Leaving

So my extension worked after many trials and tribulations, running around between different people, my contract ends on 20th October and I leave for the Old Faithful Inn on Wednesday morning. It’ll certainly be strange to leave this place which I have called home for over 2 months. Canyon closed to guests on Sunday, so ever since we have been deep cleaning and closing down the village. Today as I walked back to my room from work, the partially setting sun shone through the tall lodge pole pines and stretched out soft shadows. I looked back at the empty cabins and thought what a sad place this becomes with the absence of life. The place had lost its purpose (even the signs had been wrapped up) and it had no need to be in the many coming icy months. I will be sad to leave this place.

1 Englishman and 9 Asians

Two weeks ago I went to Bozeman with Tommy, to go to get his windscreen fixed after the elk crash. We went around Target and Wal-Mart waiting for the repairman to change the screen and it amazingly took only 1 hour for him to finish it in the parking lot. We visited some second hand shops, which I was very pleased about when I bought a lot of winter items for around 1-2 dollars each. We went to eat at the Bamboo Garden, a nice Chinese restaurant; the meal before me had been plucked from the table of a king when compared to Xanterra’s food.

Last week I went with 9 Asian friends from the kitchen in a 7 person owned huge white American 4x4 to Osprey Falls, next to Bunsen Peak. The hike was 4.6 miles one way so 9.2 in total; it is my longest so far. To reach the falls we had to go to the bottom of a canyon, which seemed to simply appear from nowhere, as if forming right before our footsteps. It was a steep hike down on a thinly lined trail, making you realise how close to death you could so easily be. One girl actively chose to wear flip flops for this hike, my mind could not begin to fathom why any individual would choose this, but she seemed to cope well on the treacherous path. The falls were pretty, nowhere reaching the size of those at Canyon, but beautiful in their relatively petit volume. Trees had rooted at the curved brink and the dazzling yet water misted sun shone through their silhouetted shapes and outlined a golden crest on the falls edge. We sat and ate on a ledge reaching out to the falls, but then moved below and beside the river with its wet boulders. We watched the water dance around to its decided route and I explored to search out a dead tree in which to snap off a hiking stick; my friend Brian called me Gandalf the whole way back. Others floated their bottles in the likely snow melted river and dipped in their naked pale toes. I was the last in the row to the top, and accordingly the slowest. The sun beamed down on us, the hottest I have experienced here; my breath was quick. We saw some Mule deer on the way up, I didn’t expect to see any animal traverse such a steep slope, but they seemed to enjoy the plants. After we got out of the canyon it was all ease on the flat earth as the breeze brushed away our sun ripened cheeks.

While driving back we visited two other waterfalls - the names I have lost from memory. Although they were not as impressive; we decided that the final one should be titled a trickle and not as it was named, a fall. As we left a great and powerful storm had been rolling in; only miles behind the rain could be seen so dense in the sky, it was as if the clouds were falling in their entirety. As we drove the storm followed and overtook the car, a bold smoky grey, almost black edge stretched across the sky until only from a small crevice between the mountains could the sunset be seen to peep through. Lightning struck all around in abundance, flashing up the landscape white, in all of its vastness. It had not rained for a while, a certain rarity in Yellowstone, and as we drove back I spotted speckled bulbs of orange through the tinted windows. It appeared as a newly sprung town, as some sort of mirage as it lay in the bowl of land below Mt. Washburn. That was until I rolled down my window to see that I was actually looking at a forest fire. I gazed in bewilderment at the magnificent beauty; it was an oval ring from afar that appeared like the golden heat between smoking coals in a wintry fireplace, with the thick black sky as its chimney. I could have stayed all night just to watch it spread and glow.

My friends returned on the following day, yet to see nothing remaining of the fire except for its black ash tracks on a circle of now dead trees. However, I heard from a friend today that there was a fire still ablaze around the area which had started on that same night. I am unsure whether it is the one we saw or if it was a different one as lightning was occurring frequently; we do not hear much news.

Full Moon Hike

On my day off 2 weeks ago (late update), which is only one day now, I went on a hike up Mt. Washburn again. This was the same hike as my first in Yellowstone, except that this time it was on a different trail and was at night, it is also officially titled as a ‘full moon hike’. Tommy drove us in his car, who is from Hong Kong, with 6 other people at around 6.30 in order to reach the trail end at sunset. Tommy also managed to hit an elk later on in the week, as it dashed across the road at a terribly unlucky time and ended up flipping over the front, smashing the top of his windscreen and  lying on top of the roof. This was to the sound of many screams, all under the blanket of darkness. Seconds after it jumped off and walked casually away, surprisingly alive.  I was not in his car this night thankfully. 

Anyway, back to the hike – We aimed to reach the top, where a forest fire lookout station sits, right before the sun was to set. We were slightly slow, so in a final adrenaline rush I ran to the peak to witness the surreal spectacle of the sun lowering at one side of the horizon as the full moon rose on the other. We also saw a coyote dash across the trail with some furry brown animal gripped in its mouth, reminding me somewhat of my dog Archie when he finds a bone or soft toy. And at the top in the lookout station we had an Asian noodle party (which I have been a part of many since my time here), with many sprawled packets of instant noodles finding themselves eventually in a boiling pot. It is quite an amusing sight to watch all this with a plug in hot spoon to boil the water and everyone rushing around to cook and eat before the closing of the station. On the way down we were under the bright reflection of the sun, the moons shadows were stark and ghostly. For as far as the eye could see there was nothing, only some small cars lacing between the forests and some pale yellow glow which we picked out as Canyon village.

Second snow of summer

It snowed again this week, before it was wet and slushy, this time it was delicate, fluffy and light. I have never experienced such juxtaposed weather before; previously it had been sultry with the white hot sun all through the days. It lasted for only around 2 hours but fell heavily; just enough to form bunches on the pines, to cover the grasses and construct sheets of crisp white on rooftops. I went on a small walk with some friends on a local trail snaking through the snow covered woodland to finish on the road. It appeared to have been somewhat abandoned of any maintenance with profuse amounts of fallen trees on the trail. As we came to the road many cars, bus-size R.V’s, hummers and any other kind of obnoxious American vehicle you could think of had stood in its tracks, this is a very common occurrence. People had stopped to gaze upon a large herd of mule deer, with what appeared to be over 30. This kind of deer has huge ears, like a mule as the name suggests, and I had not sighted any yet. Some of the males had enormous, yet elegant horns reaching out in sporadic directions from their heads’, the type you usually see nailed into wooden boards in western style restaurants or English pubs. As we got back we amusingly found fellow employees with skis and snowboards strapped to their backs exclaiming they were going to go down Mt. Washburn. The next morning it continued snowing but only in single flakes, when caught on my sleeve those magical intricate patterns of snow appeared that I only see on Christmas cards or as festive decorations.

What it's like

Well I realised I haven’t described much about where I live or what is around me so I will do so now. Employees live inside 1 of 4 main dorms with the names Bison, Grizzly, Wapiti and Bighorn; I used to live in Bison which is for people under 21 although it is now closed. Everyone will be put in Grizzly and Bighorn soon as over half of the workforce has left; it was very dead in my old dorm. My roommate and I were moved into Grizzly last week, or more like kicked out, into a room that looks exactly the same with identikit furnishings and decoration.
There are abundant bunches of trees and forests around, they creak and sway in solidarity while some bend in semi circles as others lean and intertwine – the shapes these trees can make are tremendous. They enclose Canyon Village off from the rest of the world, apart from the General Store, Gift Shop, Restaurant and Visitor Centre above – there is not much else here except a gas station. It is situated 1 mile away from the actual canyon, so it is a short hike. The old hotel used to be right next to the edge but the NPS (National Park Service) were not happy with its placement and in addition the entire hotel was sliding slowly into the canyon. In the end they intentionally torched it all and built Canyon Village in the oh so lovely 50’s style. It is probably the ugliest of all the hotels here because of this. Canyon Village is also at the highest altitude in Yellowstone for where it is possible to stay, so as it says humorously on some gift shop t-shirts, ‘We partied with the highest people in the park’. It is also probably the most remote, there are few hiking trails around and we are far from any main tourist attractions, apart from the actual canyon. Therefore, it is somewhat necessary to drive, hitchhike or get on a tour bus if you want to see much of anything. However, you can go on long hikes from here if you are very experienced (which I am not). If you walk out of the village area and across the road there is a large flatland, like a field with no borders and emerald trees above amber grasses. I walked this and it’s beautiful...what a wonderful backyard to have!
I see squirrels prance back and forth the same path all the time here, with a pinecone locked between their teeth; they take them to their nest or whatever kind of home a squirrel may have. Whistle pigs are often seen too, I guess it is the same as a groundhog; they scurry along the tarmac and hide under picnic tables. The rest of the wildlife you will see is a deer or two, a bison resting in the sun and sometimes elks eating housekeeping’s soaps out of carts, as you can see here – http://sphotos.ak.fbcdn.net/hphotos-ak-snc4/hs368.snc4/45083_419569713844_598978844_4771538_2140094_n.jpg

I attempted to get another job, for the third time now, which was in the deli preparing food and serving customers. Someone who worked there had heard I wanted to get out of housekeeping and he really wanted to get out of the deli, so we attempted to switch jobs. Long story short, Jennifer had agreed to let us switch but then changed her mind and got very angry for no apparent or logical reason, I really cannot understand this woman but she seems to have me chained down as a cleaner.

I also just handed in my extension form, so hopefully will be staying in Yellowstone until the 24th of October, moving to Mammoth or Old Faithful after 28th September; though I requested different jobs of course.