Checking out Ojo Caliente before the trail forks. We stayed right to go to Sentinel Meadows. If we had gone left, we could have hiked to Fairy Falls.
Ana, Miriam, Seth, Winnie and Bekah on the trail.
Seth checking out the sinter mounds of hot springs. There's an old incomplete bath house near one of them. The park started building it in 1881 but abandoned the construction as park administrations and priorities changed. We never saw the building; we would have had to go off-trail to see it, and I was very concerned about staying on the trail.
The girls looking at a frog they found in the marshy stream.
Winnie near one of the streams we crossed.
While the trail had some beautiful flowers (I learned a new one: fringed gentian) and a few Yellowstoney features, the black clouds of biting deer flies that attacked us left us running away rather than enjoying the sights. And one part of the trail required us to cross a muddy field that enveloped our boots. Poor Winnie started bawling at one point (the deer flies and mud were too much for her), and the couple who caught up to us on the trail got to experience that as well as the flies and mud. The insect repellent that lady was carrying seemed to do nothing to deter the bugs.
A stop in West Yellowstone for some ice cream seemed to smooth things over for everyone.