Yellowstone
Set alarm at 4:15AM. Shit (both action and exclamation). Bed at 8:35,sleep quick.
TUESDAY, 8/2/05: Look at clock at 12:25 and 2:35 and don't go to sleep after. Think of moving jacket and comb from blue bag to A&K bag. Lay and think until 3:45AM when I realize I haven't packed my slide film! Out of bed and pack 15 rolls of slides, leaving ten in a packet for the next trip in the fridge. Type this at 4:05AM, having shut off the alarm. Reweigh the bags and found that the blue bag went down from 16 to 15 pounds, but the A&K went up from 14 to 16, so the total weight went from 29# to 31#, getting up near Ken. Feel fairly alert, though warm, and decide to start dressing now at 4:10AM for the 4:30, maybe earlier, phone call from the car service. 5:23AM: Don't know why I was writing notes: started TR\Yellowst in WP51 this morning, and then dressed and remembered FILM to pack and called at 4:28 when I had nothing left to do (but did I put OUT hall light??) and they said the car was outside. Down and leave at 4:30, quick driving and no traffic and direct "flight" American (not Florida, which has a special entrance) at 4:47! Try automatic check-in but they don't have my records, though clerk checks me through, though I have to carry my own bag to security. Put computer AND videocamera in separate box, but don't have to take my shoes off as guy before me has to take off his BOOTS. Stand in line at desk to check that seat F IS at a window, and he puts me on the frquent-flyer miles by checking my zip code and then checking 101 Clark Street. Baby SCREAMING across way! Earplugs in. They announce something about buying food, but I paid $32 for car and $6.49 for a ham and cheese at Au Bon Pain, so I should be set with my large bottle of water and morning pills. They announce a full flight and only one carry-on bag, and kid KEEPS screaming. They board by GROUPS, first-class first, and I'm group 5. Stanby passengers will be notified in 10-15 minutes. Announce that photo IDs no longer needed. Finish this at 5:30, flight announced at 6AM, not 6:19, for 3:31, arriving at 8:31AM, so I lose one hour there and then another hour between Texas and Wyoming. Happy to see that my AlphaSmart is behaving, but the kids aren't. Ready to get out puzzles. Back out at 5:56; it's light out, sun JUST coming out of clouds at 6AM as we taxi to take off for 2:56 flight. I'm DIRECTLY over center of wing in row 15, but it's so HAZY over much of the countryside that I wouldn't have been able to see much anyway. Grumble nevertheless, do puzzles, off at 6:09, take pills with orange juice and a granola bar at 6:36, they selling an awful-sounding snacky breakfast of raisins and biscuits for $3 but the juices are free. $2 for music headphones, but the video of "Miss Congeniality II" isn't working, though it DOES work on the NEXT leg, silly planning! Boring gray flight. In at gate C7 and C14 announced for Jackson, but when I look at the board it's at A14, so I take the air-shuttle there after landing at 9:02 (which is 8:02 local) and stop at 9:16. Board at 10:10, changing watch to 8:10, for 2:14 minute flight, 51E in Jackson Hole that turns into about 68 when we get there after spectacular flight over city of Dallas, irrigation fields, desert, then mountains and Tetons in distance. Boarding time printed as 9:10AM and we took off at 8:42, hoping my bag has gotten on board. Roll 1: #18 irrigation wheels at 9:29, #19 river from hills at 9:48. #20 big town and DAM at 9:52. #21 abstract desert at 9:54. #22 big mine and town at 9:57. #23 ski trails(?) at 10:04. #24 of more mines in snow hills at 10:16. #25 red rock before clouds start covering at 10:11. #26 green at 10:45. #27 same at 10:47. #28 valley at 10:51. #29 braided river at 10:53. #30 Tetons ahead at 10:54. #32 at civic park(?). Free Dollar shuttle-bus-ride. Get luggage at 11:29. Onto Dollar 11:31 and off at 11:34. To desk at 12 and arrange (all wrong) for car while waiting for Ken, doing puzzles, collecting papers for various tours, talking to pleasant agent Verona, get car 065-TPO. Ken arrives at 1:50 (normal delays) and switches all my choices around. #33 Teton-top at 2:14. To Hotel at 3:10, spectacular room overlooking Tetons and promenade where everyone stares at the three female moose we saw last night and two together next morning. 3:40 from information center where Ken gets information, to museum, busy and good, to #35 cloud at 4:45. To hotel at 5:15, unpack almost DIZZY from fatigue, watch moose, to dinner at 6:20, actually good of mushroom ravioli and asparagus, then rib-eye of buffalo tough but tasty, a good Shiraz for $27, and Ken turns back his dessert in a huff. Jason's a seductive waiter. Back to room to look at moose afer being outside for a bit, then bed at 9:15, sleeping quickly, partly since it's already 11:15PM NYC time.
WENESDAY, 8/3/05; Wake at 2:30 and pee, then type dream at 4:33 and up at 5:50 to dress and wake Ken at 6:01 when the alarm obviously isn't doing it. Get DEET and raincoat into bag, type this to 6:24 and leave for breakfast. Ken does some song and dance about breakfast at 6:25, but then says he's going to the bathroom: it would have been easier just to SAY that! Almost cloudless sky outside, clouds lit by hidden sun that maybe hasn't risen even at 6:26AM, ready for 6AM-starting breakfast in the Pioneer room so we can get to the 7:55AM line-up somewhere for the boat-tour and walk which seems to be a prime thing to do. Lots of birds and bushes to identify, includng VERY friendly blackbirds with yellow-fringed wings and yellow breasts that fly within inches of tourists on the promenade below. Thin layer of cloud along lower Tetons, and NOW at 6:28 the heights are lit by the sun rising behind us, as it set before us at dinner through clouds and screens at the huge window before they raised the screens to an incredibly beautiful panorama: couples AT windows facing each other, we at NEXT table facing OUT, just perfect! Finish one note-page and put it away and we leave at 6:30. Breakfast to 7:23. I drive, Ken navigates, and we get to SOUTH ENTRANCE at 7:43 and he cannot for the life of him figure how we got so out of the way. Told we have about 18 miles to go. Panic! Ken RUSHES out to Visitor's Center at 8:03 and gets tokens one and two for what turns into an only-ten trip of the 26 tokens which are sometimes all gone by 8AM! Our luck! #2 Teewinot, "Mount Pinnacle," at 8:15. On start of walk, 10 of us. #3 rock climbers at 9:28. To 9:42 to #10 of climb and falls video which "pisses many people at me," though when I apologize to Maureen she says it was perfectly OK as long as I found the group again. Videos of PICAS to 10:03, Mountain climbers' videoed to 10:17. #17 shuttles on lake at 10:28 from "false" Inspiration Point. #18 10:31 after chimpmunk videos. #19 LOTS of people on top at 10:35. Inspiration Point video and chippie at 11:11. #23 lots of people visible walking back at 11:13. On boat 11:48, just got to our dock, and across lake to find HORDES waiting to come back across. To Jenny Lake Lodge at 12:21 and lunch of yucca soup and fruit and three sorbets at 1:30. To #30 from mountain to 2:37, climbing Signal Mountain to see not THAT much, but lots of people and cars at viewpoint over mountains, and the incredible BEAR videos to 2:37. Back to hotel at 3:25 and leave for 4:15 (afer resting) loop to Rockefeller stone (very uncomfortable walking in my white slippers on the gravel path) at 4:45-5:05, then to drink Moran Sunset and Huckleberry Marguerita (without salt) in bar at 5:17. Finish dinner at 8:45, TIRED, and at 9:03 leave room for described view, and in at 9:50 and bed at 10:12. Left Ken in bed about 9:05PM and went out with my videocamera to look at the lingering effects of the twilight, and first suffered for some minutes while French kids screamed back and forth across the lawn behind me until when three of them sat on the concrete abutment right behind my left-most seat and started shouting to each other and their friends across the field, I just turned and shouted "Tais toi!" and the elder girl looked surprised and said "I'm sorry," and I responded "Thank you for apologizing," and very soon after that they decided they'd had enough and went inside, or at least stayed quieter outside. I watched first Venus and then Mars (both of which enlarged into circles on my enlarging screen) set into the clouds over the black-rimmed Tetons, and kept doing panoramas in regular light, because when I tried to do the "night vision" absolutely nothing came onto the screen, which was not how I thought it worked, though maybe it only works that way with views close-up and not far away. STILL have to read the manual to learn how to USE the thing. Did a few panoramas, focusing in on people still in the dining room, but mostly just sat and enjoyed the still-pink sky and visible silhouettes of the peaks and liked being where I was, dressed just right in my jacket, no one stopping to bother me, and being happy about our day and our luxurious room-with-view for $249 per day, but not the stuffed-stomach feeling from the too-large omelet for breakfast, the tasty yucca soup and assorted fresh fruit and three kinds of sorbet: Japanese plum, apricot, and the ubiquitous huckleberry, though we were surprised when the dinner waitress said they weren't ripe yet, which implied that all those that we had in sorbets and drinks (Ken added them to his Cosmopolitan when he didn't want another Huckleberry Marguerita and I'd had enough of my Moran Sunset and had a SECOND boozed-coffee drink to satisfy his wish to sit longer) were frozen, and then I left my A&K bag on the chair when I staggered to the room at 6:05PM to lie on the bed in total fatigue until getting up at 7:10PM to go down to dinner. The twenty-minute circle of the Picnic loop with my white scuffs was an exhausting disaster, making my legs more tired than ever. Otherwise, all I have to record from today was the various photos and videos from the trip to Inspiration Point, the ride up Signal Mountain that really didn't show us that much, and the desperate attempts to think of new things to do since we've already seemed to have exhausted much of the "charms" of the Grand Tetons, aside from gossiping about the single young man dining at the table at which we sat last night, the ugliness of various families and individuals who desecrated our views, and talks of the liabilities of various food and drink orders, and "sadness" about Jason being absent this evening, and having to pour all our own champagne. Got to bed at 10:14PM and got to sleep rather quickly, then woke with a jolt at 11:11PM with a thin, sour gastric reflux which I guess was from the mildly seasoned pork loin that finished dinner when we both had no room for dessert, leaving most of his salad, three-quarters of my pork and carrots, and almost half of his salmon-trout which tasted slightly off, while I had no trouble finishing the increasingly cold Australian Brut for $23 that Ken kept saying he didn't like but kept accepting another inch or so whenever I offered it. And we both agreed that the gangly youth with his back to us below our balcony-table was well worth looking at, though he didn't agree with my evaluation that his IQ may have been about 80. Hazier mountain-view this evening versus the brilliant clarity last night, though there were more clouds. Weather again rainless and not too cold, making my weather-luck hold out for the first few days here, anyway, and we have only two more nights here before venturing north to Yellowstone. It's going to be hard to fill today's details.
THURSDAY, 8/4/05: Wake at 2:30AM and decide not to pee, and again at 4-something with a dream, but then up at 5:25, or whenever recorded in DREAMS, and finish typing now at 5:54, waiting for the 6:30AM phone call which will have us eating in the more formal breakfast room before meeting in the lobby at 8AM for the float trip that will fill the morning. Ken was glad that what he felt as a COLD coming on yesterday morning (undoubtedly due to the freezing room that night) didn't pan out through the day, though I was distressingly fatigued after the Inspiration Point climb and descent, and lay exhausted on my back before going out for the view and an afternoon drink (pity my poor liver!) and then laying curled on my side in exhaustion for an hour before dinner chatting with Ken about dreams as children, early life-events, and other intimacies that make travel with a friend so pleasant. Don't even pee before finishing typing now at 5:58AM. Ken mistakenly re-sets alarm for 6AM, shuts it off, and we NEVER get 6:30AM wake-up call, and we're ready for breakfast at 6:52AM. I'm caught up again, quickly, not that much to WRITE! Breakfast over at 7:42. Charge battery, downstairs at 7:59. It's an 8:30 lunch float trip, Ken says at 8:10 as he comes down and we sit and watch the passing fat zoo in the Jackson Lake Lodge lobby. To boat 8:46AM, and decide to get in line for last pee call for three hours. Through #34 to 11:30, seeing bald eagle flying, a Swenson's hawk sitting magnificently in a tree watching us sweep by, bison resting under a bush that I try and probably don't succeed in getting a video of, a flash of a BRIGHT blue bird flying, a round of about a dozen circling vultures on high, ALL of which are too fast to be caught on video, and take videos of boats. We land for lunch on benches with tablecloths in the sun, one of which I move to the shade despite Ken's protestations that I'm being anti-social by not sitting in the sun with everyone else, though we do end up having dessert with a threesome in the shade who make nice conversation, and I chatted about the Tawaraya Ryokan and the Gion Parade with the sexy Japanese from Rye who's working for some company from Japan. We RUSH lunch of a camp-broiled cheeseburger, a frankfurter (both of which we can have another of if we want) and potato salad, tomatoes and lettuce, and then slices of cantaloupe and watermelon and enormous peanut-butter and chocolate-chip cookies that are really awful and after taking a bit of each put them into the hotel wastebasket, where they remain for the next two days. Leave on bus at 12:40 after a rather exhausting walk to the bus over a dusty path in the hot sun (the river trip was pleasant enough, not much to see, shallow bottom most of the time, Jeff at 20 an informed guide, Jim in the back somewhat sexier, and I get a video of them rowing SIDEWAYS to go faster through a slower part of the water. We're comfortable on the pontoons, Ken and me in front, kids laughing too much in the back, just 13 of us, riding back from Moose Junction pullout point to the hotel. Leave hotel at 1:40 for a planned ride to the Gros Ventre Slide via Antelope Flats Road, where we're enthralled by about a dozen BISON on both sides of the road from 2:33-2:37, then at 2:44 start guided trail. #35 wildflowers at 2:50. #36 and #37 of slide and flowers to 2:57, impressive gash in hillside, uprooted trees growing sideways afterwards, and two years later the slide-formed dam broke and flowed 4 miles down to Kelly, destroying most of the town but killing only 6 people because most of them were in the church that was spared. Roll 3: #1-3 of trees growing on ROCK at 3:08. Hot walking up and down hill, another couple taking a slightly different way. #7 six-colors at 3:15. #8 river at 3:39. Back via Mormon Row, which isn't much until the end, where a section is roped off being restored, no real pictures. Back by way of Moose Junction, tired, and lie in bed 5:05-6:58: I don't think I actually SLEEP but Ken insists I SNORE. Dinner 7:10-8:35, champagne I wanted awful, my gazpacho soup more shrimp than tomato, my pork loin three huge pieces I have one and a half of, no desserts. Ken's tired and goes back to room, I decide to go to the LEFT, where I'd not been before, and kids are screaming on the lawn, but the sounds die down as the path goes downhill to the horse-trail that skirts the bottom of the slope at the base of the hotel and the edge of the Willow Flats (as the second couple tell me their turnoff to see the Flats are called), and continue along the well-marked path until I hear a couple catching up to me and we chat: they're in a cabin, which starts at $179/night, has no view of the mountains, but has two sinks, is large, but has no cooking facilities. They return to their cabin while I continue into the darkness, no animals visible but wondering what I would do if I encountered a bison, elk, or bear! Walk up a slope evidently leading to the road leading to the Lodge, still light enough to see, but cold enough that I start hugging my arms to myself. Another couple comes down from the overlook, camping, saying there are stables somewhere here where the horses come from, and they talk abut how the coyotes around their trailer-home near Lompoc, California, used to rend the night with their sex-calls and cries. We wish each other a good night. Back at 9:38, kids STILL screaming on the lawn, and Ken's still up and we chat to 9:45, calling for a 6AM wakeup call.
FRIDAY, 8/5/05: Up at 6. Ken in bathroom to 6:14, me to 6:27. French toast poor to 6:45, me eating only 4 of six half-slices, but getting refills on good hot chocolate. Drive to Coulter to 7:35, expecting traffic that we got none of, and off with enthusiastic Ranger Josie at 8:07, taking Mt. Moran #12 at 8:38. POTATOES grow on fertile moraine soil, and I tell her connection about potatoes on Long Island. Idaho too? See a beaver swimming just off-shore in Coulter Bay on our way to Swan Lake. Two sandhill cranes fly over gracefully, land with raucous cries in a flurry of orange I hardly identify with them, and then video them from a great distance, indeed looking very much like deer as they're said to do. Watch what appears to be a coot, which name Ken never heard applied to a bird. To 9:40. Video blue heron on beaver dam and take #12 of thistle and bee at 10:54. Off the hike at 11:15, VERY tired, walking past the amphitheater again and only later realizing that we're doing all this at OVER 7000 FEET! Which will help explain my breathlessness afer wallkng up one flight of stairs or even getting into bed! To the John Coulter cafe at 11:10AM for decent pepperoni pizza, a mug of root beer, and a Zonker Snake River Stout, while Ken has something fishy and salady. Want dessert and spend $2.73 for 3/4 pounds of fabulous cherries that I finish myself. TIRED! Walk to end of Coulter Pond-edge walk with an annoying Ranger Dan who says the same old stories and announces our history on a 24-hour clock that gets to 11:59:34 before it gets to be 10,000BC, or something. Not much in the line of views, Sicilian guy talks to Ken about his trip, I'm tired of these tours, and we started about 1:10 "for an hour" and got back at 2:34 and go to john to shit to 2:46. Up to room at 4:13 and AGAIN lie down on bed, wanting to write post cards but just not feeling like it. Leave for dinner with jacket and tie at 5:15, forgetting my cameras in case we see the elk on the drive back, and leave for Jenny Lake Lodge at 5:25 and get there early for a kir in the lounge and few choices on the $60 fixed-price dinner: Norwegian smoked cheese risotto with asparagus, good mushroom soup with cabernet, a "Jenny Lodge Signature Salad" of usual greens, and a venison loin which is quite good which Ken won't try, his Pakopako, or some sort of fish, just OK. Kids screaming around us. He has his glass of Goats do Roam, not very good, as is not my Red Bicyclette with the Venison, though the Sancerre for $9 a glass wasn't too bad, but the kir was the best of the lot until I moved us into the lounge to the good guitarist, a sweet older couple, and my fresh-baked chocolate-chip cookies, his three flavors of chocolate Moo's ice cream with Italian plum, cabernet, and apricot, same as I'd had for lunch, and my Creme de Peche was good for a final booze that sent me reeling. Left at 8:15 and drove and drove around the Potholes Turnout and even partway up Signal Mountain, but no elk whatsoever, as we had been told there would be, though there were more bison to be seen and photographed. Back to hotel at 9:15, dark, too dark to see what was reputed to be animals out back, and I finally took my first shower of the trip to 9:45 and got to bed at 10, to wake after 11 to record a dream, then back to bed just after midnight.
SATURDAY, 8/6/05: Up at 8:15, first time for no wakeup call, though I was up earlier and had a few more dreams that I didn't bother to record. Breakfast at 8:35, two sunnyside eggs with corned beef hash, not bad, with toast and hot chocolate, and finish at 9:26 as I go to pay BALANCE (for four days for two people) (when Ken paid a DEPOSIT of $527.88) of $1112.38, over $200/day including everything. Leave Teton Park at the dot of 10AM, to the Yellowstone border at 10:30, my Golden Age pass accepted with ID, but only one map, and to Yellowstone Lake House at 11:45 to reserve for lunch and three trips tomorrow for which I have to pay $45 in cash. Pass many BURNT areas, even though fire was in 1988, to Visitor's Center at 12:15 and take #15 of lovely Yellowstone Lake House sitting room. Still full from breakfast, so have only half a tomato and bruschetta sandwich with a half-cup of corn soup, good as last night, and lunch to 1:25, to 1:45 quick thermal walk, Ken smelling the sulfur for the first time, me taking photos and videos, particularly of maybe-sick bison, and into room 419 of Mammoth Hot Springs Hotel at 3:15, grungy room for only $99 plus $10 tax per night, asking for an extension cord for the fan in the air-conditionless room, and unpack quickly and type to 4:22 when Ken wants to go down for a drink to wait for his cousin Jonathan (due to land in Bozeman at 1PM and rent a car and get here "after 3PM" and Ken continues to worry as we drink two Mammoth Hot Springs Ales and Stouts to 5:30, when I've written six postcards to Sherryl, Mildred, Charles, Spartacus, Fred, and Rita, and then up to finish this at 5:56, taking stuff down for trip to Bozeman restaurant at 6:30, I guess Jonathan still a no-show. Leave at 6:05, #22 leaving Yellowstone at 6:16, arch from 1872, #23 Gardiner Park Avenue at 8:10PM. We stopped into the Park Avenue Restaurant, ordered the mushroom casserole which was enormous and totally filled me up, a good bottle of Riesling for $22, and in the middle of the salad Jonathan walks in! He tells his story, Ken has the Farfalla and me the Crazy Old Lady Pasta, both of which were very good, and drank and ate and he took off to meet up tomorrow morning at 6:30, and we get back at 8:30 to chew out the clerk for not relaying Jonathan's 4:30 message to Ken that he'd be two hours late, and then I finish this at 8:37PM, totally wiped out from a do-nothing day, and prepare to go to sleep with the rain outside and the fan inside, completely stuffed! Read the New York Times Ken bought yesterday, clipping out two articles and the puzzle, and also USA Today that I picked up two days ago, saving ITS puzzle. Ken insists on turning over to sleep at 9:15 and I get to bed at 9:30, getting up twice to shit and record two dreams.
SUNDAY, 8/7/05: Up at 5:50 and finish typing dream about Rolf to go into bathroom and finish at 6:15, having shit THREE times and still feeling stuffed, and finish this at 6:20 in preparation for meeting Jonathan downstairs at 6:25 for breakfast, after Ken delays (and expresses surprise that I shut fan off) and meet Jon, and Ken questions itinerary to 6:32. #24 elk "at home" at 8:03. I have light breakfast of fruit because I'm still uncomfortably stuffed from last night. Endless discussion of where we meet, and finally I read ticket as "Restroom Parking Lot," which is very specific, so we get out at 7:35 and I sit on rock and they talk and finally Ranger Denia (or whoever) comes out and Ken goes up to talk to her and six or seven others join, and the "8AM exact" tour takes off at 8:11. We pass beautiful Hymen Terrace at 8:13 for #25, passing two private homes and driveways right in the park, and #27 asters at 9:27. Long hard climb in cool forest, mother and two kids staying behind, father and son in middle, Ken and Jon and me in front asking all the questions, another young couple quiet. #28 Mammoth at 9:38. #29 panorama backward at 9:40. I'm getting winded going uphill, finding it very difficult to get enough oxygen even though we're only about 7000 feet. #30 salsify puff at 9;46 (gray jays caw above). 10 years of wolves are controlling elk population now. Green budworm video and #29 baneberry of which EVERYTHING: fruit, leaf, stem, root, is poisonous, but priests used to use them in ceremonies, and I suggested that, like mushrooms, most HALLUCINOGENIC varieties were called poisonous to keep everyone away from them, but priests knew how to use them in small quantities to get in touch with "god" and "the infinite" and "nature", which was why they were priests. No one replied. When Denia kept talking about global warming, Jon kept interjecting "We're only talking about one degree every ten years." Baneberries at 10:12 in a couple of photos. #34 RECENT log-tear. Then we look up a hillside to see a white low animal we sort of agree is a coyote going into the woods at the left, and almost immediately a pronghorn races across to the right, unfortunately unavailable for my cameras, as was the hawk that soared past immediately after. Then video ELK hairs (she thinks) on sticky pine tree. #35 valley at 11:40, and Jon reports hearing thunder behind us. We start racing along, six or seven already left us behind when Denia stopped to help two tourists on the trail going the other way, and we quickly passed the un-beavered ponds for which the trail was named, but I videoed lots of ducks and ducklings while some sat and ate and rested, but I sat only to have everyone get up again. Out into the plains as the clouds covered the sun, but though I put sunscreen on my arms, they turned out quite dark. We kept going faster, Jon staggering, Ken plodding with his stick, Denia telling great story of a 54-year-old who was lost for 37 days before being found weighing 50 pounds and hallucinating, so they named Mount Westmore (or something) after him even though he was found miles away. #36 Gardiner in Montana, which we'd crossed into, but now it's mostly downhill as the rainstorm passes without wetting us, and I take #37 of exit photo at 12:17. Back to hotel at 12:24, no rain. Leave room at 12:39, tired, for lunch. I have only chicken wings with bleu cheese and celery and a good lemonade, others drink lots of water and some beer. Power goes off about 1PM, but our order is the last out of now-dark kitchen (file 2 started 9:33PM Sunday 8/7). Back up at 1:37, knees HURTING, so Ken gives me two Advil, saying 90% of men over 50 have arthritis, and I decide to start taking aspirin. Roll #4: #1 upper blue Mammoth Hot Springs basin, much of which is dried up, though the writeup says "though patterns change, the quantity is consistent," but the dryness is VERY distressing despite my attempt to admire the DRY TERRACES rather than the flow of water (now gone) which created them 10 or 20 years ago. #2 Mammoth at 2:27. We drive through the upper terrace quickly, he not wanting to walk very much, and it's mostly a DISASTER, very disturbing. Lower walk starts at 2:40 and #3-4 Palette Springs at 2:40. #5 Cleopatra Terrace at 2:56. #6 Minera Terrace at 3:09. #7 lower Minerva at 3:15. We decide to drive back up because the confusing maps seem to indicate we missed many of the good ones upstairs, and Ken remembers the small space just inside that leads us to the spectacular, many leveled, many not-named, parts of the new Canary Spring, and I take lots of photos and videos and even Ken likes it enough to try more of the top, even when it starts raining. #8 Canary at 3:37, through to #13 and videos to 3:46. #14 Cupid Spring, last new one, at 4:03. Video last orange mound at 4:22, #20 Canary from below at 4:24. To get ice cream at 4:38 to pass time before barlet opens at 5, having Ken's huckleberry and my peach yogurt, both good, then to drinks at bar at 5 of my Yellowstone Sunset, good, and Ken has a Cosmopolitan and a good lemon-lime gin until two KIDS come into bar and we leave at 5:49. To bed to rest, then dinner 7:01, spinach salad with Dirty Mike's Lemonade, then baked brie with too much bread and lots of nuts, still too much food, and leave them while they both have dessert and talk about Mount Washburn tomorrow up to 10,000 feet, which worries me, so I'm up to room at 8:32 and shower and brush teeth to 9:14. Ken goes in to shower, having left a 6:30 wakeup call for a 7AM breakfast and an 8AM start on the Mountain. Ken lies down and starts being impatient as I finish now at 9:43PM, fan going---oh, four female elk videoed on lawn before dinner and two circled the fenced-fumarole outside the dining room toward evening---and if I get to bed at 9:50, it's still 8:40 sleep, which sounds good. I took THREE aspirin with night pills, and will take three again in morning to hope to help weak knees in climbing, Jon may not even come. Stop now at 9:45PM. Bed at 9:55PM and lie for a bit, debating starting Actualism, going through the first few steps, thinking of the beauties of the day and how well (or poorly) in general this trip has been going, then drift off to sleep at perhaps a few minutes after 10, comfortable in my soft bed under the fan, blindfold and earplugs shutting out the world.
MONDAY, 8/8/05: 3:22AM: Finish typing my latest dream, having peed, ready to finish this and go back to bed to hope to be able to endure the rigors of today's hike, thinking this vacation almost half-way through and not the most successful, but just about what I can expect in these advancing years, vaguely nostalgic and sad from the dream-content just transcribed. I wake and lie for a bit, then 6:32 wakeup call comes and Ken is in bathroom already. Breakfast from 7:02-7:42, me only with fruit and hot chocolate again, Ken waiting for the "15-minute" (which returned maybe in 9 minutes) skillet sweetbread that turned out to be just too sweet to be appreciated, though he ate most of it anyway. I read New Yorker as they both return to their rooms, since I had come ready for departure. To car at 8, arrive at base of Chittenden Road entry to Mount Washburn at 9, start up at 9:10, having taken Toridol from Ken for pain in my knees and ankles at 9:15. #21 of Mount Washburn at 9:25. Rest 9:40-9:48, breathing heavily at 10,000 feet at top but trying not to go into oxygen debt. Rest "half-way" at 10:35. #22 at 10:38. #23 at 10:48. #24 at 11:08 after MUSKRAT (larger, browner, larger tail) sighting before he ducked into his hole, and video MARMOT in drainage pipe at 11:12. #27 11:15 trails. #28 of top at 11:17. #29 marmot at 11:18. To #33 and video to 11:35 at top. Lunch to 12:15: peanut butter-banana-date-honey sandwich, orange, 4 oreo cookies, and a can of apple-cranberry juice that I manage to spill some of and Ken crabbily wipes up with one of his two napkins. #34 Norris Geyser Basin, and starting down at 12:28. #35 lichen at 12:48 and #36 flowers at 12:56. ANKLES hurt! 3 more aspirin at 1:17. #37 flowers at tree root 1:30. Roll 5: #1 flowers, #2 up and #3 down-hill trees at 1:33. #4 flowers at 2PM. To video bluebirds, and to car at 2:06, quite tired but thankfully not breathless. #5 Tower Falls at 2:43. Finish Tower Vanilla soda at 3:03, and Jon again surprises us by showing up when we didn't expect him. #6 Tower River 3:06 to #9 at 3:11. #14 bison HERD at 3:47. #15 Soda Butte at 4:07. #17 Petrified tree at 4:44 from 50 million years ago, two others taken by thieves before final tree fenced in, which shocked Ken no end. #18-19(?) of male elks by lake, two and four pronged. #21 Undine Falls at 5:19, cursing Ken out for wondering why I was breathing hard because I RACED through the whole boardwalk taking pictures because he didn't even want to STOP because he was afraid rain would ruin our view of Lamar Valley, which was on his itinerary, which turned out very beautifully except when I wanted to continue and he insisted I didn't trust him, even though he planned the whole trip, because NO books mentioned it was worthwhile to go all the way to Cooke City. #22 Sunset butte at 5:23 on the way back. To photo 7 elk on front lawn until 5:45, when Ken left room leaving note saying he was at the bar drinking Moose Drool and I should join him there. Get in and wash face and put on new vaseline, which I've been using constantly for dry lips (did I mention yesterday, after my shower, I scraped off the white-tip on my cheek nitrogen-burn, but it sort of came back anyway. I shit and go to bar at 6:03 and have a Raspberry Daiquiri with more raspberry liquor added, following a very horse-radishy Bloody Mary while Ken had his Moose Drool and Black Butte. Ken said that Jon had phoned for reservations for 7:15 for Park Avenue Bar and Grill again in Gardiner, but he didn't answer his phone at 7:02, and he finally walked in, saying he had trouble finding a parking space after being delayed by a center-line painter that went at 7 miles per hour for too long a time for him to get back in time. He's down at 7:14, obviously late for the reservation, but there's a good table with different servers, and Ken and I have two refillable (huckleberry and regular) lemonades and SHARE a Porterhouse pork chop for $18 (for which they do NOT charge the noted $4 plate-share charge) which is just wonderful with two sauces, and Ken adjusts both portions perfectly, he having the salad and I having the herbed roasted (cold) potatoes and his carrots and one of his asparagus and it's very good, but in a highly raucous restaurant. We leave at 9:05, dark already, and Ken comments on Jon's "drive, then brake, then accelerate, then brake" method of driving his white SUV of which Ken insists Jon empty the front seat because "I'm too crowded in the back." They talk inanities and we're back to hotel at 9:30 for Ken to leave a wake-up call for 7:15 and I take my slippers off to see that I still have the ankle rash, and THEN he lies there naked and suggests my coughing may be a solitary symptom of UNcharacteristic GERD: I don't reflux enough to TASTE it, but enough to ruin my esophagus, and it "can even lead to esophageal cancer," which of course I'm delighted to hear. He even begins packing for tomorrow, which I'll wait to do, and finish this at 10:05PM, later than usual because of our later lunch, but we'll have breakfast at 7:45 and get to Norris in time for the 9AM ranger-led tour of the Norris Geyser Basin. So I'll blow my nose and turn off the lights and get to bed by 10:10. But as I lay down I kept on coughing and kept on coughing, and knew I'd drive Ken mad, so I got up and rummanged through my dop kit and then through my drawer, where I thankfully quickly found my Fisherman's Friends and took out four of them, two of which seemed to work well, but still I coughed a bit and later took the other two, and then resorted to the technque I'd use when I coughed after a cold: I bundled up the blanket and put it under my pillow (I'd already tried putting the pillow on the side, then on end, but that didn't elevate my head enough) and that actually seemed to work for a long time. My breathing got more regular and I actually got to sleep.
TUESDAY, 8/9/05: I woke once with a small bout of coughing and debated rummaging once more for Fisherman's Friend, but I'd undoubtedly wake Kin and didn't want to do that, so I suppressed the coughs, or did so deep in my throat through closed mouth without much noise, but when I sat on the toilet to type my dream at 6AM, I coughed a few more times and REALLY began to worry about my right ankle: could I take more toridol, or get some kind of ankle-wrap which would relieve the now-clearly MUSCULAR or TENDON pain rather than the bone-pain of arthritis, or just not walk as much as before, negating some of the pleasure of the last week of this vacation (relieved that today would be the last day having to consider what Jon wanted to do, or share glumly uncommunicative meals with him), and a few times tried Actualism but fell asleep each time, once even getting the beginning of the start of mympths, but not quite enough to record it as a fact. Now it's 6:10AM, still an hour to pass before our 7:15 wakeup call and I SHOULD get some more aspirin, but maybe THAT was contributing to a GERD-type cough that Ken surmised, I think unfairly, since I did NOT cough the night of the WORST full-meal day, the first meal in Park Avenue Bar and Grill! Finish now at 6:11AM. Up at 7:01 to shower, since I obviously can't sleep, and finish just at 7:17AM when the phone wake-up call rings and Ken said he was "only somewhat" disturbed by my coughing, "But not as much as you were." Begin packing at 7:21AM. Pack and down at 7:45 for same small breakfast, and then Ken and I go to the grocery store at 8:15 where I buy an ankle-wrap for $5, a package of Advil for like $8, and a bottle of cough-suppressant for like $2 and change. Back to room, ankle still hurting, to take toridal at 8:39. Leave at 8:52. #23 and 24 Roaring Mountain at 9:23. Museum of Park Ranger at 9:33, which Ken doesn't even want to stop at when he finds it isn't the Norris Geyser Basin Museum where we're to meet Jon for the 10AM Ranger tour, but I insist we go in and glance at some uniforms, insignias, recreations of cabins and offices from a hundred years ago, and I take #25 of a hundred-year-old fireplace and guide at 9:41. To Norris Museum at 9:50. Tour starts at 10:07 with personable Ranger and a huge group of people which grows smaller as we move on, many passing us the other way. #26 Emerald Spring 10:12. Five hundred geysers HERE, over HALF of those in world. He says that "Geyser" in Icelandic means "gushing." #27 Cistern Spring 10:38. #28 HIGH Steamboat above trees. Geyserite builds up a half-inch per year in very productive geysers, to an inch a hundred years for very slow geysers. #29 Veteran Geyser and Norris Basin at 10:46. #30 Pearl Geyser 11:03. Porkchop Geyser exploded in 1989, seen at 11:07. Yellow Spring at 11:20. #31 Green Dragon Spring 11:27. Puff'n Stuff Geyser at 11:30. Arch Steam Vent at 11:32. Crater Spring. It's hot and crowded, but we all enjoy all the sights, me marking times and names of unmapped sights on map. #32 aquamarine pool at 11:33. Echinus Geyser at 11:41. Back to the crossroads at 11:49, pass Steamboat again at 11:50, and leave Jon at 11:55 to go his own way, and to car at 12:04. LONG line at the john, since one main one is closed, so Ken pees by a tree, as do I, and hope I can save my urge to shit during the 44 miles to Old Faithful Inn. Leave at 12:08. To Old Faithful, having passed the Lower, Middle, and Upper Geyser Basins in that order ("Like the Nile," says Ken) and stop nowhere because he wants to get to hotel to check in, but he says he has everything of note all planned out. I'm in to desk at 1:02 and she says our room's ready, so we can bring our bags in and check in, so I go back to car in the car-port and we bring our stuff to desk, pissing off a guy who'd been waiting in line and choosing to ignore my saying we'd BEEN there before and OUR paperwork is ready, and when he still curses us out I pass him with our keys in hand and snidely remark "Happy vacation" and he snarls "I hope I never see you again." [And he doesn't.] We get to room 2036 on the ground floor without Ken having to traverse any steps with his rolling luggage, but our keys don't work! Worker uses his passkey to let us in, Ken lets me go to the john and gets the right keys ("Someone had dyslexia" the woman who helps him remarks.) and says we should go immediately to lunch at 1:10. I remark that I saw the sign that said the next Old Faithful eruption would be plus-or-minus ten minutes from 1:30 and we should go see it. He gets very exasperated, saying his schedule says so and so, and he's hungry, and if we eat lunch later we'll have to change our dinner appointment, etc, etc, etc, and ALSO says that we should have lunch and he should THEN take me to the CLINIC, the sign to which we saw when we entered and I agreed I would stop in to see what gives with my rash, my cough, and my sore ankle. So I sigh and say I'll do whatever he wants. To dining room line at 1:18 and he has a mediocre Reuben and me a good half-sandwich of ham and cheddar and a cup of home-made tasting vegetable soup, having been a hit with Paula(?) from Poland when we say we've been to Warsaw and Cracow and particularly Zakopane, which she lights up about and continues to beam at us whenever she passes with a group to be seated. We have a beautifully brown-domed Vladimir from Slovenia to serve us our food with lovely brown eyes, and an even lovelier Zdenek who serves the wrong food to each of us each time, which shows how distinctive we look to HIM. I'm content with lemonade, which is refillable, and Ken has a beer that doesn't impress him, and we finish at 2:15 and ask directions at desk which has a very clear map, so we drive between the shop and the gas station, go down a winding road to the long building that serves as the Clinic and two other offices, and walk in to be greeted by a pert redhead who immediately gives me two forms to fill out and takes my HIP card. Then she hands me over to Kathy, short, plump, and dark-haired, who Karl(?) that night knew, who tells me to take off my shirt, listens to my heart, takes my history, listens to my complaints, and then talks to Melanie, older and blonde, whose name I unfortunately forget until the second time, and she says I should have an EKG, a P-A and lateral x-rays, and some medication (alburan?) which will thin my blood in case I got an embolism when sitting on the flight last week! When they get the results of my EKG, even though I tell them beforehand that everyone always remarks about SOMETHING being not normal, but not dangerous and "I'll die from something else." But they do a blood pressure and the first reading is 180/90, which is unheard of, and a quick second is 170/90, better, but still not great. More papers to sign, a release for charges that come to something like $800, and finally Ken, who did NOT leave to unpack around 3PM as suggested, demands that he and I and Melanie talk, and she puts it out directly: she's worried about my EKG, being 3:15PM here and 5:15PM in NYC they tried the number on my HIP card to get a recorded message that they were closed, found some kind of unrelated company for James Chin, and she definitely did NOT like my suggestion that I continue my normal life until they get my LAST EKG to compare with THIS EKG: "Yes, you could do that, but there's a small chance you might be exchanging 12 hours now for 24 future years of improved living." Well, it's hard to argue with that, and Ken obviously agrees, and when he volunteers to go back to the room to unpack my stuff and give me whatever I'd want to take with me to the Eastern Idaho Regional Medical Center (EIRMC), which is the best place for cardiology in the area, they say the ambulance is already HERE! Ken dashes out and at 4:30 I'm dressing, having had a port installed in my left backhand which I almost rip out trying to get my arm into my sleeve, and being told that the EIRMC will have to meet me halfway because the Park Ambulance can't go more than so far away! I need to pee, and the butch driver actually comes in with me (they obviously ALL think I might have a heart attack ANY SECOND!) until I can't do anything and he obligingly leaves. Ken is back with my bag, they put my shirt (with pen and notes) into another bag, take my shoes since I'm strapped to the gurney in a backless blue robe, and glance at my watch to see that it's precisely 5PM. Feel silly being strapped down and wheeled around to the ambulance door, but I remind myself that Ken took the cough suppressant OUT of my bag but left my camera IN, so I asked him to take a PICTURE of me (#33), which he does after I put it on and after which I shut it off. My bag and shoes are put inside, and the butch guy goes around to drive and I'm left with "I'm Matt," with the nametag "M. Hnat." He asks if I want to sit up, and that's definitely an improvement, since I thought I'd be restricted to two tiny views of the roadway from two tiny windows below the length-stretching bench alongside my gurney. He asks me about the temperature, saying he's hot in wool and Kevlar, and later tells me of the four Rangers shot over the past five years by various psychos and criminals, and he looks impressively bulky in his bulletproof vest. He fills out forms, takes my blood pressure every so often, and fits me with the oxygen-to-nose feeders which I'd had before in the Clinic because my pulse oximeter, that finger-clip thing which he rather clearly explains sends some kind of beam through my skin and measures what percentage of my red blood cells are carrying oxygen: a good minimum is about 90, average is 94-95, and I'm sometimes down to 89, sometimes up to 98, but that might all be the jostling of the ambulance on the highway, which seems to have no trouble with traffic, and after a rather long time I see the West Yellowstone entrance pass and am told that the Stagecoach Motel is still THERE! We have lovely talks of travel (I talk of Antarctica, Switzerland, Tibet, Kilimanjaro; he's only been overseas once: to ski in Austria; no talk of wife or family, he had nothing to do with the lost, now-dead, ranger, worked for a while at the Delaware Water Gap park which he represented at the Javits Center one year, and we talk about Brooklyn, my apartment, my job, his job, and at 6:30 we stop at a gas station with a close-by grocery where an even MORE attractive green-eyed Scott Gummit lets me sit (strapped in, as he is on the banquette) in a CHAIR which lets me look out sideways at the passing scenery: the sky goes from ominous to rather-nice sunset as we drive into Idaho Falls as he makes unkind comments about the hospital's poor placement out at the edge of town, but keeps praising its good reputation. I pee by mysef in the grocery, feeling slightly dizzy from having lain in one spot for an hour and a half watching trees (and in one case an ELK cross the road) pass by, and get in at 8PM, exactly an hour and a half for each leg. Scott has three kids, dammit, but loved San Francisco, visited NYC a few times, and seemed like a GORGEOUS guy to know. He takes me to Karly(?), who lays me out (taking off my shirt for a CLOTH back-closing robe, and exchanges my pants for a blanket to which he adds a WARMED blanket when he asks what I might like and I say my feet are cold) on another gurney and attaches a permanent blood pressure sleeve to my left arm which usually gives readings in the 160/89 range, though it did get down to 152 and to 83 at one point. Many questions and papers and drivers licenses and HIP cards to hand over, X-rays again with a cold board down the BACK only, and blood drawn for the all-important A-dimer test, which Karly says I should pray comes back negative. At 9:30 I say I'd like some dinner, and almost instantly a box lunch with a chicken sandwich, three containers of apple-cranberry juice, and the same 4-oreo pack as before as well as two packs of three graham crackers, as well as a half-pint of milk which he takes back. At 10PM Karly cruises past to say that every test is done and looks OK except for the A-dimer, and about half an hour later says THAT'S OK! Dr. Nathan, from Seaside in Brooklyn, praising Lenox Hill Hospital for cardiology, moved here for the money, comes in and says that the rash is trivial, the "high" blood pressure readings are OK, maybe inflated by my cough, which he says has no connection with anything, and that my ankle has an INFECTION, called cellulitis, for which he gives a half-hour intravenous antibiotic for which an alarm goes off when it's finished, and I didn't even know where the sound came from. I'm in a sort of storage area, so about three or four people come past to get something from a cabinet or a drawer or look at something. A baby cries in the hall, lots of people pass by, and I keep reading my New Yorker as it gets later and later. ONE nurse said "Oh, there's a good Marriott nearby," and I panic for a moment, but Dr. Nathan assures me I'll be staying in a private room on the fifth floor for tonight. At 11:30 move to room, try to get to sleep before getting my prescribed cough suppressant for my AWFUL cough, but a nurse comes in from 12:20-12:40 to ask PAGES of questions and THEN gives me a double-dose of Guanfizine, or whatever the common cough suppressant is, and I thankfully have my earplugs, and I have to urinate into a container so they can measure my output (as I guess they measure my input from the two-quart water bottle by my bed).
WEDNESDAY, 8/10/05: I may get to sleep about 1AM and wake at 2:40 to pee and cough to 2:55, feeling awful. Up at 4:20, coughing, to raise bed, but only the foot because I don't realize there are TWO sets of controls side by side on each side, and ring the nurse by accident, who tells me what to do and waits while I urinate, again measures it and cleans it out and washes her hands. I can't have suppressant for two more hours! Wish I had Fisherman's Friend! Try bed up, try bed down, no good. At 5:40 nurse comes in for blood. Look in regular bags for FF, not there. Pee. Try lying flat, no good. Raise again, no good. Notes to 6:25 to get up to date, pee, and ask for suppressant, which again she gives a double dose of 600ml. Don't sleep, but REST til Pauline comes in at 7:40 "for me last, since I saw you were still sleeping." Blood pressure is 159/89 and temperature's OK, and Dr. Nathan "could come in any time AM or PM." And breakfast is soon. Pee. Read paper to 8:25, start typing at 8:40, having FOUND Fisherman's Friend in side pocket and taking two. At 8:45 Pauline enters with aspirin and ZETIA! She says she'll CHECK if Dr. Nathan's here, or WHEN he'll be in. Type to 9:22, when I ASK about breakfast and Pauline thought I HAD it and orders me one. 9:30 do the "Me call Dr. Chin?" routine and don't. 9:39 breakfast of two cold pancakes, 2 syrups, 1/2 pint milk, OJ, banana, and maybe 4/5 scrambled egg. 9:44 nurse: Dr. Nathan here in half an hour. Finish breakfast, including milk at 9:54, and take two Fisherman's Friends. 10:15 KEN calls, I ask about getting to Old Faithful Inn and they give me two typed pages of info. My intravenous antibiotic was Cubicin. Dr. Nathan says I can go, did NOT have a heart attack, will give me prescription for Clindamycin for ten days, two pills three times per day, and I should stay off my feet as much as possible, but he KNOWS I'm on vacation and WILL be walking around. Guanfesine was cough suppressant, and got a LAST 600ml from the nurse at 12:15, when they took off port, with blood. "Abnormal T wave is meaningless." 11PM: I'm GOING by 12:30. 11:48AM: Called five or six people: who KNOWS how all this will be billed and WHO will pay for it! And decided on "Easy Way Taxi" who quoted me $155 (tip optional, of course), cash, 12:30 at main revolving door, arrival about 3PM, so I called Ken and left word with him. 12:18 finished with the final notes, ready to put on shoes, get ID bracelet removed, and go down to the taxi. #34 my room 536 and Pauline at 12:22. #35 Tetons from southwest of West Yellowstone at 1:30, at start of one-way traffic stop that lasts until 2PM for absolutely no discernible reason: BOTH lanes seemed open 95% of the way. #36 eagle and nest. Stop in West Yellowstone to buy Nyquil, Dayquil, and Comtrex, of which I take doses of BOTH the last two, which I think affects me for the rest of the night. In at 4:05 for $180, with which he seemed pleased even after I at first said we wanted the LODGE and then it became so impossible to find the INN from there that he finally asked a Ranger for directions, got them ("I hope you know what he said," I said, "I sure didn't get it."), and absolutely completely could NOT find the road. He returned smiling to the ranger, who said "Can you follow this car?" and proceeded to turn left past a stop sign facing the other way that we had BOTH decided led only to a construction area. He lets me out and Ken is in the john and my bed is a mess, which I add to as he tells me of his days and I tell him of mine. Then take #37 of room at 4:44. We're out to see (and video at length) Old Faithful at 5PM, then go to the noisy bar for a drink, me a Bloody Mary that sits poorly with my lunchless and overly drugged stomach. Ken falls for the dreadlocked father at the next table and joshes {file 3 at 8:42PM, 8/10/05} with Miguel from Colombia, having the nerve to ask him if he felt safe in Bogota. To room about 6 to sort through everything, separating out bills and things for the future, and shit a bit before going to the dinner line at 6:54 to find we have to take a beeper which finally pages us about 7:30 for our 7PM meal. Ken's fettucini and my Pork Osso Buco totally fill us up, with the salad and a glass of wine, and we leave most of it and get back to room at 8:35 when I take a full dose of Nyquil and the second prescription dose of Clindamycin in 3, rather than 8, hours, which is probably awful. Type with GREAT awkwardness and many mistakes until 8:50, planning to go to sleep and NOT cough until the phone rings at 5:55AM, actually only 9 hours away, not even enough sleep to make up for what I missed last night, not to mention the dream I'm sure to have. Feel drunk, tired, sick, and wishing trip were over, sadly, since the geysers and other features really are spectacular. Ken is VERY annoyed with kids running loudly in hallway outside door and in room upstair. Wait til I start coughing all night! Will roll my bedpread to get the needed elevation. Forgot to take two night-pills, yesterday's of which I took only at NOON today. REAL FUCKED UP, and high blood pressure to boot, and I DID make it to 8:50PM, Ken snoring, naked, in bed already with all the lights still on. Let's hope he can stay asleep---oh, and it RAINED torrents tonight, and place is being reconstructed so all great interior and exterior vistas of Old Faithful Inn are gone. Got to bed at 9:07, having taken Nyquil and one Comtrex.
THURSDAY, 8/11/05: Wake at 2:28, coughing, and took ANOTHER Nyquil dose and Comtrex, and cough a few times again but blessedly don't wake up (don't even PEE all night) when the alarm and phone goes at 5:55AM. Pee (partly on the floor) cough not once while I type this to 6:06, finding the separate john and sink convenient for the both of us to use. Open the shades to find it VERY cold outside: long-sleeved shirt today! Missed looking for the Perseids last night. First in breakfast line at 6:24, getting two Advil from Ken and giving them back later. #1 line in at 6:28. FIRST in. Finish breakfast of fruit salads and two hot chocolates at 6:45, add second shirt underneath at 6:50 and out at 6:55. To great Ranger Tom Kearney, pronounced Karney, and off at 7:32 to Lone Star Geyser, videoing Western Tanager (I hope) at 10:16. #2 Lone Star starting at 10:20. #4 11:18, #5 11:22 still in "steam" phase as we leave at 11:33. having waited an unusually long time for climax. Long walk back to car at 12:30, tired! To Old Faithful to see an eruption at 12:38, to lunch 12:43-1:31. Call HIP, who'll send forms and I have to return ORIGINAL bills, to 1:57. On road, as Old Faithful erupts, at 2:12. FOUNTAIN Geyser in Paint Pots area gives a BRILLIANT 20-minute display up close. to 3:38. Out at 3:58, taking more pictures of Firehole River Canyon to #12 and back at 5:05 for another Old Faithful eruption to 5:26. To room and shit and shower (small blood from cut on my head when I ducked into a pine-tree branch-end) to 6, then puzzles while Ken gabbles to 6:47 and to dinner at 7:30 to be back at 9:07, full of elk and a bit of pecan too-sweet pie. Bed at 9:22 with full dosages.
FRIDAY, 8/12/05: Wake at 12:21, go back to sleep, pee at 2:30, not coughing. Wake at 4:06, cough, type dream to 4:20. Wake at 6 feeling poorly and dress and finish this at 6:20AM. To LINE for breakfast (of 12), in at 6:30, fruit salad, back to room at 7:03, drug-up, shit, forget hat, leave 7:22, arrive at 7:45 at parking lot after MAGICAL drive through sometimes totally obscuring fog, starting with four elk right on the exit road from Yellowstone Village! Start tour at 8:09, 16 of us through the courtesy of the leader who has mercy on the partner of the woman who tried each morning since Monday to see if there's a cancellation. There's also a trainee-tour leader, which means we're 17, but no one younger than about 18, all physically capable (albeit fat in some cases), and who seem to share the leader's time with intelligent questions and comments in a very pleasing way. He describes it as a "stroll," but most of the time I find myself panting to keep up, usually after videotaping some feature after everyone has left it for the next stop. Fog still in as we leave "until 11AM." #14 spider web in dew 8:20. #15 spring 9:07. #17 Everett's thistle, guy lived 37 days on this, boiled, "fiber enema" maybe responsible for one report that he weighed 100 pounds when found, one report that he weighed 50 pounds when found. #18 Cavern pool 9:29. Three people, swimming at night, dark, thought they were diving BACK into the RIVER: 1 died, 2 BADLY burned, suit to SUE for "No safety guards" thrown out, NEXT suit tried to say "Killed by Federal grizzly bear" ALSO thrown out on appeal; if any like these would succeed, Park would be compelled to CLOSE much territory and lose much of its appeal. END video-reel 51 at 9:37, put in new reel 57. #19 boiling pool into Firehole River 9:39. #20 and 21 Firehole River boundaries at 9:50. THREE HUNDRED active geysers, most in world. Surrounding SILICA deposits say it's a GEYSER, no thermal carcasses due to WOLF predators of ILL animals. #24 jawbone and thighbone of bison. #25 bison skull. #27 colored ROCK 11:34 after we separated sexes to pee in the woods, ending about 11:50 at car. THREE MASSIVE ELK to #35, on video too, to hotel at 12:25. Sandwich lunch (with Old Faithful eruption) to 1:20, to car at 1:27, #36 and 37 of Great Fountain wonderful perfect-timing eruption at 1:59. Roll 7: #1 runoff at Midway Geyser Basin, which only had one geyser and three pools. #2 Grand Prismatic Spring side 2:34. #5 Excelsior runoff 2:54. See "Yellowstone, Land of Fire and Water" movie 3:48-4:04; BEEHIVE erupts as we go into Visitor's Center, Old Faithful erupts 4:18-4:25; the following movie is the SAME. Giantess is in constant eruption. Castle erupts in distance. Aurum erupts for a minute (every five hours) at 4:45. Old Faihful at 6:05-6:10 after painfully walking upper basin of Upper Basin, lots of actvity, getting WET from Giantess, and join Ken in bar for drinks 6:5-6:55, then dinner 7:10-8:30, me with mediocre hamburger and Ken with poor steak. To room and Ken is IMMEDIATELY to bed, asking for wakeup at 7 to breakfast at 8 for tour at 9, and I MIGHT take key and drive in early-morning fog. Finish at 9:03 when Ken bitches from his bed. Take ONLY Nyquil after brushing teeth cursorily to 9:20 and bed.
SATURDAY, 8/13/05: Wake twice during the night to glance at the time, once before midnight, once after, but didn't get up at all before I woke at 5:55 and decided to look outside: perfectly clear (no rain: good; no fog: bad) and then KEN got up which let me put on the light to get HIS (as he made it perfectly clear, as mine is filed away more deeply than his) Yellowstone map for my morning solo drive. Get to car at 6:10, drive toward Madison and pass a stopped car on the right to find myself in the literal midst of over a dozen female elk! I stop, slowly back up BEHIND the original discoverer so they could do as they wished, and found the small ones on the left vanishing, but two great females on the right, chewing placidly on grass. Then others reappeared on the right, and I watched them as some cars stopped and watched, which got no attention from the grazers, while others raced past without slowing, which seemed to cause them some concern. I watched until their white rumps (wapiti) vanished into the forest in about half an hour. Then to Firehole River Drive for a string of over a dozen geese flying overhead, the prediction for Great/Grand Fountain Geyser being left from last night from 10:30PM to 1:30AM, and no activity around White Dome Geyser except from two Japanese in a white rental car who ran about ineffectively with a camera on a tripod, who refused to even acknowledge my wave. I looked at Artemesia, but there didn't even seem to be a turnout connected to it, so I stopped at Daisy, but was disconcerted to look at the map and see that it might be as much as a mile away. Took off down the trail anyway, but got about a half mile when I decided my feet were hurting enough even before the day started, so back to hotel at 7:40, park right next to the entrance, and get up to the line for breakfast to find Ken not there yet, register for two, told to stand to the side, and just as they called me Ken came across the hall. Usual breakfast with Vladimir to 8:22. Take antibiotic, two Advil, one Celebrex, and two Comtrex. Still coughing this AM and foot sore. #6 painters as we leave hotel at 8:41. #7 Aurum erupting at 8:43. To parking lot for Mystic Falls tour to find Tom Kearney leading it, while I sit in car as much as I can while 13 of us gather, but three leave on their own so we're left with ten, which is about perfect. Told that a ROYAL (hunter's term) elk has SEVEN points, and it's not possible to have more than seven, which I'm quite sure mine had, but one I saw this afternoon was undoubtedly as much as 30% larger than mine. Osprey video, long walk, Jewel Geyser erupts twice while Tom talks before it, lots of smoke from nearby formations as maybe two dozen elk flee the forest cover, chased by a young male, one of the women says, but no one else seems to have seen it. Tired of following them, looking at marmots with darker tails that I thought was the characteristic of muskrats, looking at trees and the river and not being very impressed by Mystic Falls themselves, where we were left at 10:47 (when Ken thought the WHOLE tour was 1.5 hours) to rush back to car, Ken insisting on walking way ahead of me except when he had to stop to pee about once each hour, and my foot was so sore I took three aspirin and two Advil, and when I coughed took two Comtrex, too, but still felt pretty bad, still puffing at altitude. Back to car at 11:15, POOPED. Arrive at Yellowstone Lake Hotel exactly at 12:14, good lunch of Cuban Sandwich and salad and hot fudge sundae for me and salad and apple pie ala mode and fettucini for Ken with too-smoked salmon for his taste, and we split a $12 half-bottle of Korbel champagne, good. Lovely waiter, great quiet room with hardly anyone there, finishing at 1;25. Leave at 1:32 (Ken peeing again, me filling my water bottle. #11 bison 1:44. Bison to #16 to 2:03. To #18 ABOVE Inspiration Point at Grand Canyon of the Yellowstone by 2:30. To #26 at Inspiration Point by 2:43. To #31 from Grand View to 2:54, Ken rushing, me trying NOT ONLY to photograph but also LOOK at what was there: thrilling colorful vistas, hordes of people, great color changes, trees and deserted spaces, crowded parking lots, lots of johns, and green-and-white striped river below falls, not ever seeing Lower Falls, taller at 300 feet as compared to the Upper at 100 feet. Roll 8: #1-3 at Look Out to 3:19. Pee stop to 3:30. First stop had 57 steps, Look Out had 58 steps, just by coincidence? Upper falls rim to #8. Artist's View to #19 at 4:22. To #21 at Uncle Tom's View at 4:41, coaxing myself NOT to try the 300 steps and additional slopes to get a look at Lower Falls from below. #22 bison traffic jam at 4:55 to Mud Volcano at 5:10. #23 Mud Geyser 5:17, #24 Black Dragon's Cauldron 5:36, me dragging myself after rushing Ken to take photos and videos, foot hurting more and more, refusing to move faster for fear of REALLY hurting myself, enormously relieved when I can finally sit back down in the car. #25 "Short climb down" from top of Mud Volcano group to parking lot below at 5:33. Leave Mud Volcano 5:40 to SOLID traffic jam TWICE around enormous bison herds, taking videos and photos almost at random. DASH to hotel, bizarrely finding NO ONE in front of the car ahead of us which finally pulls into a turnout to let us pass, ALL the way from West Thumb to Yellowstone---NO car overtaken. Wash face with GREAT relief (hadn't done it this morning) and Ken goes before me to dining room and we're seated at 7:02, me coming JUST in time to follow him to our table. Pecan shrimp for me, with salad with huckleberry vinaigrette, with actually good green beans and wild rice, while Ken doesn't care for his linguini, but he loves his recommended $36 Conundrum which isn't bad, but I said I preferred the less-than-half-price $17---German flavored wine starting with T?---NO, Gewurztraminer! Back to room at 8:15, having actually FINISHED the entire entrée for I think the first time, and lie for a bit while Ken talks about what we do tomorrow---a lot, it sounds like, another exhausting painful day--- and I shower from 8:40-9:15, hoping to get away from what sounds like military marching back and forth and running back and forth across the ceiling from the room upstairs. SHOULD brush my teeth, but I de-cotton new earplugs to replace those entirely too small and too dirty, get out new shorts and socks and shirt for tomorrow, as well as pills for breakfast and tonight, deciding to take the first of the going-home Diazepam. Do all that to 9:25 when I shut off the lights after Ken refuses to say when he wants to get up or have breakfast: "I want to get up when I wake up and then have breakfast after that. What do you want?" Silence. "What do you want?" "I prefer to be incommunicative in silence." I shut off all the lights except the bathroom, say goodnight, and type all this to 10PM, the exhaust fan VERY loud in the bathroom and people STILL stomping around upstairs. Take Nyquil, night pills, and first Diazepam after (but did NOT!) and get to bed at 10:10PM.
SUNDAY, 8/14/05: Wake at 4:21AM and lie a bit deciding whether to pee or not, but get up to pee and go back to sleep after coughing once or twice. Then have one of the most extraordinarily erotic dreams in ages and wake with a thrusting erection, and probably sleep again and try to continue the erotic dream, and wake at 5:59AM and pee and transcribe the dream into file 8 starting at 6:04AM. I wake again at 7:26AM and take out my earplugs and Ken says "Time to get up?" at 7:30, so we're up, shit, pill up, dress, and leave for breakfast at 7:53AM. ONTO breakfast line 7:57. They have to do a table check, of course, without keeping ANY available tables noted, and get seated at 8:09. To room at 8:42 after another good bagel with cream cheese and butter and hot chocolate. To Fairy Falls parking 9:05, having convinced Ken that the ground fog is ALREADY cleared from the area, so he agrees, after my refusal to restate all the arguments he gave in the FIRST place as to the benefits of going to Fairy Falls first. #26 people walking Midway Geyser Basin at 9:28. #27 ORANGE-centered 17-year old lodgepole and original forest beyond 9:46. #28 burnt and fallen forest 10AM. #29 Fairy Falls 10:06. #30 Faggot and Fairy 10:16. LONGEST 1.6 miles out by 10:50. #31 geese and Middle Geyser walkers 10:54. To car 11:10. To Hotel 11:23 and Ken goes to room and gets our lunch at the deli and I sit in car and BREATHE! Stop for Gibbon River picnic lunch at 12:30. Good quick lunch to 12:45. Into Norris at 1PM (noting times on map: Cistern Spring at 1:11; Palpitator Spring at 1:18; Fearless Geyser 1:19; Minute Geyser 1:23; Steam Geyser 1:27; Crackling Lake 1:39; Black Growler Steam Vent 1:41; Whale's Mouth was nothing at 1:41; Pinwheel Geyser (defunct) 1:44; Whirligig Geyser 1:47; Constant Geyser erupted for amoment at 1:46; Colloidal Pool at 1:52; video Porcelain Springs at 2PM; Congress Pool at 2:03, and finally Bathtub Spring at 2:10). #32 Porcelain Basin overlook 1:33. #33 runoff of Whirligig Geyser pool 1:47. #34 Colloidal Pool 1:53. #35 three FORMS of thermal pools 1:57. Pee. #36 above at 2:06, and car at 2:14, to Artist's Paint Pots 2:25. IN to 2:33 and TIRED. Roll 9: Paint Pots #1 and 2 at 2:38. End video at 2:47. #4-5 milkbaths (in shade and in light). Walk back 2:54-3:01. #6 at Old Faithful eruption and Old Faithful Inn at 3:44. To Castle Geyser at 3:50. #7 Shield Spring at 3:56. #8 Castle and boiling pool 3:59. Then ranger comes running down to say that we have ten minutes to make it to Grand, which is erupting only twice in a day. Video to 4:16, photos to #17. Fabulous thrill! #18 Wave Spring 4:26. #19 Bacteria mat 4:28. Video and photo Beauty Pool at 4:30. Castle 4-6AM on Monday per schedule, noted at 4:40. Dash back toward room. #20 bison and video to 4:43. 4:48 to room, ELATED and EXHAUSTED. Leave at 5:02, dressed formally for dinner, arrive at Yellowstone Lake Hotel at 6:05, walk out in front of the hotel to 6:15, drinks to string quartet to 6:45; dinner of corn soup, tempura shrimp and guacamole, Evolution wine, rack of lamb, and out at 8:30 and back at 9:40. Old Faithful ERUPTION scheduled and I'm out, chilly, from 9:50-10, back to room at 10:08, write notes to 10:14, bed at 10:30.
MONDAY, 8/15/05: Wake and shit and pee at 4:20, coughing a bit. 6:56 wake with dream and type to 7:26, Ken awake. Shit to 7:30 with TERRIBLE skid-marks ALL up back of shorts. To breakfast 7:57 (after 6-minute table check) to 8:32. Next eruption 8:45, so I go RIGHT out, while Ken reparks the car he put at the grocery last night when he couldn't find a place to park. Old Faithful erupts 8:55-9:02, clouded. Leave room at 9:30, car packed at 9:36. Checkout to [#22 dining room at 9:39, video main hall in reparation] 9:50. Ken GIVES me $6 that he wants to donate to their charity that I don't want to. To West Thumb Geyser Basin at 10:24, easily. #22 Brown Spring 10:38. #23 Abyss Pool 10:43. Video Black Pool constant bubbles to 10:49. #24 Fishing Geyser 10:55. #25 kayaks, Lakeshore Geyser, and West Thumb caldera at 10:57. #26 caldera in caldera sign 10:59. Buy great $9 book, pee, and leave 11:23. #27 Lewis Falls (30 feet) 11:43. Arrive Flagg Ranch Resort 12:05 for lunch, GREAT "Italian Wedding" soup and cheese bacon-burger by 12:55, endless lemonade. To Art Museum in heat at 2:11. more tired than on TREK as we leave at 3:38 after #28 and 29 bronze panther and elk. #30 Gallery from below at 3:42, leave 3:38. Arrive 4PM at Wort Hotel at Jackson after I pay $12 for gas. Into room 222 at 4:05, unpack to 4:32. Type a bit, but Ken wants a drink, so WALK down, have two of his and one of mine, good, and leave, drunk, at 5:30. #31 cowboy shootout at 5:53. #32 elk arch 5:57. #34 revolver show 6:11. #35 stagecoach 6:24. #36 Ken's Couture 6:20. "Show" downtown through #37 to 6:40. Leave hotel, newly washed and dressed, at 6:57. Roll 9: #1 Stagecoach and antler at 7:01. Ken refuses to even LOOK at the pleasant, cool, quiet, private little tables outside on the balcony, insisting on crowded, loud, stuffy bar. Dine 7:10-9:05 on Roderer champagne, two glasses for me, and Conundrum, two glasses for him, with my bacon-wrapped chorizo-stuffed dates and his fried green tomatoes and crab, then his pork shank and my boar loins and my peach cobbler not that great and his caramel-dipped chocolate bars that I helped finish, as I did his pork, GREAT! Cute bedroom-eyed water-pourer and a---who was Matthew Broderick's partner in Producers? [Nathan Lane]---lookalike. Back to hotel at 9, fuss with packing, start typing at 9:45 and finish at 10:20PM, having decided on an 8AM wakeup call so I can have breakfast at 8:45, get to Dollar (whether by walking or by Petti picking me up) by 9:45 for 10AM shuttle to airport for departure on a schedule I haven't rooted out yet. Ken goes to bed and sleeps through all this, all lights still burning, and I put last pages away and undress and put lights out and finally get to bed at 10:30PM, using only two thick pillows to elevate my head to prevent coughing, and fall asleep rather quickly.
TUESDAY, 8/16/05: Wake with relatively severe gastric reflux at 12:21 (again!) AM, stuggling to finger water up my nose to get rid of the bitterness there, and finally succeed and drop back to sleep with maybe one cough. Then at 3:32AM I wake after a dream and go to the john and hawk up a small piece of food, like the white shell of a pea, which I cannot identify, and shit a smelly brown sticky shit and wipe myself off laboriously and then at 3:47AM begin to transcribe my dream. Finish typing at 3:57AM and continue to clean up myself from my shit and get back to bed at 4AM. Look at clock about 4:40AM, not really sleeping, vaguely worried about flights, connecting, packing, going through this last day. Doze, have a vague dream, transcribe not much of anything at 6:48AM, take a Diazepam at 6:50, counting that I have 8 left, and decide to take some of the remaining time to REALLY brush my teeth, which I've done, at most, only two or three times this whole trip, and have to get ready for seeing DiMatteo on Thursday, only two days for now. Start that routine at 6:53AM, Ken snoring away as I open door. Do it so thoroughly that the temporary cap comes off, cleanly, before finishing THAT task at 7:16AM, deciding to take a shower next, changing into last clean shorts and socks---no sense taking back CLEAN clothes! Start shower process at 7:18AM. Shower to 7:40, hearing Ken shave outside, and immediately I exit, he goes in to shit. Put on clean socks, shorts, and shirt and put everything out to pack at 7:50AM, Ken still in bathroom. Dressed and actually ready to PACK at 8:03, Ken sitting. Tenth roll of film IN camera. Squeeze everything into blue bag, absolutely crammed, by 8:25AM. To breakfast at 8:30AM. Back at 9:13, 3-egg omelet and no hot chocolate refill. Call Dollar and they say they, finally, CAN pick me up in front of the hotel in 15 minutes, so I leave at 9:25 to wait. But I must have misunderstood, because no sooner than I get downstairs and pull my jacket out of my bag than a little Dollar shuttle pulls in across the street: I wave at him and he parks at the hotel, saying he didn't realize it was a one-way street. Bags in back and me in the only other front seat and zip around to Dollar; funny, I did NOT recognize it from the front, but as we drove in from the BACK I remembered every detail. To the offfice, and I guess it was the senior Verena who was Ms. Patti, and I thanked her for the transfer and she nodded sourly. She asked about the car, she checked Levin's reservation for the 11AM shuttle, and mine for the 10AM shuttle, and I read two copies of Jackson Hole Dailies after unzipping my big bag and thankfully finding the litte bag with "necessities" RIGHT on top and my house keys RIGHT there. She says to board shuttle and woman in john leaves just as I arrive and I can pee and get out to full shuttle at 9:52 which leaves at 9:56! Hope Ken catches his OK. Arrive airport at 10:11, passing the same two (unphotographed) (as was the "good" view of the gallery from the road) Trumpeter Swans in the pool just north of Jackson. Last wistful views of the somewhat hazy Tetons, and out (guy just JERKED his roll-on from under my blue bag, which crashed on its end onto the floor) to the American counter with almost no line, remembering to take off my blue-bag STRAP and storing it, and get at least seat 19 something, from 15, hopefully more behind the wing for the Dallas-LAG flight, she telling me to check again in Dallas. Check in at 10:18, take bag around to end for checked-luggage clearance, and had only to present a photo-ID for my tickets, not even needing my white paper stamped "electronic ticket." Get seat close to gate 1, only gate, with boarding pass and driver's license on top to be checked. Get out AlphaSmart and ask woman (taking up two seats and later using her cell phone) if she would mind if I tapped away, and she smiled and said "Not at all, thank you for asking," and I did this to 10:38, entirely caught up! Going onto note-page 14, just about a page a day. Clear out newspapers and magazines, clipping out quite a bit, to 10:58, when security for flight 2244 is called, and I take out my laptop, wallet, pen, and take off my shoes and pass through at 11:02. Take bag IN to pee and put in earplugs against VERY persistent kids' noises, and type this to 11:07, boarding time noted at 11:45AM, start Los Angeles Times Sunday Crossword Puzzle. Finish puzzle at 11:55, when we start boarding. Board at noon, crowded flight, cloudy out. BOO! 2:12 flight announced. Off at 12:29, #2 Jackson at 12:31. Into clouds 12:33. 1PM I start seeing desert-type ground. Clouds again at 1:25-2. 2:16 they essentially say the landing will be very rough, no possibility of getting up, so I'm up on line for the john and settle that, at least. Not that bumpy at all! Arrive at gate A33. They announce many departure gates, none of them for LaGuardia. 2:26 "All seat belts fastened." #3 Dallas-Fort Worth Airport in front at 2:41. Land at 2:43. Rainy. 2:51: Many flights cancelled because of weather, see clerk. LaGuardia STILL not announced. 2:59 on line for agent information, all screens in the neighborhood blank. 3:12 agent tells me it's scheduled for 5:55 boarding at gate C4. Go long way around on slidewalks to find another flight boarding at C4, but I see another flight to LaGuardia at next gate: C3. Go to that gate and told flight is full, but they'll put me on the waiting list. I ask how many are on the waiting list and they say, "We don't give out that information, as it changes all the time. You don't have long to wait, since we finish boarding at 4:45" (it's now 3:27, that is 4:27, on my watch, and as she adds, "You can wait here, because you'll still have time to get to gate C6 for the 5:55 boarding for flight 750." So she puts my name on the list, she assures me, and I hear others talking about waiting for this flight who had been scheduled for flight 750, so it doesn't sound very hopeful. I grab a nearby seat and type this until 4:39, not much time to sit in suspense. Wonder when I WILL get home?? At 3:56 [4:56] my name is called and I get a window at 26A which is JUST enough behind the wing (and thankfully on a 2-person side rather than a 3-person side)---and it just now occurs to me that my BAG will probably STILL be sent on flight 750, though by the time we take off and get there, there may be little difference between the times---I can't find original schedule, but at 4:08 [5:08] they say there are 11 planes lined up for our SLOT, so we have to move onto the field even though our "wheels up" time isn't until 6:30! At 4:32 I change my watch to 6:32, NYC time, and type this at 6:40 as I [start file 4 at 6:40PM NYC time] wait to take off on an EARLIER American flight to LaGuardia. VERY confusing, and I start the USA Today puzzle before typing this while we aimlessly taxi around at 6:41, warm inside. Said to arrive at LaGuardia 10:40-10:45. At 7:29 told that we're going NORTH over Illinois to avoid bad weather in the southeast, and will be in at 11:15. MOVE at 7:42, thus announcing a 3:35 flight? Off at 7:51. Oklahoma, Kansas, and Missouri move below in the sunset, not really much to see, and cross the Mississippi, much braided and joined by another river, to Iowa at 9:14, 1:45 left, but then the lights start coming on and Chicago is BRILLIANT against the curve of Lake Michigan. Then Indiana, Ohio (where we seem to skirt part of the lower shore of Lake Erie, but as much as I look I can't discern Cedar Point or Cleveland), Pennsylvania, and New York. Land at 10:57, only 3:06 even with the right-angle turn between Dallas and NYC. 11:10: since I said nothing about luggage, mine will be on flight 750, in at 11:48PM! At 11:44 "750 arrived from Dallas," and get my bag at 11:49! Into cab at 11:54, $28 taxi home at 12:15, TIRED, though it's just technically 10:15PM in Yellowstone.
YELLOWSTONE SUMMARY PAGE
TUE,8/2: Taxi at 4:28AM, fly LaGuardia-Dallas 6:09-9:02 (8:02 local). Fly Dallas-Jackson 8:42AM-10:55. Drive to Jackson Lake Lodge by 5:15, dinner,bed.
WED,8/3: Breakfast in Pioneer Room. Ranger tour to Inspiration Point 8:03-11:48. Lunch at Jenny Lake Lodge, drive up Signal Mountain, video bear, walk to Rockefeller stone,drinks,dinner in Mural Room,video night view, bed 10:14.
THU,8/4: Breakfast in Mural Room, Float-trip (and picnic) 8:46-12:40. Gros Ventre Slide walk, bison, dine in Mural room, walk below hotel 8:40-9:38.
FRI,8/5: Pioneer Room breakfast, Coulter Bay tour to Swan Lake 8:07-11:15. Lunch at John Coulter cafe, Coulter Pond-edge Ranger walk 1:10-2:34. Dinner at Jenny Lake Lodge, drive unsuccessfully to see bison. Bed at 10PM.
SAT,8/6: Leave Teton Park at 10, Yellowstone Lake House for lunch, thermal walk, and to Mammoth Hot Springs Hotel at 3:15. Drinks, postcards, to Gardiner Park Avenue Restaurant to meet Jon and have dinner to 8:30;bed 9:30.
SUN,8/7: Ranger tour to Beaver Ponds 8:11-12:17. Lunch; power off. Mammoth Hot Springs upper and lower basins, ice creams, drinks, dinner, bed 9:55PM
MON,8/8: Breakfast, Mount Washburn climb (with box lunches) 9:10-2:06. To Tower Falls for soda, bison herd, petrified tree, Undine Falls, drive Lamar Valley, elk on lawn,drinks,Gardiner Park Avenue restaurant to 9:05,bed 10:30.
TUE,8/9: Coughing, ankle sore, grocery-shop for medicines. Museum of Park Ranger, Norris Geyser Basin tour 10:07-11:55. To Old Faithful Inn for lunch and trip to clinic 2:20, recommend hospital. Pee and on ambulance 1 5-6:30, pee, and on ambulance 2 6:35-8. Intravenous for cellulitis, box-lunch dinner, and to room at 11:30, coughing, nurse 12:20-12:40 questionnaire.
WED,8/10: Sleep at 1AM, wake at 2:40 and cough to 2:55, up at 4:20, cough suppressant at 6AM, doze to 7:40. Cold breakfast, leave 12:30 in $180 taxi to Old Faithful Lodge, then Inn, having bought drugs in West Yellowstone, first Old Faithful eruption, drinks, dinner 7:30-8:35, drugs, bed at 9:07PM, tired.
THU,8/11: Coughing, first to breakfast at 6:30, Lone Star Geyser Ranger tour 7:32-12:30, lunch, call HIP, Old Faithful erupts. Fountain Geyser in Paint Pots gives brilliant display, Old Faithful to 5:26, shower, dinner, bed 9:22.
FRI,8/12: Breakfast 6:30, drive through fog for Caldera tour 8:09-11:50. Sandwich lunch (with Old Faithful eruption) to 1:28, Great Fountain eruption, "Yellowstone, Land of Fire and Water" movie. Beehive erupts. Old Faithful erupts 4:10-4:25. Giantess in constant eruption. Castle erupts in distance. Aurum erupts for a minute. Walk Upper Basin. Old Faithful at 6:05-6:10. Dinner 7:10-8:30 and bed at 9:20, taking only Nyquil, cough going.
SAT,8/13: Solo drive 6:10-7:40, breakfast, Mystic Falls Ranger tour 9-11:15. Lunch at Yellowstone Lake Hotel good, lots of bison on way to Grand Canyon of Yellowstone, visiting Inspiration Point, Grand View, Look Out, Artist's View, and Uncle Tom's View. Bison traffic jam to Mud Volcano. Two more bison traffic jams. Dine in Old Faithful Inn with his Conundrum wine, I shower, bed at 10:10PM after catching up on notes, still exhausted.
SUN,8/14: Late breakfast after wait, to Fairy Falls 9:05-11:10, stop at Gibbon River for deli lunch at picnic table. Finish Norris Geyser Basin and then Artist's Paint Pots. To Castle Geyser and Grand Geyser erupts! Leave for Yellowstone Lake Hotel 5:02-6:05, OK dinner: Ken's Evolution wine, bed 10:30.
MON,8/15: Breakfast, Old Faithful erupts to 9:02, checkout to 9:50. To West Thumb Geyser Basin 10:24-11:23. Lewis Falls, Flagg Ranch Resort for good lunch, then to Art Museum 2:11-3:38, To Wort Hotel in Jackson at 4PM, drinks, Jackson "shootout" to 6:40, great Snake River dinner for $169, each drinking own choices of wines by two glasses, back to Wort Hotel and bed at 10:30PM.
TUE,8/16: Shower, pack, breakfast, Dollar shuttles me to Dollar at 9:30. Then Dollar shuttles me to airport 9:56-10:11, fly Jackson-Dallas 12:29-2:43. LaGuardia flight not announced! Change to "earlier" flight, boarding at 4:08 for "vacating slot" and off at 7:51-10:57, over brilliant Chicago. Wait for my flight 750 luggage at 11:49PM,taxi home 11:54-12:15 for $28,bed at12:45AM.
WED/8/17: Up 6AM,see Dr. Chin,look at mail,call people,liesurely day AT HOME!