6 a.m. July 27-3 p.m. Aug 11
I was with an awesome group of people for more than two weeks in wild west.
Right now, staying at 3030 coffee shop, sorting thousands of pictures from the trip, I just feel like I took too many pictures because many of them are almost the same :P well, fabulous pictures are produced in this way though. :D
I can't believe that I am back to midwest now except the weather here is a little bit like in the Rocky mountains. Two weeks ago, everywhere was yellow because it was too dry. The grass was crispy. I am not sure the cows like crispy grass or not. Maybe the grass can be chips for them.
I am so glad that ICC offers the GEO/BIO field trip class. Last year, I went to Southwest with a bunch of people I didn't know at all and became good friends with them. This year, Rocky Mountains welcomed us. :)
I fell in love with those mountains and hiking which are absolutely breathtaking, even though I always imagined that we could die any second, any minute because of the volcano eruption. Nobody will know when the Yellowsone will erupt. If it did, that would be a huge disaster of the whole world. When the geology instructor said how big the caldera it was, I was shocked. Well, maybe I shouldn't have felt that since the disaster would be huge. Last summer, we climbed SP crater in Arizona, which is a small cinder cone. It was a tough hike.
The instructors said our group was so lucky because when we were on the way to the Yellowstone National Park, we saw an elk with huge antlers!!! Our bio professor Kristen got so excited at the moment because she had never seen one before. (If I remember right.) We saw tons of bisons later on. "Wow!! Bisons!!" this was how we felt at the first time. "Oh...bisons again." this was what we said on the second day. That was incredible to see bears, wolves, elk, bighorn sheep, mule deer, bison in the wildlife instead of zoo. OH..bears!
On Aug 7, the day we hiked Amphitheater Lake of Grant Teton, we met two black bears. It seemed like I was the only one to meet both of them. Maybe because it was my birthday? I wasted my birthday wish though, it was not getting eaten by a bear. One bear we saw was on the way to the lake. The baby bear was about 30 feet away. A half naked guy stood still on the path and clapping. His partner was taking pictures of the bear. Nobody talked. The bear walked across the path in front of them!!! A few of students and I was behind and realized that there was a bear. I didn't really have time to take out of my camera because it happened so fast! We didn't stay for a long time after the baby bear went up the hill because we didn't really want to meet his mom.
The second big baby bear showed up on our way down to the mountain. This one was just 15 feet away. Literally close enough. I could see his nose, ears, and eyes! I remembered to get picture of this creature this time. There was a family stopped before us and hikers were coming uphills. The bear just crossed the path and looked for food. I just couldn't belive what happened in the same day. Luckily, the bears didn't care about human. :) and their moms didn't show up. :))) which was really good.
The hiking on this trip was tough but the view around was absolutely gorgeous!!
I wish I could go to the field trip with ICC again, again, again, and again. Maybe I should become a professor? :P
School starts tomorrow!!CRAZY! Summer is too good to be wrapped up. To be honese, I am not ready for school, at all. Can I just say I have high altitude reaction and not going to school? :P Just kidding.
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