Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
Norris Junction to Madison Junction
3.9/9.5
Side road to parking for
Artists' Paintpots.
The area is wheelchair-accessible only
as far as the colorful features at the base of the hill. The gray and noisy paintpots are up a
short but somewhat steep trail. The area's springs and their surroundings abound in colorful
clays—orange, red, and pink. Green and yellow bacteria and algae line the runoff channels.
4.4/9.0
North end of
Gibbon Canyon
and a short side road along the river for fishing
access. Tiny hot springs steam along the riverbank.
4.9/8.5
Gibbon River crossing and
Monument Geyser Basin Trailhead
parking area. A
700-foot (200 m) climb in about 1 mile (1.6 km) takes you to some tall and oddly shaped
geyser cones, including the still slightly active Monument Geyser, also called Thermos Bottle
Geyser, which is gradually sealing its own spout with sinter.
Blood Geyser, an iron-oxide-stained feature at Artists' Paintpots
5.0/8.4
Lone Tree Rock in the Gibbon River was pointed out to tourists in the stagecoach
days. At least one lodgepole still grows out of a rock here, but maybe it's not the same tree.
5.3/8.1
Parking for Beryl Spring on the south end of the bridge only.
Beryl Spring,
named
for the blue-green gemstone, perpetually throws its superheated water 3 to 4 feet (1-1.2 m)
into the air from the several bubbling spots in its pool.
One or more fumaroles hiss like steam engines behind Beryl, while along an old roadbed
above it is a dormant paintpot and hot spring area. Both up-and downriver from Beryl are
steaming hot springs, perhaps less active than in the past. Acid eats away at the bridge deck
near Beryl.
According to Mary Bradshaw Richards's account,
Camping Out in the Yellowstone, 1882,
a
“roarer” above the river poured forth a torrent of boiling water from a horizontal orifice, cre-
