Spent some time at Earthquake Lake near West Yellowstone. A ~7.5 earthquake that occurred in 1959 killed 28 people when 80 million tons of earth from a mountain collapsed and blocked the Madison River. Water quickly started to rise behind the blockage, creating a 190′ deep, six mile long lake. The lake is slowly leaking back to the Madison River, and in one or two centuries it is expected to be gone. Many dead tree trunks remain in the lake, providing a place for cormorants to perch at night.
Above, the collapsed mountain earth doesn’t look 50-years-old, except for the trees that have grown in the center of the picture. The picture below it is of the Madison River and Highway 287 looking north from the landslide.
An eagle surprised me when it flew by. Must have been perched nearby. The birds around me seemed to react to it. Didn’t get many pictures of birds. The mosquitoes kept me inside. The camp host said it rained all of June, making for a bad mosquito season.
A beautiful black bear also surprised me by running in front of my truck on the campground road. There were also sightings of a female moose and it’s calf, but I missed this.
The rains also brought lots of beautiful wildflowers.
