We didn’t know what to expect when we drove to Mammoth Hot Springs. We knew it was a set of volcanic springs, and lots of people went there because it was pretty. So we drove north.

On the way we went over a pass that was relatively snowy, and then down into some lovely meadows and large tracts of burned out trees. The mountains became a little more jagged and pronounced as we got to the northern side of the park, and I knew we were looking into Montana in the distance.

Over the mountains in Montana were threatening clouds. I mean, these clouds might have been hired as mafia hit men, they were so threatening. Big and dark, emitting flashes of light and curtains of gray underneath that was some form of precipitation. Snow maybe. Rain. Hail. Sleet. I thought of postmen.

The hot springs were completely different. Most springs are holes in the ground with water bubbling out. These weren’t holes, they were large hills, formed in plateaus. In fact, it looked like someone was strip mining the hillsides for copper or some other colorful mineral.

Up close, there were the typical Yellowstone elevated wood walkways, and stairs. Lots of stairs. Going up. Up, up… up… the side of the tiered hillside. Committed to our vacation experienced, we began to ascend.

We were going against the flow. Everyone else was going down. We had just missed the lunch rush, I reasoned; or maybe these springs had an eruption schedule and we had just missed it. We continued to climb and I began to feel the lack of oxygen set in (we were close to 7,000 feet and I am a wimp). I felt like a salmon going upstream to breed, except I wasn’t in a breeding mood. It was getting dark, and those clouds over Montana were heading this way, and that thunder….

Oh. Uhoh. I realized why everyone else was leaving. Yep. Thunder, lightning, heavy rain (or snow), heading our way. And me, climbing to the top of a flat, bare, exposed plateau. Uh…. Who's afraid of a little lightning?

I was damned if I was going to travel this far, braving Mormons, bears, bison, and Japanese tourists, and miss this amazing sight over a little weather. We kept climbing. Two or three other naive… I mean hardy tourists were with us. We gave each other confidence. Pretty much false confidence based on shaky bravado, but hey… I couldn’t tell the difference.

The top had a little water in it. Amazing how little water this huge, mammoth hot spring put out. Hardly enough to water my lawn. But apparently, it had a lot of minerals in it and left them behind, causing a constant buildup that formed the plateaus, and gave them a nice red color. There were spots of green where it had begun to tarnish. Notice the mafia clouds.

A close up look shows the tiered nature of the springs and some of the water that was burbling and giggling down in little waterfalls.

We walked about half of the walkways, missing the best of the hot spring pools. How do I know this? Some of the people that were evacuating as we went in told us.

Large drops of rain fell on us as we wandered the high plateaus where nature was building its own strip mine. We ignored them, and were happy.

Later that day, as we drove south from Mammoth Hot Springs, our car was pelted with ping-pong sized hail.