Steam, Stars, and Winter Soundscapes (1/8/2015)

We signed up for a "tour" through Xanterra (we made all our arrangements through them). It's called Steam, Stars, and Winter Soundscapes. It was 2 hours....we drove in the bombardiers to three different spots and did a little night hike at each one and spent some time listening to our surroundings. It's so quiet here in winter, it was pretty cool. Too bad there weren't any stars out tonight. But we did get plenty of steam and sound. Our first stop was Keller Cascade, listening to a water fall. Then we went to Black Sands and hiked about a quarter of a mile out to a geyser. We waited in silence (no talking) and listened to the bubbles escaping the geyser. Pretty soon we heard thumping and could feel a slight vibration in the ground. Then the bubbling sound got faster. It was pretty cool to listen to. There are only two geysers in the park that do the thumping thing like that. Our last stop was Biscuit Basin. Most of the biscuit formations disappeared in (forgive me, I forgot the seismic details) some natural event a couple of decades ago, but there's one biscuit left and we saw it by flashlight on our last little hike. When we got back to the bomb, our guide, Berlin, had hot chocolate for us in souvenir insulated mugs with the logo for "Steam, Stars, & Winter Soundscapes."