Day 12 - Earthquake

Today we drove back to the highway we came in on to find out about the earthquake.  We had driven through a valley with the Madison River flowing through.  We saw men fly fishing in the river.  It looked picture perfect but as we drove through the valley we saw a lake named Earthquake Lake and saw signs indicating a disaster had occurred in the peaceful valley.  We spent almost three hours driving and stopping at roadside info signs telling the whole story.

At 11:37 pm on August 17, 1959, one of the severest earthquakes recorded on the North American continent hit this peaceful valley.  Half of a 7,600 foot mountain came crashing down into the valley, bottling up the river, and causing a tidal wave to send a 20 foot wave of water down the valley where vacationers where staying in cabins and campgrounds.  Today one of those campgrounds is 100 feet under the new lake that was formed called Earthquake Lake.  We saw cabins that had been literally picked up and swept along the tidal wave of water and left down river.  With all this devastation, only 27 people were killed.  Most of them were camped at the campground that is under the waters of Earthquake Lake.  Part of that campground was in the direct path of the rock slide that occurred from the earthquake so some life was lost and those people were never recovered.  Now the valley has returned to the tranquility of before the quake.

Yellowstone sets in a earthquake zone and it is not uncommon for them to occur but they aren't the magnitude of the 1959 quake.  The last time we were in Yellowstone, there was an earthquake.  Kara and we were tent camping and we were awakened by the ground shaking.  We didn't realize that it was caused by an earthquake until we heard the news the next morning.

After we left the valley we returned to West Yellowstone by way of a road that cut across the very tiptop of a part of Idaho.  The trees are turning yellow and orange.   I'll post a picture and also of a huge ranch that we passed in Idaho.  The rest of the pictures I will post are from the earthquake.

When we got back to town, we picked up our lunch at McDonalds and ate back at our camper.  The McDonalds doesn't look like a regular one, so I took a picture and will post it as well.  We spent the rest of the afternoon being a tourist and shopping along the main street of West Yellowstone.  If we
saw one tee-shirt shop, we saw a dozen.  We ate supper at a very nice place called Madison
Crossing.  The restaurant along with some very nice shops is in an old school building.  The
atmosphere was great and the food was good as well.

Carol and Sandy overlooking Earthquake Lake.

We didn't go into the park today but will tomorrow.  It didn't rain today either.  The temperature got down to 32 degrees but we obeyed the rules and unhooked our water so the faucet didn't freeze.

West Yellowstone, Montana McDonalds

Beautiful ranch in Montana west of Yellowstone.

Fall trees in Idaho.