign reading, “Road Closed Ahead.” I pull over at Kepler Falls and radio my Dispatcher, “Ralf, I’m at Kepler; sign says the road’s closed ahead. What do you want me to do?” His response: “Well, it’s probably the South Entrance because of the fire closure. Let me know if you run into snow up there and call me when you get to Grant.” Right . . . Snow?! Okay, I can do this. But snow? I can’t remember the last time I drove in snow. I’ve lived in the southwest my entire driving life. Snow? Okay, Melinda, you can do this. It’s only rain.
It is absolutely beautiful though . . . and oh so quiet. Only a bit tense, I enjoy my drive to Grant Village, which actually isn’t far at all, and the rain pretty much subsides by the time I arrive. I call Ralf, “Everything’s good; no snow and it’s almost stopped raining.” “Okay, great. Thanks for letting me know.”
I pick up my tour bus and our first stop is the beautiful 125-year-old Lake Yellowstone Hotel. By the time we leave it is snowing. First the flurries. As we continue north the trees are absolutely magical with white everywhere . . . snow.
It truly is a “Wonderland.”
“If you’ve ever wondered what Yellowstone is like in the winter, this will give you a bit of a glimpse,” I tell them. We saw bison herds in the Hayden Valley all covered in snow and even the white Trumpeter Swans in the Yellowstone River. White everywhere. By the time we arrive at the Upper Falls of the Grand Canyon of the Yellowstone the falling snow is covering everything . . .
and we only heard the Lower Falls (with its 308-foot drop). “Listen. That is the sound of the biggest waterfall in Yellowstone.” It was totally socked in.
Later we actually see Gibbon Falls over on the west side of the Park, with snow blanketing everything . . .
Amazingly, every single one of these folks get out in the snow and walk all around the Lower Geyser Basin (Fountain Paint Pots) with me . . . in the snow. It is absolutely beautiful seeing the thermal features, explaining how they work . . . in the silent falling snow.
And then . . . on to the Old Faithful area in the Upper Geyser Basin.
I am even more impressed with myself. I’m not cold. Mind you, I’m a low-desert rat from Phoenix, Arizona—having lived there for almost 23 years (and before that in Southern California for 30+ years). When I first arrived up here in late April I was always so very cold. I got teased by all the seasoned guides for being such a wuss. But I’d bark back, “Yeah, just you wait ‘Enry Iggins’ . . . When you guys are oh so hot this summer, who’ll be the wuss then!” We’ve had many great laughs this summer. And I’ve definitely acclimated to this incredible place I love so much.
The snow has all but melted off now. We’ll be heading back to Phoenix in a few weeks . . . where we know how to do winter (none of this -40 to -65 below stuff)! But we’ll be back next summer. It has been a joy having this opportunity to show people the Park and just how unique, yet fragile, this amazing place is called Yellowstone National Park.
It could still snow again before we leave, but I’ve shown myself I can handle whatever happens . . . with joy and excitement because I live in Yellowstone National Park!
The Old Faithful Inn
In the early 1900s when the well-to-do Easterners came out west to see for themselves this amazing and strange “Wonderland” they had heard of in the Northern Pacific Railroad advertisements, they were no doubt excited, but nervous. They’d heard stories as well of Indians and bears that could kill them! So when they arrived—after their long, hot, dusty stagecoach ride from the railroad station in Gardiner, Montana—into the Upper Geyser Basin and Old Faithful, there stood this massive, impressive structure with its beautiful large banners beckoning them to the shelter and security of the Old Faithful Inn.
The Inn, with its massive seven-foot wrought iron-wrapped doors assured them of their safety from this new and strange land of geysers, hot springs, mud pots and steam vents—and, of course, from the Indians and bears.
This grand, new building was built by Robert Reamer, a young architect from San Diego recommended to Harry Child, President of the Yellowstone Park Association and Transportation Company. This was an association that was to last most of the rest of their lives.
Started in June of 1903, the Old Faithful Inn opened one year later in June of 1904. Those amazing, hardy workers who actually built this Old Inn labored through the winter to make sure it was completed in time for the summer season. And open it did! Over the past 112 years the Old Faithful Inn has become not only the icon of the Yellowstone National Park but of the National Park Service itself.
I often wonder if Robert Reamer was deprived of having a tree house as a young boy, because he more than made up for that loss in his early years with this massive tree house that is the Old Faithful Inn. Standing 76-1/2 feet—seven stories—the Old Faithful Inn was built of not only the ever-present Lodgepole Pines but the Rhyolite boulders of the surrounding Park as well.
Everyday during the summer thousands of people still come through her doors and look up, up, up in wonder and amazement. And every week or two I am privileged and overjoyed to spend my day sharing tours of this Old House with those interested in knowing more about this beautiful and unique Old House.
Perhaps Robert Reamer was trying to make a connection for those early visitors of long ago—through the Old Faithful Inn—it being a bridge from the wilderness outside to civilization inside. But today, 112 years later, people are still feeling the indoor experience of the outdoor forest in this oversized tree house built no doubt with love so long ago.
A few years back an elderly woman visited the Inn, bringing her grandmother’s journal with her. As a young woman, her grandmother had visited The Inn pasting a postcard of the Old Inn into her journal, circling her room. The elderly woman shared her grandmother’s journal with the Bell and Front Desk staff and everyone was so excited, they immediately all proceeded out front to figure out which room her grandma had stayed in all those years ago. Unbelievably, that very room was available and they invited the woman to stay in her grandma’s room. Of course she did, sleeping in the room her grandmother had occupied 90 years earlier!
Connections. She had a connection not only to the Old House but to her grandmother. My connection to and love for this Old House grows every time I enter. It’s about all of our connections to not only this beautiful Old Faithful Inn, but to this incredibly strange and wondrous Yellowstone National Park with its many weird thermal features and wild-roaming animals. It is indeed a Wonderland.
Many thanks to Karen Wildung Reinhart and Jeff Henry for their thoroughly delightful book, Old Faithful Inn: Crown Jewel of National Park Lodges: https://shop.yellowstonenationalparklodges.com/shop/books-dvds/old-faithful-inn-crown-jewel-of-national-park-lodges-by-karen-wildung-reinhart-and-jeff-henry.html
And a grateful thank you as well to Ruth Quinn for her absolutely wonderful book about Robert Reamer, Weaver of Dreams: The Life and Architecture of Robert C. Reamer https://www.amazon.com/Weaver-Dreams-Architecture-Robert-Reamer/dp/0976094517
The Long-Ago Dream . . .
In the early 70s I visited Glacier Bay (then, National Monument; now, National Park) in Alaska and fell in love with the thought of taking people into beautiful country to see and experience nature. I had so enjoyed my trip up into the glacier fields, seeing and being in that incredible beauty and wildness, I was determined to prepare myself to do just that once home. Well, as it often does, life just “got in the way.”
It might have taken me over 40 years to do it, but that long-ago dream has become my beautiful reality! I live and work in Yellowstone National Park!
I’ve now been here two months—almost half-way through a five-month contract. I live and work out of the Old Faithful area.
I’ve learned so much about our amazingly unique and majestic first National Park.
And I finally feel I’ve put together a pretty interesting and entertaining tour, but I’m always learning more—and probably always will be doing so, as there is much to learn about the “Greater Yellowstone Ecosystem.”
Everyday I get to travel around this awe-inspiring, always special ecosystem sharing with others the stories and reasons its wildness and remarkable beauty must always remain.
Visit a National Park this year . . . come to Yellowstone. It truly is a “Wonderland.”
It’s Not a Movie!
On my first day off, I had the opportunity to wander around the Upper Geyser Basin after breakfast on an absolutely gorgeous sunshiny morning. As I got to a bit of a rise and looked back out over the Basin with all the steam coming up off the geysers and hot springs, this incredible surge of joy and wonderment came over me . . . “I live in one of the most incredibly beautiful, alive and wild places on the planet!”
As I reflected back on the amazing things I’ve seen and learned since I came to Yellowstone (less than three weeks ago), I remembered watching the mama grizzly (sow) and her two cubs. It was awesome to watch her with those babies. She seemed determined to go about her business eating and teaching those adorable cubs what to eat.
At one point one of them looked a little overwhelmed with all of us (probably 100 people at that “bear jam”) gawking at them and it reached up and touched her face as if to say, “What’s going on?” The entire crowd let out this audible “Awwwww . . .” and the mom just seemed to reassure the little guy it was safe and that she’d see to it. Definitely! You certainly do not want to come between a grizzly and her babies!
I also reflected back on being enchanted with watching and observing wolves, bison, elk, moose, pronghorn, bighorn sheep and mountain goats. One morning coming back from breakfast we watched a badger, another time I watched a Pine Marten, Yellow-bellied Marmots, Least Chipmunks and Uinta Ground Squirrels. And those are only the mammals!
I’ve seen a Loon, Peregrin Falcons, Ospreys, Trumpeter Swans, Canada Geese, Mergansers, Sandhill Cranes, and Harlequin Ducks! And scores of other smaller birds such as all the beautiful swallows, bluebirds, and warblers. Whew!
My sister said, “It sounds like you’re living in a PBS Nature show!” Terry McEneaney puts it beautifully in his book, Birds of Yellowstone,
“. . . where else can you watch an Osprey carrying a fish in its talons fly past a spectacular waterfall, or . . . hear the simultaneous bugling of an elk, hooting of a Great Horned Owl, howling of a coyote, calling of a flock of Sandhill Cranes, and trumpeting of Trumpeter Swans in . . . [an] unforgettable wilderness concerto? Watching birds in Yellowstone is like going to a multi-media show.”
I am blessed. I’m learning so much and wanting to learn even more. I’m honestly looking forward to sharing my joy, enthusiasm and learning with others about this amazing and important place. Yellowstone National Park!
The Wolves of Lamar Valley
Yesterday I saw my very first wolf. Not in a video or movie or photograph. A real, live wolf. And not just one wolf. Lots of wolves. Looking through the scope at the new mom enjoying some sunshine with pups still in the den, I got tears in my eyes and was filled with an emotion hard to describe. What were these tears about anyway? I was filled with a joy that these magnificently beautiful wild things are back in Yellowstone and doing well, but it was more personal. I have been incredibly drawn to wolves as long as I can remember. The closest I’d come to that feeling of complete wildness was listening to coyotes going after prey in the “wilds” of the Santa Monica Mountains in Southern California in the early 70s. But I’ve always wanted to see—and hear—wolves in the wild.
On our way from the hotel in Cooke City heading to Lamar Valley, we were able to watch a male moose with his antlers just starting to re-emerge down at Soda Butte Creek in Round Valley. I felt it was a sign we would be blessed with many wonderful more sitings on this special first full day in Yellowstone.
We arrived really quite early—just barely getting light—but there were already hardy wolf watcher citizen scientist volunteers at “Bob’s Knob” in Slough Creek. Everyone was incredibly helpful and let us watch through their more high-end scopes.
As I sat on that knoll yesterday in the Lamar Valley of Yellowstone National Park, I felt so very privileged to experience such a spectacular site.
The morning light increased as we kept watching and learning, and I knew this was the absolute perfect way to start my summer in Yellowstone. We watched as one of the mothers left her den and pups for a short bit of fresh air and sunshine, we watched at least 6-7 yearlings chasing each other around as the older black looked on, even joining in the play a little bit, and—incredibly—watched as 3-4 of them were chasing some of the elk with no success. They’re getting older now and are expected to help out with the feeding of the moms and pups.
As I sat there on that knoll watching this scene unfold in the famous valley of the wolves I’ve only read and heard about for years, I was struck by not only the amazing stark beauty of this special place, but it felt like a scene from the Tanzanian Serengeti Plains.
There were the wolves, a grizzly crossing in the low valley, and then all the huge bison and calves, pronghorn and elk—and of course the ever-present ravens. What a scene! I understand “they” really do call it the “Serengeti of Yellowstone.” I don’t remember hearing it called that, but my guess is I probably did hear or read it—but certainly didn’t recall that as I watched this scene taking place before me on May 1st 2016—but I can certainly see why it would be referred to in that way.
I’ve arrived and am ready to start work here in Yellowstone National Park tomorrow, and am so blessed to be spending my summer over the next five months being able to show these kinds of scenes—or even a tiny little part of it—to people from all over the world. I think it was a perfect way to begin my summer watching the wolves of Yellowstone.
